How Do Counselors Safeguard Their Mental Health and Maintain Their Wellness?

Counseling can be a very stressful profession.  Each client trusts us to be fully present and engaged with their struggles, losses, conflicts, difficult emotions, and crises.  Over time, counselors are at risk for experiencing vicarious trauma, secondary traumatic stress, burn out and compassion fatigue.  You may be able to relate because you too have a job that is stressful, in its own way.  I want to share what counselors do to safeguard mental health and maintain wellness. I hope these ideas charge up your own brainstorming for all the ways that you can recognize your own needs and create a tailored plan to meet them.

In the counseling culture, we read a lot and talk a lot about good self-care.   In graduate school, every course spends time addressing this in some way.  Self-care is one of our most critical mandates.  We think of self-care as all the small things that we can do every day, all day long, to manage our stress. We also realize that good self-care is a lifestyle.

First, let’s consider small, repeated acts of self-care.  As a counselor, I am supposed to be mindful of my physical and emotional needs throughout the day. 

These are some examples of meeting physical needs:

·      I should not get so busy that I forget to refill my water bottle or skip meals. 

·      I am supposed to remember how sedentary my job is and build solutions for that into my day. I find time or make time to hold yoga poses, take one brisk walk around the block, or choose stairs over the elevator.

·      For long days, I plan, cook, and refrigerate my meals ahead of time.  I know my meals will be delicious. Also, eating whole grains, antioxidants, healthy fats, and correct portions helps clear my brain fog and keeps me from feeling sleepy between 2 and 3pm.

·      I keep mixed nuts at my desk, so I can grab a nutrient rich, protein snack with good fats, if I need it.

Here are a few ways that counselors use self-care to meet their emotional needs:

·      I check in with myself here and there, all day long, to recognize my thoughts and emotions.  It helps to be aware of them and to process those.

·      I manage my stress with slow, deep breaths and micro doses of meditation throughout the day, just to help me clear my mind and release my stress.

·      When there’s something weighing on my mind, I talk it out into a voice memo.  I can review that later, or just erase it.

·      When we are under stress, we tend to hold muscle tension.  The sensation of low grade, but chronic tension can be very subtle, until we’ve been holding it long enough to be stiff or achy.  I know that I clench my jaw and brace my back muscles.  During the day, I do a mental scan to see if I have been holding tension without noticing.  I focus on releasing all the expression and tension from my face and jaw.  I blow up my cheeks like a puffer fish to help me relax my face muscles completely.  For my back, I rest into a child’s pose or do a quick knee hug.

Now let’s consider self-care as something we can incorporate into our lifestyle:

When I am working from home, counseling online can be socially isolating. When I’m not paying attention, that sense of isolation builds up. So, I do things like:

·      Call my mom, so we can talk while I’m making dinner.

·      I schedule lunch with a friend one time per week.

·      I don’t let my weekend get swallowed up by all the jobs and chores that need to be done to just to run my household. I make sure that we have fun family time and/or social time, however big or small, every weekend.

I love my job and I have a passion for helping others. The work I do to develop my skills and my practice is deeply meaningful and interesting to me. It’s easy to focus on work, and to put in however much time and energy it takes. Even when that is at the expense of having a full life.  

Every so often I take stock and give myself a report card grade on how healthy and balanced my life is.  I ask myself:

·      Have I been doing the maintenance work of nurturing my most important relationships?  When I name the top three people who add the most to my life, I ask, “How many times have I spent time with them, had a conversation or shared a meal with them in the last two weeks?”

·      Part of being a parent is telling my kids what they need to do and explaining how to do things. This includes monitoring their grades, chores and other responsibilities. Has that become the predominant part off our conversations?  How much conversation has about their friends, interests, and lives?

·      The same can be said for a spouse.  What is the ratio of time spent talking about the business aspects of running a family (finances, scheduling, completing chores and job sharing) and the time spent sharing experiences, talking about our dreams, unwinding together, or sharing some laughs?

·      Has my family slipped into a rut where all the members are running on parallel tracks?  Are we spending quantity and quality time together?

·      Do I finish work, eat something (or not) and fall into bed, exhausted?

When I answer yes to any of these questions, the follow up question is always, “What am I going to do about that?”

I hope this was helpful. Looking at my challenges may be a way to start thinking about your own challenges and your own possible solutions. I hope you will incorporate acts of self-care to improve your quality of life and your longevity.

If you need help managing your stress or help making changes toward a healthier, more balanced life, reach out.  Let’s connect and talk about how I can help.