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Burnout and chronic work stress
Residential burnout treatment in Spain
A licensed 28-day residential programme in the Málaga countryside, run by an English-speaking team, for exhaustion that rest no longer touches, particularly where the evening drink or the sleeping tablet has become part of getting through the week.
A private room as standard, a price published in full, and no referral fees paid to anyone for sending you here.
Checked for accuracy on 28 July 2026. Next review due July 2027. This page is general information about our programme and is not a substitute for advice about your own situation.
Burnout is treated at Sierra Recovery inside a 28-day residential programme in the Málaga countryside, published in full at £9,900, as a clinical programme rather than a rest cure. Rest alone does not resolve burnout, because what sustains it is a set of patterns: no boundaries, worth measured in output, perfectionism, and an identity fused with the role. Those are what the curriculum works on, alongside any drinking, sedative or stimulant use that has become part of managing the week. Sierra is a registered health centre authorised for addiction healthcare, not a psychiatric hospital or a wellness retreat. Below is what the programme actually involves and who it suits.
Programme
28 days residential
Published price
£9,900
Group work
3 sessions a day
Room
Private, as standard
Language
English throughout
Registration
N.I.C.A. 67331
What burnout actually is
Burnout is classified in ICD-11 as an occupational phenomenon rather than a medical condition, and it has three defining features: exhaustion that rest does not fix, mental distance from the job along with cynicism about it, and a collapse in the sense of being effective at anything. It arises specifically from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed.
That definition is more useful than it looks, because it locates the cause. Burnout is not a shortage of resilience in the person. It is a sustained mismatch between demand and capacity that went on too long. People do not burn out because they are weak. They burn out because they kept going, which is the opposite trait.
It matters clinically that burnout is distinguished from depression, because the treatments diverge. In depression the flatness is global and self-worth collapses across the whole of life. In burnout the exhaustion and cynicism are anchored to the work, at least at first, and someone can still find enjoyment elsewhere. Left long enough, though, burnout very often becomes depression, and by the time people reach residential treatment the two are frequently indistinguishable. Both are assessed here.
The stage most people are at when they call
Almost nobody arrives at the beginning. These are the markers, roughly in the order they appear.
| What you might notice | What it usually means |
|---|---|
| Working harder to achieve what used to be routine | Early compensation. The capacity has fallen and the effort is covering for it. |
| Sleeping and waking up unrefreshed, every day | Exhaustion that rest does not fix, which is the first of the three ICD-11 features. |
| Cynicism about work, colleagues or clients you used to care about | Depersonalisation. It is protective, and it is usually the feature families notice before the person does. |
| A drink to come down at the end of the day, every day | The most common route from burnout into dependence, and it escalates quietly because it looks like a reward. |
| Sleeping tablets to switch off, stimulants to switch on | The two-drug cycle. Each dose makes the other more necessary and both make the exhaustion worse. |
| Physical symptoms: chest tightness, gut problems, headaches, infections that linger | Chronic stress expressed physically. Real, and worth having medically assessed rather than dismissed. |
| Feeling that nothing you do makes a difference | Reduced professional efficacy, the third feature, and the point at which people usually consider leaving the field entirely. |
If several of those land, our short self-check takes under a minute and stores nothing.
Where the treatment actually happens
People ask for photographs before they ask about therapy, and they are right to. You are deciding whether you could live somewhere for a month. This is the place, not a stock library.
See the full gallery · how people get here.
Why a retreat is not the answer, and what is
The instinct with burnout is rest, and rest alone reliably fails. People take a fortnight off, feel better, return, and are back where they started within a month. That is not a failure of the holiday. It is evidence that the problem was never fatigue.
What produces burnout is a set of patterns: an inability to set boundaries, a sense of worth wholly contingent on output, perfectionism that makes delegation impossible, and an identity so fused with the role that stopping feels like disappearing. Those are all treatable, and none of them are treated by a spa. This is a working programme, not a rest cure, and the modules that matter most here are boundaries and decision-making, perfectionism and the inner critic, values, self-esteem, and self-care.
If alcohol or medication has become part of managing the week, that is treated at the same time rather than as a separate matter, because it will otherwise undo everything else.
