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When Resilience Becomes a Liability: Resilience Training, Carers & Burnout

Writer: Tess Howells
Tess Howells
Sep 4
4 min read

Updated: Sep 5

I have noticed lately that several organisations are offering resilience training to their caregiving employees, or to the unpaid carers they support, to help them manage stress.


Resilience is valuable and highly regarded by society - we admire the nurse who agrees to do another shift, the parent who somehow finds the strength to keep giving, the social worker who takes on another case to an already overloaded caseload.


But when does resilience stop supporting us and start costing us?


How self-reflection can help carers reclaim their vital health.


Resilience is valued and admired, but for carers it can tip into endurance and over-functioning, keeping us going long after our bodies have started signalling distress.

This blog looks at where healthy resilience ends and the cost begins, why the people who burn out are often the ones who coped for too long, and why offering resilience training to already-resilient carers can miss the real problem: the load itself.


What is resilience?

Resilience is our capacity to adapt, recover and continue functioning in the face of setbacks and adversity. Healthy resilience doesn’t mean that we don’t get stressed or struggle at times.

It means that we can experience difficulty without becoming overwhelmed by it.

For health workers and carers, it can help us to:

  • cope with unexpected crises and unpredicted changes

  • recover emotional equilibrium after a challenging day

  • tolerate a degree of uncertainty

  • ask for help when we need it


When coping turns into carrying too much

The problem arises when “I can cope with this” becomes “I don’t know if I can keep doing this.”

Most carers are extremely good at functioning under pressure.

They keep pushing through despite feeling exhausted. They often become the person everyone else can depend upon. They manage one more crisis, one more appointment, one more sleepless night.

And eventually, resilience can become a kind of protective armour that:

  • stops us noticing our own needs

  • has us see exhaustion as something we must push through

  • can make us feel guilty or inadequate for asking for help

  • convinces us to put up with the demands, because “others have it worse” or we “can’t let people down”


Is it resilience, endurance or over-functioning?

Resilience is easily confused with endurance, and it can be disguised as over-functioning. The three can look the same from the outside, but they feel very different from the inside.

  • Resilience allows us to respond, recover, adapt and sometimes it allows us to say “enough”. Healthy resilience acknowledges, “This is difficult, but I have the resources to get through it.”

  • Endurance can keep us going indefinitely, even when the cost to our health and wellbeing is becoming too high. Unhealthy endurance might sound like: “I’m exhausted, but I just have to keep going” or “I don’t have time to look after myself.”

  • Over-functioning can become dangerous, because the very characteristics that make someone highly valued as a worker or carer - conscientiousness, responsibility, persistence, empathy, reliability and ability to cope - can enable us to remain in an unsustainable situation for far too long. And this can lead to serious health consequences.

The person who burns out may not be the person who couldn’t cope. 

They may actually be the person who coped for too long.


I recognise this pattern in myself

I certainly recognise this pattern in myself. I prided myself on being the one who had the highest client caseload, would still take on urgent clients, remain after hours, do my paperwork at home in my own time.

And people admired my ability to cope with so much pressure, and I gained the approval and acceptance I needed to feel good about myself.

This is why, in our Carer Fatigue and Burnout course and workshops, we address the origins of this over-functioning - the need to please, and the difficulty of setting healthy boundaries.

Sustainable caregiving isn’t about becoming better at carrying an impossible load.


What resilience training can unintentionally say to carers

When employers, often with the best of intentions, offer their staff or carers resilience training, they may be inadvertently communicating that an inability to cope with unsustainable demands is a personal failure.

But the research indicates that highly committed caregivers are already extraordinarily resilient.

They have survived high workloads, physical and emotional demands, resource shortages - all whilst being repeatedly exposed to the suffering of others.

It is their resilience that has enabled them to continue giving long after their nervous system has been signalling distress.

Burnout is not evidence that you failed at caring; often it is evidence of how long you succeeded at carrying too much.


If this resonates, my Carer Fatigue and Burnout course looks at where over-functioning comes from and how to set boundaries without the guilt.



Commonly Asked Questions About Resilience

What is the difference between resilience and endurance?

Resilience is the capacity to adapt, recover and keep functioning through setbacks, and it includes being able to say “enough”.

Endurance keeps us going indefinitely, even when the cost to our health and wellbeing has become too high.


Does resilience training prevent carer burnout?

Resilience training is usually offered with the best of intentions, but the problem is: highly committed carers are already extraordinarily resilient.

When the demands themselves are unsustainable, more resilience can simply help someone carry too much for longer.

Sustainable caregiving is not about getting better at carrying an impossible load.


Is burnout a sign that I’m not resilient enough?

No. In fact, it can be the opposite! A person who burns out is often a person who coped for too long.

Burnout is not evidence that you failed at caring; it is often evidence of how long you succeeded at carrying too much.



Where can I learn more about Thrive Positive Psychology?

For more information about stress, burnout, radical self-care and how to support yourself in your caregiving role, visit:



Or sign up for Tess' Carer Fatigue & Burnout Course. You can download a FREE preview here: https://www.thrivepositivepsychology.com.au/courses


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