Compassion fatigue is also known as a second-hand shock since it arises from helping those who are seriously traumatized or emotional under duress. Although it is sometimes referred to as burnout, it is a slightly different concept in that, it is highly treatable and less predictable plus its onset can be sudden while burnout emerges over time.
Compassion fatigue may portray either physical, mental, spiritual or emotional baggage.
Frequent symptoms of compassion fatigues are (Alkema et al., 2008):
Chronic physical and emotional exhaustion
Detachment within self and feeling like the world has become vague and less real
Having a difficult time when sleeping
Loss of body weight
Headache
Poor job satisfaction
In order to curb the risks of compassion fatigue, one needs to create a self-care plan to mitigate its occurrence
The first step of self-care starts by getting involved in self-monitoring and self-awareness activities to recognize changes in work, lifestyles outside the job and behaviours. Developing both formal and informal mentor relationships in one’s work environment can help in reducing compassion fatigue. Some of healthy practices that can be used to prevent compassion fatigue are:
Reducing stressful workloads. through acknowledging your limits and admitting you can’t do it all.
Monitoring sleep patterns. Sleeping for about seven hours a night helps in reducing mental illness and stress
Taking regular vacations. This will help in changing the working environment and the normal workload view.
Meditation. This helps in bringing calmness and physical relaxation even during a stressful moment
Seeking personal therapy to process work problems. Having someone to talk to help in reducing stressful moments since problems shared are somehow solved
Regular exercise getting involved in regular exercises have been proved to help the body maintain good shape hence ready to deal with the compassion fatigue
References
