Preventing Parental Burnout With Dr. Amber Gunner

Burnout is not just for corporate employees, business owners, or entrepreneurs. There is also parental burnout, mostly experienced by mothers who juggle responsibilities at home and at work. Yanet Borrego sits down with Dr. Amber Gunner, a woman on a mission to help moms avoid burnout and live a truly fulfilling life. She discusses the four signs of parental burnout and how to address them, as well as the immense power of embracing your authenticity. She explains why it is not impossible to build your dream career while being an amazing mother at the same time. Dr. Amber also opens up about her own battle with burnout, an experience that taught her the importance of getting parenting feedback straight from her children.

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Preventing Parental Burnout With Dr. Amber Gunner

In this episode, I have a super special guest with me, Dr. Amber Gunner. We are going to talk about a powerful, transformational, and very relatable topic. It’s one that I was telling Dr. Amber and I'm struggling with. This topic is about burnout. Dr. Amber Gunner, I'm so excited to have you. How are you doing?

I am doing pretty good. I have had a busy few weeks and getting to a point when it's time for me to start slowing down as well. I'm happy to be here, have this conversation, and show everybody that we all have to navigate through this. It comes down to our practices, our honesty, our truth with ourselves, and then the willingness to trust that we can slow down.

I love that so much. To give the audience a quick introduction, Dr. Amber Gunner helps moms avoid burnout by building allies so they can continue their career success. As a mom of two, former corporate VP, and an amazing entrepreneur, she's sharing her journey through burnout. When we started this episode, I was telling Dr. Amber how exhausted I felt. Usually, when I introduce guests, I never stumble. That's not something to be impressed by. I am very fluid. I don't take it too seriously but, in this episode, I stumbled by introducing her so I had to start over.

I'm like, “Please forgive me because I'm exhausted.” She was holding space and saying, “Should we record this episode on a different day?” We both shared the value of integrity and honesty. We are going through also these moments when we need to rest and reset. We want to show up like that for all of you, audiences because we also go through these moments where we need to take a moment, reflect, and see what we need to nurture ourselves. Thank you so much for being here, Amber. I appreciate it.

Thank you so much for having me. I do appreciate you being willing to show up in that exhaustion and also acknowledging that you will rest after this. I'm going to hold you to that.

I have a client at 5:00 and I'm like, “From the end of this interview until 5:00, I'm going to rest.” I want to know and also all the audience to know about your journey. What was your journey of finding that purpose to serve women and moms in their burnout journey? What was your experience with burnout yourself? I cannot wait because I know this episode is going to be super juicy. Give us everything. This is no filter. This is raw. Let's go.

I love to tell this story because it continues to be a humbling experience. As an entrepreneur, a corporate VP, a doctor, and a mom, my story shows and illustrates that I am no different than what we are all navigating and struggling through. The difference was that I said, “I'll do it. I will be the one who helps moms see through this and find a way to continue their careers.” My journey started in about 2016, at the end of the year. In the same week that I found out I was having my second baby, I got laid off from my job.

That sent me into probably one of the darkest times that I've experienced depression to put it lightly. I was contemplating suicide. It was hard because I was pregnant and was aware of what the implications of that meant. I've been grateful that I spoke up. I told my husband at the time, “Something's going on. I need you to take me to the OB.” I was able to share with her how I was feeling and what I was going through. She ended up deciding to put me on some antidepressant medication that would be safe for me, as well as for the baby. I knew that I wanted to be here, I wanted to live, and I was having a hard time doing so.

Interestingly enough, getting off of those antidepressants became my goal because I knew it wasn't something that I wanted to have to stay on but I accepted the reality of where I was. That became my mission from the time that I found out I was pregnant and getting on those meds up until I had my baby. We hired a doula. Just because I was not working at the time, I was able to spend a lot of time at the gym. I love swimming. They say that swimming is good while you're pregnant. That was what I did. I swam 3 or 4 times a week. I met with this doula and that became my introduction to caring for my body.

With the things she was teaching me in addition to being on the medication and having some exercise, that became my time to focus on my mental health and mental wellness. I didn't see it as such at the time. I wanted to stay healthy and be able to have this baby. Thankfully I did. I had my son that summer. He was healthy.