What we are, and what we are not
Sierra Recovery is entered in the Registro Andaluz de Centros, Servicios y Establecimientos Sanitarios (the Andalusian register of health centres, services and establishments) under N.I.C.A. 67331, authorised by the Junta de Andalucía for the care unit atención sanitaria a drogodependientes (healthcare for drug dependency, authorised care unit U.71). That is a registered health centre with a supervised treatment residence, not a psychiatric hospital, not a detox unit, and not a wellness retreat. We treat burnout inside a residential addiction and dual diagnosis programme, which suits people whose exhaustion has been accompanied by drinking, prescribed sedatives or stimulants, or who need intensive structured psychological work rather than time off. You can check our registration yourself on the Junta's public register.
Where you are physically dependent on alcohol or a prescribed medication, a medically supervised withdrawal is completed in an appropriate medical setting before you arrive, billed separately.
Not sure whether this is burnout, depression or dependence?
It is very often more than one, and the assessment separates them before you commit to anything. It happens before you travel.
What a day here looks like
Structure is the treatment, not the container for it. A month of externally imposed rhythm is what breaks the pattern that a fortnight off cannot. This is the real timetable, Monday to Friday.
| Time | What happens |
|---|---|
| 08:00 | Breakfast, cooked by a Michelin-trained chef |
| 09:15 | Planning: the day is set out together |
| 10:30 | Process group, the harder one |
| 12:00 | Therapeutic group |
| 13:15 | Lunch |
| 14:30 | Psychoeducation, working through the curriculum |
| 16:00 | Group activity, often outdoors or with the horses |
| 18:30 | Dinner |
| 20:00 | Day closing, together |
Saturdays turn to holistic and body-based work. Sundays are a supervised excursion, because reconnecting with the world outside a clinic is part of the treatment rather than a break from it.
What the treatment actually involves
The programme runs Monday to Friday on a fixed structure, with Saturdays given to holistic and body-based work and Sundays to a supervised excursion. Rather than list therapy names, here is what each part of the week is for.
Three group sessions a day, five days a week
The day opens with a process group at 10:30, a second therapeutic group runs at midday, and a psychoeducation session follows lunch. A group activity fills the late afternoon and the day closes together in the evening. That is roughly fifteen structured group contacts a week, which is the part most people underestimate before they arrive and value most afterwards.
Groups are small, in English, and run by the clinical team. Hearing someone else describe your own thinking back to you does something that individual work cannot, and it is the fastest route out of the isolation that overwork builds.
A seventeen-module curriculum, not a rest cure
The psychoeducation strand moves through a fixed seventeen-module curriculum written by our clinical director. It is the core of what we call the Regulation Model, which is our adaptation of the PROMIS Clinics methodology to this centre rather than a model of our own invention. It covers skills training, communication styles, boundaries and decision-making, trigger recognition, self-esteem and self-concept, dual diagnosis, self-care and habits, emotions, crisis identification and management, suicide prevention, goals, grief, values, trauma and relapse, perfectionism, loneliness and isolation, and cross-addiction. Every module runs the same structure: check-in, theory, an experiential dynamic, shared reflection, and a commitment carried into the week.
The cognitive work uses the ABC model, the same structure that underpins cognitive behavioural approaches: the event, the belief you attach to it, and the consequence that follows. It is taught, practised, applied between sessions and reviewed, rather than talked about once.
Individual therapy alongside the group programme
One-to-one sessions run three times a week and are where the material that will not surface in a group gets worked. For most people that is the thing underneath the use rather than the use itself.
You are treated by the same small team throughout, in the same house. Nobody is handed between departments, and there is no rotation of therapists mid-stay.
Yoga, meditation and body-based work
Saturdays turn to holistic and body-based practice: yoga, meditation and mindfulness, breathwork, art, and time outdoors on the land. This is not decoration and it is not a spa timetable. Early recovery is a physiological event as much as a psychological one, and sleep, appetite and the ability to sit still are usually the first things to return.
The self-care and habits module runs alongside it, treating rest as a right rather than a reward and food as connection rather than control.
Equine therapy on working farmland
The horses live here, on the forty hectares around the house, and equine work is part of the working week. Horses respond to what you are actually feeling rather than what you say you are feeling, which is why the work reaches people who have learned to talk their way around a therapy session.
What happens when you go home
Aftercare is planned before you leave rather than mentioned on the last day. For clients returning to the UK, care continues online or in person at the PROMIS clinics in London, with a weekly session for a full year, more than 48 in the twelve months after discharge, and a written handover to your GP so nothing has to be explained from scratch. For clients elsewhere in Europe we arrange continuity online and help find local services.
