Work Stress Anxiety | Burnout Prevention & Work Anxiety Help
Work Stress Anxiety is a dedicated podcast for high-achieving women seeking expert guidance on work stress, burnout prevention, and managing work anxiety. Hosted by Cheryl Paris, a clinical hypnotherapist and stress recovery coach, the show blends real stories, nervous system regulation techniques, and hypnotherapy for stress relief. Listeners learn to handle workplace stress, job insecurity stress, and toxic workplace dynamics while building emotional resilience and preventing burnout. Practical strategies for work-related stress recovery and improving work-life balance are covered in every episode, making it an essential resource for women facing workplace pressure.
The weekday podcast is for high-achieving women
If you're struggling with workplace anxiety, feeling emotionally drained, lying awake at 2:03 a.m. staring at the clock, replaying conversations, or wondering why your success feels so expensive now, you're in the right place.
Hosted by Cheryl Paris, Clinical Hypnotherapist and Stress Recovery Coach, this podcast helps high-achieving women understand work-related stress, prevent burnout, build emotional resilience, and recover from chronic workplace pressure.
Work Stress Anxiety uses metaphors, nervous system education, and real-world workplace examples to help high-achieving women make sense of stress, anxiety, and emotional exhaustion at work.
Through honest conversations with ordinary people you’d walk past in the street every day, Cheryl explores real stories, real struggles, and practical ways forward, without the motivational nonsense.
You'll get to learn practical strategies for:
• Work stress and workplace stress
• Work anxiety and anxiety at work
• Burnout prevention and burnout recovery
• Emotional exhaustion and nervous system overload
• Emotional resilience during difficult periods
• Stress recovery after prolonged pressure
• High-functioning anxiety
• Workplace conflict and investigations
• Toxic workplace cultures
• Setting boundaries without guilt
• Sleeping better when your mind won't switch off
• Coping with uncertainty, change, and job insecurity
Helping you understand what's really happening in your workplace mind, what's happening in your nervous system, and what you can do next.
ABGW stands for Awareness, Balance, Growth, and Win-Win Wellbeing.
Not pretending that a breathing exercise fixes your dysfunctional workplace.
None of that resilience theatre or so-called positivity.
Just practical support for high-achieving women who want to stop paying for their success with their health.
Shared stories are anonymised.
This podcast is for educational and reflective purposes only and does not constitute medical, psychological, legal, workplace, or professional advice.
Episodes
148 episodes
What Would Life Look Like Without Pressure? Discovering Life Without Work Anxiety
Why is work still hijacking my head when I've already logged off?Setting a boundary means nothing if it never changes what you do, and that single line can stop you in your tracks. Cheryl Paris is joined by Stephanie for a grounded conve...
Resentment Is Your Boundary Alarm Clock: Stopping Where Work Stress Gets Too Much
I'm shattered. Why is my brain still acting like the day isn't over?Praising burnout is quite a dangerous ordeal. When you’re the dependable one, the fixer, the person everyone relies on, it can look like strength right up until it start...
How High Achievers Stop Self-Sacrificing At Work: Creating Boundaries
Why does one honest boundary feel like a confession of guilt?If “being dependable” is your default, boundaries can feel like betrayal, even when you’re drowning. Cheryl Paris is joined by EMDR specialist Stephanie McCallister for a candi...
Burnout Resilience and Work Stress: The Pattern Hiding in The "Yes"
I closed the laptop. Apparently my brain didn't get the memo.You can be great at your job and still feel like you’re quietly unraveling. If you’ve ever thought, “I should be able to handle this by now,” while you lie awake replaying a co...
Work Stress: You Look Fine. So Why Does Resentment Feel So Heavy?
Resentment can feel ugly, but sometimes it’s your clearest signal that responsibility has started to blur. We share a personal moment that many high-functioning women will recognise: juggling work, study, and life, then getting a seemingly simp...
Work Stress and Work Anxiety: The Bedtime Work Anxiety Loop
Why does one small work message pull me straight back into pressure?Wellness advice is everywhere, but when you’re already tired and stretched thin, it can feel like the internet is yelling a thousand different fixes at you at once. Cher...
Work Stress: Reading Your Body's Work Anxiety Signals
Work is over, so why does it still feel like I'm in it?“I’m just stressed” can be true and still miss the point. When stress becomes the background noise of your life, it can start masking what your body is actually trying to tell you, e...
Work Stress Pattern Recognition | When Boundaries Keep Moving
I am tired of needing fresh proof that I am not a fraud.When high-achieving women keep renegotiating their work boundaries, it's not weakness—it's your nervous system anxiety trying to protect you. In this episode, Cheryl reveals why cap...