I felt like a new woman. I had overcome this very dark time in my life. I jumped into work. I had this job where I was traveling for work. We'd hired a live-in nanny so she was taking care of the baby as well as my daughter. I was traveling. I was gone. I know the majority of what the nursing rooms in most airports look like because I was pumping in about every one of them. That was my life for a year.

Something happened. It dawned on me through a joke that I would tell when I would go, travel, and do these workshops because they were in-person workshops. I would tell them, “Thank you so much for having me. You all have had me here so I had a hot shower, a good night's rest, and my food while it was hot.” Naming all these things, they would laugh. We would do the workshop. It would be so much fun. I'd go back home for a little bit and then get back on the road. I did not realize that in telling that joke, I was identifying all the boundaries that I did not have in my life and in motherhood to help me feel safe, nourished, and rested on that journey.

I was running into work and from my past situation of giving birth to my son and going through that. I ran myself right into burnout. To give you an idea, in 1 year, I traveled to Hawaii 3 times and the Virgin Islands. That was some of my larger trips. I was at home for 4 or 5 days and then back out there again. Let me not forget that I was completing my dissertation and defending that so that I could graduate in time with my Doctorate. It was a lot unconsciously unaware of what was happening and going on. As that burnout started sinking in, I recognized that I needed some help.

I was someone who had been in therapy since I was eighteen so I felt exhausted with therapy. I felt like we'd reached the point that we needed to. I ended up getting into a year-and-a-half-long coaching program. Within that program, I had multiple different coaches but this type of environment was centered on women, helping them feel whole within who they are and what it is that they need.

Lo and behold, that would uncover so much stuff for me to have to deal with. I had one of my coaches. She was like, “You need to take care of yourself.” I was stunned by the question or her recommendation even because I didn't know what she meant by that or how to do that but it stuck with me so much that I started unearthing that.

The reason I went into working with moms and in this field or passion is because I discovered it. I recognized that we have been taught to take care of everything outside of us. We typically say, “I don't have time for me or to do the things that I want to do.” While that may very well be true, I recognized and figured out that when I made the time, reversed it, and took care of myself first, everything else worked itself out.

I see it with my clients all the time and some of them are moms. We also have this belief that we need to sacrifice ourselves to please others, which doesn't make any sense because we are the foundation. That's why in an airplane, you put your mask on first so you can help others. It is true. There is so much baggage from the past generationally that women have been carrying around of we need to over-give, over-commit, and over-please. We run this pattern of overdoing everything to make others feel better or take care of others.

Your journey is truly inspirational. It’s so empowering and healing to hear your story. I am super curious about this because I know my experience. When did you start realizing and do something about it? That gap can be years or months. I know what that has looked like for me. How was that for you like, “I need to do something about it,” and doing something about it?

There's an area of your life that's being affected. You go and seek support for that, and then it uncovers all these other things. I initially started getting coaching around my marriage and partnership. Like I have clients that come in, it's like, “It's them.” It’s like, “Let's look at you for a moment and see.” It's like that song, “It's me. I'm the problem.”

The outside is a projection of what's going on within ourselves. If you are in an abusive and toxic relationship, this is very different than what we are talking about. This is more about being empowered to take control.

Once I started receiving the coaching and we started looking at things, it was very clear that there were actions and things that I needed to take. I started doing it immediately. I had started repairing my family first. Not necessarily my partner but the relationship that I had with my mom and my dad was the very first step for me in that part of that journey. It was beautiful to see the growth of how I viewed family and my upbringing. Now, to be able to bring healing into that space so much so that my mom is one of my strongest allies and biggest cheerleaders.

People say all the time, “You're so lucky you have your mom.” That is very true. I also want people to know that that took healing and a lot of work on both sides. She had to be willing to lean in and do her work alongside me also doing mine. What it has created is this beautiful reciprocal relationship that extends beyond being mother and daughter.

That is what I'm most grateful for but had I not started looking at that and being willing to do that work, me solely continuing to blame her was not going to get us to where we are. I initially was looking at my partnership, my marriage that I was in, and it ended up unearthing the roots, the relationship with my mom and my dad bringing that into where we are.

That's very insightful because there is not a single person that I have worked with that one of the things that we worked on healing was the relationship with their parents. When I look back at the data, for whatever reason, the mom is the most common one. I can relate to that because my mom lives with me and my husband. We have been together most of my life. It was a process of letting go of that blame. The day I did that, I truly became empowered and took responsibility for my reality. That is so powerful, Amber. What were the signs of burnout? I'm deeply curious about that because I like to gather this information and compare it with mine.

