Yeah, burnout is something that takes months to recover and going back too soon will only worsen the symptoms.
Then again, it will be difficult to recover for the author even if they take half a year off as they have a major commitment to literally thousands of people looming over them. That's... not possible to relax knowing it's there when they come back.
So the only real solution I can see is for the author to come back, finnish the story and then take a year off. It is much better mentally once you have a clear end date, like clearly seeing the light getting bigger and bigger at the end of a tunnel.
But... the chances they might cut the story short just to finnish as quickly as possible are high. But I don't blame the author. So... liet's just be mentally prepared and forgive the author if that happens.
That's true too...my costumer offered me a chance to go on vacation, take a break from my project and I rejected cus I knew i'd just be staring at the screen, stressing out while I look at my wips.
There's really no winning it tbh, Idek what's a good solution, my own solution to art block was to keep drawing nonstop but everything falls apart if I take a 2 day break lmao.
Oh definitely, I won't be hating in the comments if it ever happens cus I super relate to what they're going through rn. It's just a really sad situation over all and I hope that fans would understand and won't harass the author/artist over it..
At that point, it's better if Author take a break for a year cus burnout is a bitch to deal with. Dealing with it myself rn on my own work and everyday the guilt eats me away.