The Hospital Fantasy: Burnout or an Invitation to Go Deeper?

Have you heard of the hospital fantasy?

Early on in my professional career as a therapist, I learned about the hospital fantasy from my clients.

Many of my clients (then and now) juggle multiple roles and responsibilities, including caregiving, careers, family, and personal health/mental health issues. They may also be approaching or in the midst of their pre-menopause through post-menopause years.

Can you relate?

Maybe your own life feels full to the brim and a part of you yearns to stop all the going and doing. But since that seems so difficult, or near impossible, you might find a few moments of relief by daydreaming about being admitted to a hospital. Once you’re there you’re not only forced to rest and recover, but you also get a “life reset” of sorts.

Of course, you know it’s a fantasy that likely won’t happen, but in some ways it’s comforting and momentarily eases feelings of burnout.*

In this post I’m diving into the hospital fantasy and focusing on:

• Telling the story of it: how the fantasy often plays out and related versions of it
• What’s often at the core of the daydream
• What I used to believe was the remedy to the fantasy (turns out I was wrong)
• How to work with the daydream to discover its personal wisdom and message

 

The story of the hospital fantasy: how it plays out.

You learn you have to be hospitalized. Perhaps you had a minor accident or maybe need simple surgery, preferably elective. Nothing terribly dangerous or worrisome, but enough to put you out of commission for a few days, or even a week, if you’re lucky.

In your fantasy, this is the kind of hospital that gives you the most excellent care. The staff is kind and attentive, making sure you’ve completed all necessary tests and followups before they give you the green light to go home.

During your time in the hospital, you’re free to rest and just be for a while. And when you return home, you feel remarkably replenished and renewed.

There are other versions of the hospital fantasy too.

For instance, maybe you wish you could get sick, not with a life-threatening illness but one that takes you out of your day-to-day routine for awhile. You spend your time recuperating on the couch, away from work and other obligations.

Or, there’s also the escape fantasy, wanting to run away to something different. Maybe you daydream about being a nomad, living close to nature, becoming a barista or some other kind of radical life shift.

Here’s what is frequently at the core of these daydreams.

When you start to delve into these fantasies, you realize they have a lot in common.

Often they show up when you feel anxious, overwhelmed, or burned out. Or life feels particularly complicated and hard.

They may also rise up when you have a sense that something’s missing in your life, but you’re not sure what it is. Or maybe you do know what it is, but making that change feels radical and risky. And because there is no easy answer to these complex life experiences, such daydreams and fantasies are tremendously compelling.

Of course, this dynamic is helped along by the fact that many women are taught from an early age (and role-modeled to) that other people’s needs are more important than their own. Also, women routinely carry a larger cognitive/mental load in their families and sometimes at work.

Furthermore, while much has been written recently about the need to stop, rest and reflect, workplace expectations haven’t quite caught up to that message.

No wonder women gravitate to the hospital fantasy; someone (I can’t remember who) once said that illness is the only form of accepted meditation in our society.

I used to believe taking time off was the remedy to the hospital fantasy (I was wrong).

While my clients might not be able to escape from it all, I thought my clients could probably take a day just for themselves. A whole day.

I figured that almost everyone could do that, even though it would require some advance planning and asking for help.

But I learned a lot from the responses I got. According to my clients, there were a bumper crop of reasons why it wouldn’t work…

• Things would fall apart.
• I wouldn’t get anything else done.
• It would be selfish.
• I’d fall behind and it would just make it harder to catch up.
• What would people think?

It turns out that a day off is just a band-aid when we’re talking about escape daydreams.

And I admit, not a very good band-aid at that.

We can’t fully understand or “fix” these fantasies by trying to reason through them because they are linked to the brain’s “default mode network.” This is where self-reflection, daydreaming, and creative thinking tend to happen.

On the other hand, cognitive reasoning tends to happen in the “executive network” of the brain.

The daydreamer in us isn’t much interested in the logic of taking a day off. It wants much more than that.

No wonder my clients reacted the way they did, feeling guilty, worrying about worst case scenarios, believing it would just be too hard to take time off.

No wonder the hospital fantasy or the escape fantasy seems more vivid and viable than a day off.

Perhaps that’s why we keep coming back to it, because some part of us knows our daydreams and fantasies have a life of their own, and need to be acknowledged in some way.

What the daydream often wants from you is to go deeper into it.

These fantasies and daydreams hold up a mirror to your unlived lives and the parts that are unclaimed.

They’re much like sleeping dreams, and if we dig deeper, we can discover insights and wisdom that we couldn’t have imagined just by looking at them on the surface.

One way you can begin allowing the fantasy or daydream to live is by writing it.

Not just writing about it, but writing “as if” you’re in it. In other words, using your imagination to carry on the story of your hospital fantasy or escape daydream, playing it out, including as much sensory detail as you can.

As you write your story, pay particular attention to these details.

• Scents, smells, and sounds
• Place, location, and the landscape you’re in
• What you see happening around you
• What you can touch and/or taste
• Other people that may be in the daydream or fantasy

Once you’re in the flow of writing, let your imagination lead the way.

Give yourself over to it. You might write just once about this daydream, or continue the story, adding other characters as you go along, if it seems like there’s more life in it.

At some point, as you’re reading your story, you will likely begin to better understand the wisdom embedded in your fantasy.

Personally, it always surprises me how wise this daydreaming part of my brain is.

Not long ago I found myself journaling about a daydream of escaping to live in a small town. (You might say that’s my version of the hospital fantasy.) And while I thought it was about one thing, it turned out to be about something altogether different…

I’m not tentative, I’m here. Here now. I go into a coffee house and I am known or at the very least acknowledged as someone who belongs here, a part of the community. We nod, smile, bonded together in this place we have in common, the love we have for this place. And when I walk down Main Street I feel at home. I am home.

The daydream metamorphosed into the opposite of escaping, didn’t it? And it gave me important insights into what I need right now that I may not have seen if I hadn’t done this writing. (Not to mention the added benefit of it calming my nervous system and boosting my mood.)

So give it a try, find the transformative wisdom in your fantasies and daydreams.

To do so is a brave, creative act, especially in a world that mostly considers daydreaming a waste of time. But even that might be changing, with more and more evidence that daydreaming is actually good for you.

By the way, if you’re a woman who’s approaching (or in) your midlife and beyond years and it feels like something’s missing…you’re who I created the Wisdom Tending Circle for.

JOIN THE WAITLIST and find out more about this creative and supportive women’s group that journeys through the archetypal energies and archetypal landscapes of midlife and beyond.

Before time – the dream was the birth of an intimate well of kindness, care and love in the world, dwelling in the tabernacle of the human heart.

-John O’Donahue

*Please note: If you have a hospital fantasy that is related to harming yourself in any way, it’s important to talk to someone immediately. It’s okay to ask for help, and you can contact your local suicide/crisis line.