I'll share with you the four top ones, especially as it relates to parents and moms. Some of them will be a little bit different based on work or life. In terms of when we're looking at parental burnout, we start with the exhaustion. Physical and emotional exhaustion is usually a big component of that burnout. The second thing we're going to look at is, in relation to our children, are we feeling detached and irritable? Those are two of the biggest signs that we are operating within burnout. The third thing is how pleasurable we are still finding our interactions with our children. Do we still do some of the things that used to help in bonding us?

A quick tip. If you can find things that you, as the parent and your child equally enjoy, that can support in decreasing those levels of burnout. Not only are you doing something that you enjoy but the child is also doing something that they enjoy and the two of you are doing it together. The last one that you want to look at is when people talk about, “I don't feel like myself or showing up in parenting in a way that I desire or how I've shown up in the past. I feel disconnected from that.” Those are usually the top four things that you want to be able to take a look at in terms of your burnout as it relates to being a parent.

What I love about this framework is it's for parents but it also applies to people who don't have kids. I'm like, “I feel that way.” Even with my relationship, I'm like, “Things that we both enjoy, got it.” I'm applying it to everything in my life while you are talking.

That's what I love about doing this work. My focus is on moms and parents, helping them to build allies. Something that always happens is those allies are like, “I needed this workshop as much as the mom or the parent that I'm here to support.” We all do.

Let's touch on something because we as human beings tend to compare. Some people are like, “You should work four days a week.” There are people like, “If you have a business, you should work seven days a week.” From my perspective, there is not a black or white method to this. It's you trusting your body because every person can be so different. How do you approach this when people are like, “I'm feeling tired but it's not that I've been working fifteen hours a day. Why is this happening to me?” How do you approach that when people are like, “Maybe it doesn't make sense in my mind but my body's telling me I'm tired?”

Exhaustion mentally and physically is usually the first big indication. We have to have a relationship with our body to know what it is telling us and when we are pushing past our limits. Prior to burnout, I did not have those boundaries within myself. I wasn't aware enough of my body to even know. I don't run my life in a way that is like, “What is everybody saying that I should be doing?” I'm in tune with, “What are the things that I said I needed to do this week?” I measure that with how my body feels about what we've done so far and how much more it's able to do.

Create a relationship with your body to know what it is telling you and when you are pushing past your limits.

Part of that has been because I am a visionary. Truly, it starts with, “How do I see myself showing up in entrepreneurship, motherhood, and partnership? How do I see myself visually? How do I visualize that? How does that feel in my body?” I then measured that again. It's like I have my internal compass. If I know that reading to my kids, taking them to get ice cream, or taking them to the park are things that are important to me, and we haven't been able to do that lately, then what is it that is getting in the way of the vision that I hold for myself in motherhood? Is it that I'm spending too much time on my business? Is it that I haven't asked for enough support so that I can do some of those things?

They say that comparison is the thief of joy. I could see that because it's hard to compare yourself to somebody else because the circumstances are not going to be at all the same. The people and their needs are not the same. When we develop the ability to learn our body, be aware of what we're feeling, and then set that vision for what we want this to look and feel like, then that's how we can determine when we're pushing past our limits.

The beauty of coaching is guiding the individual in getting to know themselves and how to think by themselves rather than telling them what to think or what method they should or not follow. It is all about trusting their body, intuition, and transformation. It's beautiful that you are working on this space. I'm not a mom yet but I want to be soon.

Sometimes I'm working on my business and honestly, I'm tired so I'm communicating what I feel. I imagine that I have a daughter or a son. I want you to tell me your experience or what you have seen. How can you show up in an empathetic and compassionate way towards yourself and give the best to your kids when you're feeling exhausted? How does that work? You tell me because I haven’t experienced that.

I am nodding because yes, it is often. You want to communicate your truth.

To your kids?

Always. What I do with them is I let them know, “Mommy has been working. I'm tired. I'm going to stop and get us some dinner. I'm then going to go and lay down for a little bit because I'm tired.” Typically with that, they will be so understanding. They will often say, “Mommy, do you need anything? Do you need a hug? Do you need us to bring you water? Do you need us to rub your feet?” It's like, “No, I don't need any of that.” On occasion, I will say, “Yes, I need a hug,” depending on what it is.

