My Professional Work with Trauma

As part of my role, I assess clients that access the service that may have childhood and/or adult trauma and guide them onto a suitable therapy pathway. I also work with clients in therapy with the focus on common mental health difficulties such as a depression and anxiety who may have historical trauma.

I was drawn into this role not only because of the possibility of helping someone with their mental wellbeing but also my own drive and curiosity to learn more about mental health and how to improve my own mental wellbeing as well.

Compassion Fatigue, Vicarious Trauma and Secondary Trauma

Work as a Psychological Wellbeing Practitioner in the NHS is fast-paced and as no surprise, demand for NHS services is increasing despite staff shortages – this demand adds pressure to therapy services and to staff (House of Commons, 2021). Working with individuals who may have trauma can increase the likelihood of developing compassion fatigue (Sinclair et al., 2017), vicarious trauma and secondary trauma (Baird & Kracen, 2006). These can then result in reduced resilience or the reduced ability to adapt to the stressors of the job and can lead to burn out. Burn out in psychotherapists can also lead to staff sickness and have a negative impact on the quality of care given to clients that we psychotherapists are treating (Everall & Paulson, 2004; Laverdière et al., 2019).

Compassion fatigue is defined as a reduced ability to be empathetic towards someone who has disclosed a traumatic life event (Sinclair et al., 2017). Vicarious trauma is defined as “harmful changes that occur in professional’s views of themselves, others, and the world, as a result of exposure to the graphic and/or traumatic material of their client.” Secondary trauma is defined as “a set of psychological symptoms that mimic post-traumatic stress disorder, but is acquired through exposure to persons suffering the effects of trauma” (Baird & Kracen, 2006).

Increasing Resilience as a Professional

As a psychotherapist working with clients with trauma, it’s essential that there are resources available at work as an outlet if a particular conversation has affected me. For me this includes supervision, talking to a duty supervisor and even if it involves closing my computer for 2 mins and enjoying a cup of tea. However, I am aware that working as a psychotherapist there’s often internal stigma of disclosing difficulties that we are experiencing for the fear of being a failure or being unable to cope with the pressures of the role (George, 2016). I’ve seen personally how this fear has been a barrier to improving my own resilience. Therapy with occupation health has been a great outlet for myself to explore this more and build my resilience to increase my capacity to be compassionate both at work and in my personal life, despite exposure to both vicarious trauma and secondary trauma on a weekly basis.

References

Baird, K., & Kracen, A. C. (2006). Vicarious traumatization and secondary traumatic stress: A research synthesis∗. Counselling Psychology Quarterly, 19(2), 181–188. https://doi.org/10.1080/09515070600811899

Everall, R.D., & Paulson, B.L. (2004). Burnout and Secondary Traumatic Stress: Impact on Ethical Behaviour. Canadian Journal of Counselling and Psychotherapy, 28, 25-35.

George, M. S. (2016). Stress in NHS staff triggers defensive inward-focussing and an associated loss of connection with colleagues: This is reversed by Schwartz rounds. Journal of Compassionate Health Care, 3(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40639-016-0025-8

House of Commons. (2021). Workforce Burnout and resilience in the NHS and Social Care. Health and Social Care Committee. Retrieved October 1, 2022, from https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/6158/documents/68766/default/

Laverdière, O., Kealy, D., Ogrodniczuk, J. S., Chamberland, S., & Descôteaux, J. (2019). Psychotherapists’ professional quality of life. Traumatology, 25(3), 208–215. https://doi.org/10.1037/trm0000177

Sinclair, S., Raffin-Bouchal, S., Venturato, L., Mijovic-Kondejewski, J., & Smith-MacDonald, L. (2017). Compassion fatigue: A meta-narrative review of the healthcare literature. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 69, 9–24. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2017.01.003

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