Alongside that, mutual-aid groups are free, run everywhere, and are worth using whatever else you choose.
Who will actually treat you
A small team, in one house, in English. You are not handed between departments and there is no rotation of therapists halfway through your stay.
Nerea Encinas Sánchez
Director · General Health Psychologist
MSc General Health Psychology. Leads clinical standards, the assessment you have before you travel, and admissions.
Berenice Paramés Jones
General Health Psychologist
Individual and group psychological work inside the house, crisis follow-up and coordination of the group programme.
Marta Leal
Social worker
Family mediation, links to services back home, and preparing for independent life after discharge.
Robin Lefever
Founder of Sierra Recovery; MD, PROMIS Clinics UK
Founder of Sierra Recovery and Managing Director of PROMIS Clinics, whose method this programme adapts. PROMIS has been treating addiction in the United Kingdom since the mid-1980s, and Robin has worked in addiction treatment for around 35 years, with thousands of patients treated with the PROMIS method in the United Kingdom.
Meet the whole clinical team and their qualifications.
What is treated, and what that looks like day to day
| What you arrive with | How it is worked |
|---|---|
| Exhaustion | Fixed sleep and wake times, meals cooked by a Michelin-trained chef, daily activity outdoors. The first week is often mostly sleep and that is expected rather than treated as disengagement. |
| No boundaries | The boundaries and decision-making module, and the communication styles module. Practised in group rather than agreed to in principle, because saying no is a skill and not an intention. |
| Perfectionism | The perfectionism and inner critic module, plus ABC work on the belief that output and worth are the same thing. |
| Identity fused with the role | The values module and the life wheel. Rebuilding a sense of self that survives not working is the piece that determines whether the return lasts. |
| Alcohol or sedatives | Treated in the same programme rather than referred out. See alcohol and prescription medication. |
| Depression underneath | Assessed properly, because the two overlap heavily by the time people reach residential care. See depression. |
| The return to work | Planned during the stay rather than left to the last day, including what would have to be different for the same thing not to happen again. |
Treatment options for burnout, and how they compare
Residential rehab is one treatment option among several, and it is not automatically the right one. Being straight about that is more useful to you than a page that pretends otherwise.
| Option | What it involves, and who it suits |
|---|---|
| Medical detox | Required only where there is physical dependence on alcohol or a prescribed medication. |
| Residential rehab inpatient treatment | Living at the centre for the whole programme. It suits exhaustion that rest has stopped touching, particularly where alcohol or sedatives have become part of getting through the week. |
| Outpatient treatment day programmes and therapy sessions | Attending sessions and going home between them. Appropriate where the work situation can be changed and there is capacity to do therapy alongside it. |
| Community and NHS services | Free local drug and alcohol treatment services, reached through your GP or by self-referral. Waiting times vary and residential placements are rationed, but the support is real and it costs nothing. For many people this is the right first step rather than a lesser one. |
| Mutual aid and support groups | Free peer support meeting in person and online, everywhere, with no waiting list and no cost. Worth using alongside whatever else you choose rather than instead of it. |
A treatment plan should be built around your circumstances. If an outpatient or community route fits you better, we will say so at assessment and we will not charge you for the conversation.
The therapies used, in plain terms
Every centre lists the same acronyms, so here is what each one actually is and where it appears in the week.
| Therapy | What it is, and when you would meet it here |
|---|---|
| Cognitive behavioural therapy CBT, and the related REBT | Evidence-based work on the link between an event, the belief you attach to it and what you then do. Taught through the ABC model in psychoeducation, practised in group therapy and applied between sessions. It is the backbone of the cognitive work rather than an optional extra. |
| Acceptance and commitment therapy ACT | Learning to have a difficult feeling without having to act on it, and choosing behaviour by your values instead. Module eight, on emotions, is built on it. |
| Dialectical behaviour therapy DBT | Distress tolerance, emotional regulation and interpersonal skills, used where emotions arrive faster and larger than they can be managed. See DBT. |
| EMDR | A structured trauma therapy, used where trauma is driving the use and always after stabilisation rather than before it. See EMDR. |
| Group therapy | Three group sessions a day, five days a week: a process group, a therapeutic group and psychoeducation. It is the largest single component of the treatment programme. See group therapy. |
| Individual therapy one-to-one counselling | Three therapy sessions a week with the same clinician throughout, where material that will not surface in a group gets worked. |
| Family therapy | Offered where it is wanted, in person or online, because the people around you are part of what happens next. See the family programme. |
| Motivational interviewing | Used throughout rather than booked as a session. It is the stance the team takes: working with your reasons for change rather than arguing you into someone else’s. |
| Holistic therapies | Yoga, mindfulness and meditation, breathwork, art and equine work, on Saturdays and through the week. See equine therapy and all our therapies. |
Every element above is delivered by the clinical team as part of the residential programme. Your treatment plan sets out which of them apply to you, and it is reviewed during the stay rather than fixed on day one.