It's being able to communicate with them that I am not always this mom that can take us to go get popsicles and do all these other things that sometimes I need to be able to rest and lay down. They honor it. They appreciate that I'm communicating it with them. The best thing that happens is that it gives them permission to also do and experience the same thing. My daughter will come home and she'll say, “Mom, I'm tired. Is it okay if I lay down for a little bit before I start my homework?” “Absolutely. Take care of yourself. Do what you need to do because I trust and I know that you will also get done the other things.”

As moms, we have to understand how much we model for them, which is why I'm doing the work that I do. Many moms will come to me exhausted. We'll start talking about self-care and get into that story of like, “Did you see this growing up?” It's a light-bulb moment. “No wonder I don't know how to do it or what it looks like because I haven't had that model,” which creates an opportunity for you to learn alongside your child, for you all to do this together, and for them to see you taking care of yourself.

It's all about us being able to communicate, being open to our children, seeing us be vulnerable, and seeing those aspects of us. Do they know that their mother is strong, accomplished, and beautiful? They know all of those things. They also know that I still get tired and cry. Sometimes I'm having a bad day. They create space for that which I'm grateful for. In that truth and communication create a bond and intimacy with our children that they can trust and respect. This is also a safe space for them to take care of their needs.

That is so powerful because I was listening to a podcast episode with Dr. Gabor Maté. Have you heard of him?

I haven't.

I'm going to send you this podcast episode. He also specializes in childhood development and he's amazing. He was talking about this book that a caregiver wrote. She was a caregiver who was giving care to people who were dying and were on their deathbeds. She talks about the five regrets of the people who were dying.

The third regret was, “I wish I had the courage to communicate my emotions.” The number one regret was, “I wish I had the courage to live an authentic life instead of the life others expected of me.” The work you are doing as a mom, you're such a role model because I feel such a relief of knowing that I can be also authentic with my kids and talk about how I feel. I'll be serving as an example to them to do the same in the future so they don't have those kinds of regrets.

I apologize often to my children and my co-parents. I am wonderful, great, and also imperfect in a lot of ways. I know and recognize that. I'm okay with that. I deeply have accepted that. I also accept that I can do better. There’s one of the hardest things that I do with my children. Moms, dads, and parents, try this but I'm warning you, it's difficult. I asked my children for their feedback on my parenting. They will tell you the truth.

They never lie. They do not filter.

You keep it together a little bit and say, “Thank you for your honesty. I'll be back. We're fine. I'm going to go cry.” It's such an amazing gauge. It's like, “If I know that I want to be the best parent that I can be, I need to ask the person who I'm parenting for feedback and how I'm doing.” I asked my daughter this a little bit before school started. I've been divorced for a few years.

In the beginning, I was very intentional about having these mommy-daughter dates, as well as having these mommy-son dates. I've asked my daughter, “How's mommy doing? What are some things that she could do better on?” My daughter's so sweet. She knows that I need the sandwich method for feedback and critiques. She said, “You’re doing a great job. You're an amazing mommy.” These are her words. She says, “But the one thing you could do better on is taking me on more mommy and daughter dates.”

I have a deadline, and I still have and it's coming up. I said, “Between now and Thanksgiving, I have to make sure that I take you on a mommy-daughter date. I’ll also take your brother on a mommy-son date.” She said, “Okay.” Since then, occasionally, she'll remind me and drop little hints like, “We could do this on our mommy and daughter date.”

That is so cute and hilarious. Accountability is right there.

I have experience as an educator and a mom so I get to see both sides of that. What happens is that the mom takes care of herself. She teaches her babies how to take care of themselves and then they teach their friends how to take care of themselves and how they want to be treated. To say that it's a trickle-down effect, it’s beyond that. We have the power to be able to change the generations that are to come by taking care of ourselves. How crazy is that?

Investing in myself was the best decision ever that I had ever taken. That's the biggest revolutionary act of self-love and self-worth. You talk about that having an experience in coaching, I feel so many people are at their deepest subconscious level. Maybe they're not aware of this but what I've found when I dig deeper with my clients is this feeling that they are not worthy of getting help, receiving the support, and investing in themselves.

