This Isn’t Just Burnout — It’s Betrayal: When the System Drains the Ones Who Keep It Alive

Rooted in Black truth and offered to anyone brave enough to stay present.

You’re not burned out.

You’re spiritually bruised by a system that takes your light, your labor, and your loyalty — and repays it with silence, suspicion, or soft erasure.

If you’re Black, especially a woman or healing professional, this is likely deeper than fatigue.

This is betrayal.

And if you’re not Black — but you care, stay here. What follows isn’t an attack. It’s a portal. This is a space where truth will be spoken — and you’re invited to listen with your whole self.

Section 1: The Myth of Burnout

They’ll tell you to self-care your way through it.

Burnout, they say, is about overworking. About not having balance. About needing better boundaries.

But what if your exhaustion isn’t just about hours?

What if it’s about the constant emotional and spiritual gymnastics of existing in systems that were never designed to hold your brilliance safely?

You’re not just tired.

You’ve been carrying centuries of silence while being expected to heal everyone else’s wounds.

Section 2: The Mask We’re Expected to Wear

For many Black professionals — therapists, doctors, executives, educators — survival is performance.

Smile through the microaggressions. Soften your voice. Re-explain your expertise.

Do your job and unspoken emotional labor.

Be excellent but not intimidating. Be successful, but not proud. Be vocal, but never disruptive.

And the moment you name harm, you’re suddenly “aggressive,” “unprofessional,” or “not a good fit.”

That’s not burnout. That’s being slowly erased in plain sight.

Section 3: It’s Not Just Personal — It’s Patterned

This isn’t about one toxic workplace or a “bad supervisor.”

This is about how entire institutions use policy to punish presence — especially Black presence that doesn’t perform for comfort.

It shows up in:

• Licensing boards dragging investigations over nothing

• Corporate spaces labeling leadership as arrogance

• Wellness spaces that exploit your energy but ignore your pain

This is what we mean by state-enabled trauma.

This is what betrayal looks like when it wears a suit, signs checks, and quotes DEI.

Section 4: What We Can Do — And What We Won’t Do Anymore

We will rest — but not just to return to the same cycle.

We will speak — not for applause, but for liberation.

We will lead — not to be accepted, but to anchor.

This space — this blog — is here to name what others bury.

To say what many of us whisper privately, but live every day.

Closing Reflection:

If you’re Black and tired:

You’re not failing. You’re responding to a world that keeps asking for your magic but not your humanity.

If you’re not Black and you’re still reading:

This is what allyship looks like — not centering yourself, but staying present.

Healing is possible. But it starts with truth.

And truth lives here.

Author Bio:

Christina Rawls-Dolin, MS, LPC-S, LMHC, is a trauma therapist, sacred strategist, and founder of iPSYCHS.com. She writes for the ones the system underestimated — and still couldn’t erase.