Where else to get help, free
Not everyone needs residential rehab, and nobody should be waiting on a private programme before they get any support at all. Everything below is free, and none of these organisations pays or receives a fee from us.
| Organisation | What they do |
|---|---|
| NHS talking therapies | Free psychological therapy for anxiety and depression in England, available by self-referral without going through your GP first. |
| Mind | Mental health information, advocacy and local services across England and Wales. |
| Samaritans | Free and confidential, 24 hours a day on 116 123, for anyone struggling to cope or having thoughts of suicide. |
| NHS drug and alcohol services | Free local treatment services, reached through your GP or by self-referral. The usual starting point for community-based drug and alcohol treatment. |
| We Are With You | Free, confidential support for drug, alcohol and mental health problems, in person in many areas and by webchat. |
| Adfam | Support and information for families and friends affected by someone else’s drug, alcohol or gambling use. |
Sierra Recovery neither pays nor accepts referral fees, so nothing on this list depends on where you go. If a free or community service is the right fit for you, use it.
How to get ready
- Compare on licence, not on photographsAsk any centre abroad for its registration number and the register it sits on, then look it up yourself. Ours is N.I.C.A. 67331 on the Junta de Andalucía register.
- Get the medical picture togetherCurrent medications, any previous withdrawal, and any diagnosed conditions. This is what the pre-travel assessment needs, and it is what decides whether a detox is required first.
- Ask what the price actually includesOurs is published: private room, meals, the core therapy programme, and a year of weekly UK aftercare, with medical, psychiatric, laboratory and hospital costs quoted separately. You get an itemised written quotation before admission.
- Sort the work conversation before you fly, not duringWhatever the arrangement is, sick leave, annual leave or a negotiated absence, having it settled means the month is not spent managing email in secret. Half-attending does not work.
- Be honest about the drinking and the tabletsThis is the part senior professionals most often minimise. It determines whether a medically supervised withdrawal is needed first and it very often explains why nothing else has helped.
How Sierra compares with a retreat or private clinic at home
| What you get | Sierra Recovery | Typical private residential clinic |
|---|---|---|
| 28-day residential programme | GBP 9,900, published in full | UK GBP 12,000–GBP 40,000 · Australia A$30,000–A$50,000 |
| Structured clinical programme, not a rest cure | Three group sessions a day, five days a week | Wellness retreats offer rest and activities, not treatment |
| Alcohol or medication dependence treated at the same time | Yes, in the same programme | Usually out of scope for a retreat |
| Your own private room | Included as standard | Often an upgrade |
| Referral fees paid to third parties | None | Common |
| Distance from the phone, the office and the routine | Rural Andalucía | Usually close to home |
| Written itemised quotation before admission | Yes | Varies |
Comparison figures are the published ranges collected on our cost calculator: the United Kingdom at roughly £12,000 to £40,000 a month, Australia at roughly A$30,000 to A$50,000, and the United States at roughly $20,000 to $40,000 for a 30-day programme. New Zealand, South African and Canadian ranges are set out on the country cost guides. Indicative, not a quotation. Every clinic sets its own fees.
Confidentiality, when your position makes this difficult
Most people who come here for burnout are senior enough that being seen at a clinic at home is itself a risk. Treatment is confidential, the centre is a private farmhouse in rural Andalucía rather than a facility on a high street, and nothing is disclosed to anyone without your consent. If it would help to think through what to say to an employer, a board or a practice, that is part of discharge planning rather than something you are left to work out afterwards.
When is it time?
If rest has stopped restoring anything, if the evening drink has become the thing that ends the day, or if you have begun to think you may have to leave the profession entirely, that is enough. Burnout is one of the few conditions where the people most affected are the ones most likely to insist they are managing, and by the time it is obvious to everyone else it has usually been true for a year.