Everything and everyone else is more important. I love my husband and I take all decisions with him but sometimes he needs to understand I need this for myself. When you invested in yourself, asked for help, or built your allies network, how did you overcome that feeling and you started believing, “I'm worthy of getting this help and support. I deserve this?” How was that journey for you?

Pain can be such a great teacher for us whether or not we truly want to accept that. As many have said, I was in pain and it was like, “How do I alleviate this?” I'd been familiar with therapy so I knew that as a modality. I am a self-help girly. In college, I was reading self-help books because I was so obsessed with feeling better. For me, I didn't necessarily see it as being something of having to be worthy of. It was like I was having a hangnail. It's a little irritant like, “I can't wait until this gets a little bit better or heals a little bit so that I can feel some relief.” That was what continued to drive me.

In 2022, I had a vision about what I'm doing with you here. Maybe not this exact thing but I knew that in this upcoming year, it was going to be time for me to start speaking my truth and telling my story. As a Black woman, it's still hard to talk about being suicidal and going through depression. I had to work with my coach. We had to uncover those layers of shame that I still had around my story. I had to see the value in being able to share this and how it could support other people. The cost went out the window because I could see that what I needed next was going to require me to embody and be a certain type of woman. This coach is going to help me in doing that.

The return when you invest in yourself in whatever it is, whether it's a coach, a course, or a book, is way higher than any investment. I agree. I love that piece of vulnerability so much because I've had thoughts in the past like, “If I'm too vulnerable with certain things, does that affect my credibility?” I've worked through it and I'm still working through it. There are many stories that I cannot wait to tell because no one would ever imagine me going through those things. The fact that you are doing it is such an inspiration to me and I'm sure many people reading. How did you feel when you started talking about that?

I have looked back at the way in which other people's stories have inspired me, from the greats of your know Michael Jordans to people that have gone through prison reform systems and all of those different things. I was hearing their story and how much it was able to inspire me but also normalize the experience that I was having. In that, I was able to find some action forward. It feels good to be sharing this. I get messages from moms all the time like, “Thank you so much for the work that you're doing. Thank you for sharing.” It's encouraging them as well to be able to share and open up.

As we know, things are shifting and changing. People are ready to drop the mask and be able to allow people to see who they are authentically. The more that happens, the more we see the oneness. Truly, we see how much more alike we are than different. More now than ever, we need to be able to see that so that we can come into community and allyship. Truly, when we start recognizing what our needs are, we are willing to be open, share our stories, and cultivate a community around us that can respect and honor our truth.

It's a lifelong journey of fully embodying and embracing your authenticity. We are like an onion. We are always healing and working through things. Being compassionate in the journey is super important as we keep up-leveling. Dr. Amber, you said something important. Start getting in touch with your body and building that awareness. If we have an audience and they're like, “Dr. Amber, I was like you but now, it's a blind spot. I'm not very in touch with my body. How do I become more aware? What is a practice that I can do every day to get in touch more with how I'm feeling or what's going on with my body,” what would you recommend?

I had a mom that I worked with. That was the very thing that we were talking about in our session, helping her become aware of how much she was living in her mind and thoughts. It’s the ability to be able to pause, do some breathing, and have that awareness that I'm intentionally dropping into my body. There are so many different exercises. You can wiggle your toes and fingers. You can visualize a light coming down from the top of your head through your body. There are so many different exercises that people can do.

The number one thing is the awareness and seeing the pattern of, “I'm living in these thoughts and that I'm not living in my body.” As we know from books and everything, our body stores so much of our past and even our trauma. It makes perfect sense that we would want to live up here because, to some degree, we may have had to do that to be able to get to this moment of where we are. Now that we are safe, we have to start reconnecting with that safety within our body.

Find some exercises that work for you, at the very least that you can be aware of. Start breathing, drop back into that, see what is coming up, and allow for that to happen because it will. From there, that becomes your guide of almost what is next to work on and heal based on trying to be present in your body and seeing how long you can stay there.

There is also this pattern and I used to run it back in 2014 until I had a panic or anxiety attack. That was a huge pattern interrupt for me to start listening more to my body. I used to run this pattern of tolerating pain until the pain became unbearable. I feel sometimes we have the other extreme of, “I'm aware of my body. I feel my intuition is communicating something but I'll keep going.”

