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[engineer_adrift]

I'm 3 years and 6 months and 11 days into a 5 year chair hitch, and I'm fried.   This week had multiple major faculty family illnesses (brain tumor, among them), an announced faculty divorce, the usual annoyances, some unusual ones, and suddenly I don't want to go to work.  My emotional reservoir is drained.  There hadn't been much in it for a while, and now it is empty.

Does this happen to lots of chairs?  Anyone have a really effective coping strategy?  (Drinking seems to make it worse ... :) )

E_fried_A

[terpsichore]

Be kind to yourself. Schedule a few days break (maybe a long weekend) that takes you away from the job, away from e-mail and phone. While you're on your mini-vacation, think about what you really can and can't handle. What are the important parts and what are the essential parts of the job? (They are not necessarily the same list.) Try to find parts of the job you can dump or delegate. Try to get rid of as many tasks as possible that don't count as either important or essential.

You must find a way to care for yourself on an ongoing basis. Exercise, get enough rest, and eat well. It sounds like a cliche but these things really do help. Make sure not to neglect your own intellectual interests and growth (you don't say whether you are at a teaching or research oriented institution.)

Chairing a department is difficult and can be isolating. But it does have its emotional rewards when you accomplish something. Try to find those, even if they seem few and far between right now.

[fannie]

I have the burnout right now.  My internal monologue is saying,
"if someone wants a meeting with me, then I have to assume that that person is an idiot, because I only see idiots in meetings."

I defy you to fault my logic.

My gut response is to respond to everything that the dean asks for me with a request for more money.

I have found that doing something with students--as opposed to faculty--can replenish a little of my battery power.

It's odd.

[dr_strangelove]

So, that means you have 1 year, 5 months and 19 days left, right?

Yeah, I've been there. If your experience is like mine was, you're sort of near the emotional low point. But it will get better, and you will survive it. Before you know it, you're term will be up, and you'll be able to use those five glorious words, "Sorry, it's not my problem" again.

[pangoban]

I think it happens to virtually all chairs, at least those that take the job seriously.  I'd suggest some or all of the following, if you don't have a lot of holiday time due.
1. Go to your dean and ask for some leave for rest and recovery.  A decent chunk of time is needed: a month or two.  Appoint (or elect) a deputy chair, if you don't have one already, so that you don't have to dread coming back to a backlog of routine stuff.  It is in the dean's interest to get a good chair back in the saddle, not have a damaged one struggling with what is always a very tough job, even if the domestic front is quiet and happy.
2. If the dean has a heart of stone, call a dept. meeting and explain that you need to redistribute some of your responsibilities temporarily.  They don't need to know all the details of why this is the case.  If collegiality has any meaning, they should each agree to take on one thing for a limited and fixed period of time and the deputy chair should coordinate their efforts.  Asking for help is a sign of strength, not weakness.
3. If even that isn't possible, do the bare minimum.  Leave the office by 5 every day, and don't do admin in the evenings and weekends.  Go outside (if not raining) during your lunch hour so people can't grab you and so you get some fresh air and a reminder that life goes on outside your office door.
Good luck!