One topic related to teaching librarianship that people write articles about from time to time is Bibliographic Instruction Burnout, an overview can be found in this article Burnout and the Academic Teaching Librarian.
Part of me finds the idea of studying burnout among librarians a little laughable, because compared to other things someone could be doing, it is a pretty cushy job. The hardest job I ever had was working in a Leggs pantyhose repackaging factory for a one summer. 8 hours a day of sorting little packages of pantyhose wasn’t fun. In comparison to that teaching 14 or 9 classes for the past couple weeks really isn’t that bad.
But it is easy to feel burntout when you’re teaching the same class with small variations three times a day, and when you have to do a bunch of public speaking it can be draining. The past couple of weeks were my busiest time of the semester, and towards the end of it I started feeling very tired. There are a few things I try to do to help myself feel less stressed. I try to remind myself that library instruction is very cyclical. Usually there are just a couple of months where things are really busy, and after that I can turn my attention to other projects. I also feel absolutely no guilt about vegging out as much as I can at home when I’m busy at work. I’ve spent a good portion of the past couple days in pajamas, knitting, and rereading a Harry Potter book. I bought myself some tiny silver skull and crossbones earrings. I feel much better now, and next week things are starting to wind down. I’m only teaching 3 or 4 classes, so I feel like I’m going to be able to start working on some of things that I’ve had to put on hold during the busy teaching season.