Compassion Fatigue

Since you are entering a helping profession, we need to talk about Burnout and Compassion Fatigue.

According to the APA Dictionary of Psychology, burnout is defined as “physical, emotional or mental exhaustion, accompanied by decreased motivation, lowered performance and negative attitudes towards oneself and others.”^[1] Burnout is frequently associated with a stressful job, feeling like every day is a bad day, feeling hopeless, useless, and emotionally exhausted. Burnout usually develops over time due to persistent stress and can happen in any profession.^[2]

Further great information about burnout is a book called Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by authors Emily Nagoski, PhD and Amelia Nagoski, DMA. There is also a podcast with the authors about their book with Brene Brown entitled Unlocking Us.

In the helping professions, caregivers may experience a secondary traumatic stress called compassion fatigue. Compassion fatigue tends to have an acute onset as compared to burnout. It is a negative experience arising from dealing constantly with negative situations, and being preoccupied with clients’ needs or always hearing distressing stories.^[3] Helping professionals must engage compassionately and empathetically, utilizing their emotional energy to listen, connect, and guide clients. This can cause a caregiver to experience physical, emotional, and intellectual exhaustion as a result. There is a fine line between caring and caring too much. By paying attention to one’s own stress and practicing self care, caregivers can experience compassion satisfaction – the ability to receive pleasure, satisfaction, and gratification from caring – instead of fatigue. ^[4]

The following Helping Field Reflection is intended to help you contemplate what inspired you to enter a helping profession. You can type in your answers and then hit the blue arrow and follow the instructions to download it if you wish to save it. It might be useful to review it sometime in the future to remind yourself of how you felt initially on this journey, especially if you start to experience compassion fatigue at some point in your career.

The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health explains that the main symptoms of compassion fatigue include the following:

• • Feelings of helplessness and powerlessness in the face of patient suffering
  • Reduced feelings of empathy and sensitivity
  • Feeling overwhelmed and exhausted by work demands
  • Feeling detached, numb and emotionally disconnected
  • Loss of interest in activities you used to enjoy
  • Increased anxiety, sadness, anger and irritability
  • Difficulty concentrating and making decisions
  • Difficulty sleeping and sleep disturbances like nightmares
  • Physical symptoms like headaches, nausea, upset stomach and dizziness
  • Increased conflict in personal relationships
  • Neglect of your own self-care
  • Withdrawal and self-isolation
  • An increase in substance use as a form of self-medication^[5]

Burnout, Compassion Fatigue and Compassion Satisfaction Quiz

The Professional Quality of Life Measure (ProQOL 5.0) is intended for any helper – health care professionals, social service workers, teachers, emergency response, and so on – to understand the positive and negative aspects of helping and their ability to keep their own balance.^[6]  Burnout is a subscale on this measure, along with compassion fatigue and compassion satisfaction. The scoring instructions and interpretative information for these subscales are provided at the end of the measure. Check it out!

You can do the survey online here, or do a self-score using this pdf from the Professional Quality of Life website.

Are you surprised by your scores?

What do your scores mean to you?

What does this motivate you to pay attention to?

Take some time to watch this 17 minute TED Talk How to Manage Compassion Fatigue in Caregiving by Patricia Smith, founder of the Compassion Fatigue Awareness Project where you can find an abundance of more information on Compassion Fatigue.