Work Stress Stays Home | Breaking the 'Always On' Anxiety Cycle
I’m exhausted. So why can’t my body just bloody switch off? You shut your laptop, but your nervous system stays wired. Tight jaw, shallow breathing, jumpiness at notifications—this is work stress that doesn't clock out. In thi...
Mistaking Burnout Signals for Failure | Work Stress & Nervous System Recovery
Feel like nothing ever goes right at work? High-functioning anxiety and burnout prevention start by recognising that "bad luck" might be your nervous system sending SOS signals. In this episode, Cheryl explores how high-achieving leaders mistak...
Burnout Recovery | Work Stress and Burnout Prevention Strategies for Women
Cheryl Paris discusses with Dr. Carla Caturia the silent expectations that fuel work stress and burnout. Tune in for three effective strategies to recalibrate your mindset, supporting sustainable progress and emotional resilience.Success...
When Perfectionism Anxiety Eats Your Identity | Burnout Prevention Strategies for Women
High standards or anxiety masquerading as ambition? Work stress & nervous system recovery expert Cheryl Paris sits down with Dr. Carla Caturia to untangle the achievement trap—that moment when ambition quietly becomes self-abandonment. Disc...
High-Functioning Anxiety | The Perfectionism Mask
You can look perfectly pulled together and still be running on empty. High-functioning anxiety is the silent cost high-achieving women pay: the pressure to appear calm, capable, and endlessly available while stress builds invisibly underneath. ...
Work Anxiety Peaks Sunday? | Nervous System Recovery Guide
That Sunday night panic isn't laziness—it's nervous system dysregulation. For high-achieving women, work anxiety peaks on Sunday evenings as your body senses the week ahead. Learn why this dread is actually valuable data, how nervous system awa...
Stop the Wrong Stress Battles | Work Burnout Prevention
Stress at work doesn’t just make you tired. It can quietly strip away your patience, your focus, and the parts of you that used to feel steady. We’re joined by clinical neuropsychologist Dr. Vanessa Labode-Richman, who shares a prac...
Resilience Trap: How Perfectionism Anxiety Becomes Burnout
Staying in a job that’s crushing you can look like grit from the outside, but inside it can feel like slow erosion. Cheryl sits down with Dr Vanessa Labode-Richman, a clinical neuropsychologist, to separate true resilience from unhealthy...
Brain Dollars: The Cost of Workplace Anxiety Management
Burnout recovery isn't just about rest—it's about re-entry. When you step back into work after time off (or take on a bigger role), your nervous system reads it as a threat. In this episode, we explain why your work anxiety spikes, show you the...
The Indispensable Trap | Manager Burnout & Nervous System Recovery
Burnout prevention for managers starts with recognising the trap. Leslie, a high-functioning manager, lies awake at 2:15 AM believing her team depends solely on her. Work stress expert Cheryl Paris reveals how the need to be indispensable creat...
Fear of Initiative at Work | High Functioning Anxiety in Leadership
Your team keeps checking in, avoiding decisions, waiting for permission. High-functioning anxiety isn't just yours—it's contagious. In this episode, Cheryl Paris and funeral director Jamie uncover why your burnout recovery starts by shifting yo...
Manage Workplace Anxiety | Stop the Constant Mental Work
Work anxiety management can become another full-time job—constant monitoring, techniques, and self-optimisation that keeps your nervous system locked in high alert. In this episode, we explore why high-functioning anxious women often miss the b...
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Your Body Says Panic, Your Mind Says Fine | Work Anxiety Explained
High-functioning anxiety often masquerades as productivity. Your body sends distress signals—tension, racing heart, exhaustion—while your mind insists you're fine and in control. With guest Elke Scholz, we explore why high-achieving women exper...
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Why Anxiety Strikes Without Warning | Work Stress Recovery Explained
Why does work anxiety feel like it appears out of nowhere? In this episode, Cheryl Paris talks with Elke Scholz about high-functioning anxiety, the difference between fear, stress, worry, and anxiety, and how your body uses the anxiety scale an...
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When Nothing You Do Is Good Enough | Work Stress & Perfectionism
High-functioning anxiety and perfectionism can make you feel like nothing your team does is ever good enough. But here's the truth: the problem isn't their work—it's your nervous system running on overdrive. Learn how burnout disguises itself a...
How to Reduce Work Stress by Trusting Your Team—Without Lowering Your Standards
If you’ve ever gone home and realised your mind is still “on shift,” you’ll relate to Ella. She’s a lead electrician on construction sites, responsible for ensuring safe and compliant work, and she has a strong team around her. However, she kee...
How Leaders Use Play To Cut Stress | Nervous System Reset
High-achieving women often push harder to manage stress—but what if the real stress recovery strategy is play? Join Cheryl Paris and Zander Phelps as they unpack why nervous system regulation through play isn't a distraction, it's a leadership ...
