Prevention of Compassion Fatigue Louise Beck MSW LICSW

Prevention of Compassion Fatigue Louise Beck, MSW, LICSW Beck Cognitive Therapy Associates YAR 2016

Empathic Resonance • Key feature in caregiving relationships • Self compassion is essential in helping care givers thrive in their roles

What is Self-Compassion? • Mindfulness • Common humanity • Self kindness

LK Meditation • Training the mind to be more loving and compassionate • Dose dependent • Language, concentration and connection • Power of words

Signs of fatigue • Disturbed sleep • Avoiding thoughts and feelings associated with the situation • Distress, intrusive thoughts • Our attention wanders away from the person we’re suppose to care for • We become irritated or angry, sometimes even hateful, toward those we are caring for

Not a weakness, a sign of being human! • We all have our limits to how much vicarious suffering we can bear • When it’s too much we start resisting and we get fatigued

Typical advice we get to alleviate fatigue • • Exercise Attend workshops Work less Get supervision Delegate responsibility Spend time with friends Draw boundaries

What is the limitation of these strategies? • • They are important self care strategies Often motivated by self kindness But take place off the job So in the midst of suffering these strategies don’t help

Too much compassion? • Actually need more, but different, to alleviate caregiver fatigue

Letting go of Resistance • Mindfulness opposite of resistance • The wish that our moment to moment experience be other than it is • How do we know we are resisting? • What we resist, persists • Suffering = Pain x Resistance • What we can feel, we can heal

Compassion and Empathy • What is the difference? • Empathy involves emotional resonance, feeling the feelings of the other person • If just feeling the suffering of others without having the emotional resources to hold it • We will fight against it, and burn out • Compassion is empathy plus love • This is a positive emotion, an energizing emotion

Giving ourselves compassion • When we are experiencing empathic pain • As well as giving compassion to those we care about

Threat Defense System • We are both the attacker and the attacked • Cortisol released…emotionally painful and related to conditions like anxiety and depression • Reptiles and mammals • Mammalian care-giving system evolved • System triggered by 3 main factors • Warmth, soothing touch, gentle vocalizations

Jama, 2009 article • “Physicians with burnout who use self-care without self awareness may feel as though they are drowning and barely able to come up for air, whereas self-care with selfawareness is like learning to breath underwater. ”

Matthieu Ricard • Empathy without compassion • Empathy with compassion • https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=khj. Ps. V G-6 QA

Buddha: • “You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection. ”

Video • Empathy

When we are experiencing empathic pain • We give ourselves compassion • As well as compassion to those we care for • Otherwise become depleted and less able to give

Dali lama said (2000) • For someone to develop genuine compassion towards others, first he or she must have a basis upon which to cultivate compassion, and that basis is the ability to connect to one’s own feelings and to care for one’s own wellness…. • Caring for others requires caring for oneself

Practice: • Self-compassion for caregivers

Poem • Awakening Rights by Mark Nepo

Resource Guide • www. Centerfor. MSC. org Center for Mindful Self-Compassion • www. Mindful. Self. Compassion. org Chris Germer • www. Self-Compassion. org Kristen Neff • www. Matthieu. Ricard. org Matthieu Ricard • www. Beck. CTA. com Louise Beck, Amesbury, MA