Talk to a clinician today
You will speak to our admissions team, all of them clinicians. Confidential, no obligation, and we will tell you honestly whether this programme fits or whether something closer to home would serve you better.
Questions people actually ask
Is burnout the same as depression?
No, though they overlap and one often becomes the other. Burnout is classified in ICD-11 as an occupational phenomenon with three features: exhaustion, mental distance and cynicism about the job, and a collapse in professional efficacy. Depression is global rather than anchored to work. By the time someone reaches residential treatment the two are frequently present together, which is why both are assessed properly here.
Will four weeks of rest fix it?
Rest alone reliably fails, which is why people return from a fortnight off and are back where they started within a month. What produces burnout is a set of patterns: no boundaries, worth measured in output, perfectionism, and an identity fused with the role. Those need treating. This is a working programme, not a rest cure.
I am drinking to switch off in the evenings. Does that count as a problem?
It is the most common route from burnout into dependence, and it escalates quietly because it looks like a reward rather than a habit. Whether it currently meets a threshold matters less than whether it is now load-bearing. If the evening does not end without it, that is worth assessing.
Is this a wellness retreat?
No. Sierra is a registered health centre authorised for addiction healthcare, and the programme is three structured group sessions a day, individual therapy three times a week and a seventeen-module curriculum. The holistic work on Saturdays is part of the treatment rather than the point of it.
Will my employer find out?
Only if you tell them. Treatment is confidential and nothing is disclosed to anyone without your consent. If it would help to plan what to say to an employer or a professional body, that is part of discharge planning.
How long is the programme and what does it cost?
It is a 28-day residential programme, published in full at GBP 9,900. That covers a private room, meals, the core therapy programme, and a year of weekly UK aftercare. Psychiatric, medical, laboratory and hospital detox costs are quoted separately. You get an itemised written quotation before admission.
How do I get help for burnout?
The first step towards recovery is an assessment, and ours is free and carries no obligation. You can also seek help through your GP, through a free local drug and alcohol treatment service, or through a mutual aid group, and none of those routes costs anything. If you want to talk it through with a clinician, call +44 1202 653136 and you will reach our admissions team.
What does burnout treatment involve, from start to finish?
The course of treatment runs in four stages. An assessment before you travel, which decides whether a medically supervised detox is needed first. Any detox, completed in an appropriate medical setting and billed separately. Then the 28-day residential treatment programme itself: three group therapy sessions a day, individual therapy three times a week and the seventeen-module curriculum. Then aftercare, agreed before you leave and continuing online or in person in London.
How much does burnout treatment cost, and what affects the price?
Sierra publishes a single figure: GBP 9,900 for the 28-day residential programme, with a private room included. What changes the total is whether you need a medically supervised detox, which is arranged and billed separately, and any medical, psychiatric or laboratory costs. Private residential rehab elsewhere commonly runs from around GBP 12,000 to GBP 40,000 a month in the United Kingdom and from roughly A$30,000 to A$50,000 in Australia. You get an itemised written quotation before admission, and we neither pay nor accept referral fees.
What are the signs and symptoms of burnout?
The three features in ICD-11 are exhaustion that rest does not fix, mental distance and cynicism about the job, and a collapse in the sense of being effective. Physical symptoms such as chest tightness, gut problems, headaches and infections that linger are common and worth having assessed medically.
Is lasting recovery from burnout actually possible?
Yes, and the evidence is better than the public conversation suggests. What predicts long-term recovery is not willpower but what is in place afterwards: continuing therapy, a treated mental health condition, a support network and a relapse plan that was written before it was needed. That is why completing burnout treatment matters less on its own than what follows it, and why aftercare is planned during the stay, so it is in place before you leave.
How can I help someone with burnout?
Start by getting support for yourself, because living alongside someone with an addiction is its own burden and Adfam and Al-Anon exist for exactly that. Beyond that: raise it when they are not intoxicated, be specific about what you have seen rather than general about what they are, and offer a concrete next step such as an assessment or a call to a free service. Ultimatums delivered in anger rarely work. We speak to families every day and that conversation costs nothing.
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Talk to a clinician today
You will speak to our admissions team, English-speaking clinicians who know the programme and the people in it. Callback within 24 hours.
Registered health centre. Authorised by the Junta de Andalucía, N.I.C.A. 67331.
