Counselor in Austin specializing in Burnout
When you’re dealing with burnout or compassion fatigue, you’re not getting the freedom to be you! You may start to be short with others around you and stop doing the things that you once loved (i.e. playing drums, cooking, making cool little crafty things for people). You may be second guessing yourself and feel like you don’t have anything left to give.
I’ve done a lot of work with people in the helping profession and I’ve been working in this field for awhile myself… we are the worst at this! It’s so easy to forget about ourselves because other people are our focus everyday. The problem is, when we forget about ourselves, we’re just not able to do anything for anyone anymore. The first step is recognizing it and naming it. Let’s take away the stigma and admit this is a thing that happens… burnout and compassion fatigue are real! As helpers, we need to be real about this and acknowledge that we need help too. Together, we can talk about all sorts of tools and grow from your current basket of tricks to see what’s been the most helpful in the past. You are the expert of you and we need to go backwards to see what went wrong, so you can start moving forward and make some changes.
If you’re wondering about whether or not you may be experiencing burnout or compassion fatigue, please take a look at an assessment called the ProQOL (Professional Quality of Life) assessment. This tool was created by B Hudnall Stamm (2009). You can get the test here or look below. What were you results? I’d like to hear from you… let’s break this stigma together!