Sometimes the voice gets louder because you're not listening until something happens, like an anxiety attack, a panic attack, depression, or suicidal thoughts. We didn't make that decision that was in alignment. We waited until it was a crisis or hit rock bottom. That's a pattern that I see often people running. They don't ask for help until they have hit rock bottom. I don't know if you experienced the same thing in your project.

That was part of what my journey was to be able to teach me. I had gone through that very traumatic experience and ran right back into work. I didn't want to face and deal with some of those things that caused the depression in the first place. Our pain will be our teacher and suffering is optional. We certainly can decide whether or not we want to continue repeating these patterns.

Pain is our teacher. Suffering is only optional.

It is as simple as a thought, a belief, and a choice to do something different that will relieve us of that. Still in yet, I find the awareness of it. I was running for a whole year traveling and having the best time ever or so I thought only to come back home and be worn down, be exhausted, and then go into having a marriage transition happen as a result of so many things. We want to make sure we stay aware of what is happening and be able to act on that, not having to allow the universe to sit us down in a way before we start making a change.

You have two beautiful kids, a daughter and a son. You have a lot going on in your life. You're pursuing this dream of being a full-time coach and an entrepreneur. A lot of people ask me this question, “Can women have it all?” Can you have your dream career as a full-time coach and be an amazing mom? Can you truly show off authentically in your relationships? What are your thoughts on that?

Absolutely.

It felt like that voice from heaven was like, “Yes, God is talking through Amber or something.”

The first thing is that you have to believe that you can have it all to even be able to experience and set it in motion for that to be able to happen. That's the first thing. I also think that there are seasons for everything. You are often being prepared for different seasons and chapters in your life. It's the understanding that at this moment, I have everything that I need to have here. That's where the deep level of acceptance comes in for me.

I have all these areas of my life that are going so well. I truly still desire partnership again. That is something that I'm actively working on, even with my coach around that. That would be an area of my life that I could say was missing but I don't see it as that. I see it as if I'm being prepared for that. In this space, I have all that I need and want here.

Everything happens in divine timing. I'm so excited for you. I agree with you. I had someone relatively close to me tell me, “What are you doing? You cannot make money doing what you love.” Sometimes people will project their stuff onto you. For the audience, it's truly important that you develop this belief, “It is possible for me. I can do it and have it all.” That's the mindset because that's the only way you’re going to get there, for sure.

We have a hard time receiving and accepting where we are. We continue to look to the future of all the things that we want to have and it is so hard to get to that future place without accepting and loving where you are. I don't care what the circumstance looks like, being able to accept it so that you can then begin to change it. As we run away from it or we're trying to run towards something else and we haven't accepted where we are here, it makes it that much harder to call those future things into being right now.

People want a partnership to feel loved and the right promotion to feel abundant. They don't want the thing. They want how they think they're going to feel afterward. You’re in control of those feelings. You can feel abundant, loved, amazing, and peaceful already. That draws the outcome that you want superfast to you because you are being the effect and the thing that you want to be without knowing.

That takes time within and of itself. I remember when I first heard that concept, it was like, “What do you mean I can feel that now?” It's funny because truly everything is accessible to me and what I desire to feel. As you and I both know, it takes time for those things to happen in the material world or its physical form and I struggled with that.

I often tell myself, “Amber, it takes nine full months, not a month missed, for you to have this healthy baby here. It’s a long time for that to come to fruition. With that, this very thing that you are thinking or wanting, are you allowing it to go through the phases, seasons, and things that it needs to go through to be prepared to be here and be healthy?” When I ask myself that, it helps to bring me back here. I can say that I can accept, enjoy, and love what it is that I have.

I'm going to remember that for the rest of the day while I rest after this interview. I'm so excited that we finally made this happen, funny enough for those reading. I had a minor accident with a dog bite so we had to reschedule the interview. For me, it was such a reminder to rest because I did something that was not common sense, which means that I'm exhausted mentally.

I needed to do this because I'm hearing from you, Dr. Amber, exactly what I needed to hear. I'm so grateful that we got to connect and add so much value to the readers through your stories. For someone who is struggling with burnout or in this journey, what is one last recommendation or thought that you want them to know?

One of the things that I'm seeing, especially in building allies is first, we have to believe that people truly want to help us. The second thing to that is that we have to be able to receive that. That sometimes can be very hard because of how we may view motherhood or our beliefs around entrepreneurship or whatever it may be that gets in the way of us receiving that. I can tell you, people want to help you. They want to support you in motherhood and parenthood. They want to support you in your business.

It's important that we also seek how we can be of service and reciprocate that help. Maybe not even to the same person, maybe to somebody else. They talk about those random acts of kindness but truly allyship for me and with my community, I want to understand what you need as well, acknowledge, and accept your help, and then also be able to support you.

People want to help you. Seek how you can be of service and reciprocate that help.

I'm going to take that in too. Asking for help and receiving is such an important topic that I see even in my clients, like a lot of resistance towards and it's deeply subconscious. If our audience is like, “I resonate with all your stories and the concept, Dr. Amber,” how can they connect with you? Tell us about your social media, your website, and anything that you want us to know.

I would love for you all to connect with me on my website. You can find me at www.AmberGunner.com. I'm also on social @DrAmberGunner. Please let me know if you as a mom or a parent would like to work together one-on-one. We also have workshops available. Please bring your allies as well so that they can learn what your needs are and you can also learn what their needs are.

Connect with Dr. Amber. She has amazing content and I highly recommend her. Thank you so much for being here with us. I deeply appreciate it.

What do you feel like has stood out for you the most?

It’s listening to my body even more. I have a deep connection with my body and I know when it's asking for help but burnout can be sometimes sneaky. When you're an entrepreneur, you have so much of an investment in your baby, which is a business. You want to serve in so many ways, create content that resonates, and think about your clients. It's so much giving that sometimes receiving sneaks out of your awareness. It's more of, “When I hear my body asking for rest, how can I honor that and allow space for that to happen without checking social media, my email, or anything? It’s just time for me.” That's the thing that has resonated the most because it's a thing that I'm going through.

What have you landed on is going to be your plan of action.

When I got bit accidentally, it was my fault, I promise. I had to reschedule our interview because I was in an emergency at that time. After that, I had three more meetings. I didn't have any coaching clients but I canceled all of my meetings to create that space. Even with that, I'm still feeling exhausted. After this interview, I'm going to rest more because that's the thing. It is not like, “I'll sleep one night well and rest,” and then you feel perfect. It's listening to your body after you listen to it for the first time.

My plan of action is to rest after this interview. Something that I thought was implementing this digital detox which is, before 7:00 AM and after 7:00 PM, I put my phone in airplane mode. That helped me so much to preserve my energy because I feel it's so easy to go on social media, scroll, and see everyone, “Everyone is achieving something. They probably think the same thing of me.” Social media detox is a huge one. Social media/email/everything related to digital detox. For me, at this moment, that's what I need. That's my main course of action for now. I’ll see how I feel and then keep iterating from there.

How can I support you in holding yourself accountable?

See me on social media. Dr. Amber is going to be like, “Let me check if Yanet is online.” I'm going to be in airplane mode before Dr. Amber messages me. I love my language. The social media thing and presence are going to be the biggest ones for me. Not that you're in my home and you can know but no TV and social media. What I appreciate from people is them saying, “How are you feeling?” That makes me feel so loved. Checking in would be a nice support.

I can certainly do that. Thank you for allowing me to be of support to you as well.

I'm receiving it all. Thank you so much. I appreciate you. To the audience, if you enjoyed this episode and there were tips or information that you were truly inspired by, share it with your friends and family. If you're a mom or not, it doesn't matter because, in the end, we are all allies and part of that village of people that we continue uplifting each other. That's the main mission.

Thank you so much for that. We need to remind ourselves even with everything that we have going on in the world, it is going to be us being able to support one another through it all.

Thank you so much. Thank you to all the audience. Thank you for reading. I'll see you next time.

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I want to invite you to my upcoming free and live masterclass, From Unworthy to Unstoppable. I'm going to teach you how to find the clarity, confidence, and courage to make your wildest dreams your reality. It's going to happen via Zoom on November 8th, 2023, Wednesday at 6:00 PM Central. I hope to see you there. Reserve your spot. It's free and live. Get ready to become unstoppable. I'll see you on November 8th, 2023.

Important Links

• Dr. Amber Gunner
• From Unworthy to Unstoppable

About Dr. Amber Gunner

Dr. Amber Gunner helps moms avoid burnout by building allies so they can continue their career success. As a mom of 2, former corporate VP, and now entrepreneur she is sharing her own journey through burnout.