Compassion Fatigue Solutions

I could have also posted a photo of my flooded basement, (thanks to a failed sump pump), but I thought wet drywall isn't a very inspiring image with which to close this year.

Please come back in January to visit the new Compassion Fatigue Solutions Bookstore which will go live in the second week of the new year. I will be adding materials to this bookstore during the coming months.

I will also be resuming doing interviews with helpers for the compassion fatigue book project. I had not anticipated getting as many speaking requests as I did in November and had to put this on hold temporarily.

If you are looking for professional development ideas for the coming months, keep in mind the March and June Train the trainer workshops as well as the May workshop for managers more info click here.

I hope the Christmas break will offer you some time to rest, read a good book and take midafternoon naps.

Warmly,

Françoise

Written by Leo Babauta, author of the Zen Habits Blog - Reprinted from www.zenhabits.net with permission

Your lives are always busy, I’m sure, but the holidays always seem to add even more craziness to everyone’s schedule. Christmas parties with family, friends and co-workers, gift shopping, decorating, Christmas pageants, caroling, bell-ringing, snow shoveling (unless you live on Guam like I do), making cookies, baking turkeys, and all the rest.
It’s enough to make you want to give up!

But it doesn’t have to be overwhelming. If you’re a busy person (and who isn’t these days?), I’ve compiled some of my favorite time-saving tips — things I use in my daily life that I’ve found to work wonders for freeing up the schedule.

Why use these tips? First, to keep yourself sane during busy times — we all tend to stress out when schedules are packed. But second, and just as importantly, to make time for what you think is most important. For me, that’s my family, my writing, and exercise. You might have other things you want to make time for. Here’s how to do it.

Tips for Work

Most of us spend the most time at work, so let’s start there. If you have a to-do list that’s a mile long — or worse yet, no to-do list at all — here’s what you can do:

1. Do less. This is my favorite productivity tip, as long-time readers know — simplify your schedule by doing fewer things but focusing on the important things. This will greatly increase the impact of the time you do work, decreasing the time you need to work. What about the tasks you don’t do? See the tips below for more on dealing with them.

2. Delegate. If a task needs to be done but is not one of your most important tasks, and it can be done by someone else, delegate it. Sometimes you can get rid of half your to-do list by finding others who can do the task as well or even better than you can.

3. Limit your workday (or adjust your hours). If you work more than 8 hours a day, by setting a limit of 8 hours you’ll force yourself to focus on getting the must-do tasks done within that limit. If you work 8 hours a day, try limiting yourself to 6 hours. You’ll find that you’ll prioritize, work more efficiently, and waste less time, so that you can get the work done within that time frame. I try to give myself a 4- or 5-hour window on most days. What if you can’t reduce your hours (maybe you’re required to work a certain number of hours)? See if you can shift your work hours either earlier or later than the rest of the crowd. That’ll reduce commute time if you don’t commute during the busy traffic hours, and if you work when almost no one else is in the office you can get tons more done.

4. Get the important stuff done early. Pick the top 2-3 things you need or want to accomplish today, and get those done first. While on other days you might push these important things back (and possibly not get them done at all), if you do them first the rest of your day will be gravy. In fact, if you have the freedom, you can sometimes even call it a day after you get the important stuff done — the rest can wait until tomorrow.

5. Ask your boss to re-prioritize for you. If you don’t have control over your schedule or to-do list, talk to your boss. Tell him you are trying to be more effective with your time, and you only have time for X number of things today (say, 3-4 things) … so ask him to pick those things for you. Tell him if you try to do everything today you’ll be less effective and may not get as many things done or do as good a job. This prioritizing is essentially what you’d do yourself (see the first tip) if you had the freedom.

6. Batch tasks. Instead of interspersing your work day with small tasks all mixed together, try to group similar tasks and do them at once. For example, instead of responding to emails throughout the day, batch them and do all your emails once (or twice) a day. Do all your paperwork at once. Make all phone calls in one batch. Do all errands at once. This grouping of tasks saves a lot of time and allows you to focus better on the important tasks.

7. Focus on one project and get it done. Instead of juggling a large number of projects, set aside a block of time to do one project until completion. For me, this often means setting aside half a day or a day (I try to break my projects down into manageable chunks) to work on a project, and I try to complete it if at all possible. Often this means getting all the resources and information you need beforehand, so you don’t have to look for it or wait on it when you’re ready to actually work on the project. This also means clearing my schedule, so I’ll get other tasks done beforehand and I won’t schedule anything else for that block of time. Then work on that project exclusively and try very hard to get it done. This, I’ve found, is often the most effective way to work on projects.

8. Avoid meetings. Not all meetings are a waste of time, but many are. If you spend a lot of time in meetings, but would rather be doing your actual work instead of listening to other people talk about things they could have sent you in an email, see if you can get out of some of those meetings. You’ll get a lot more done. Read more.

9. Avoid long conversations at work. We’ve all had long conversations with co-workers that were very unproductive — often not related to work or anything important. Sometimes they’re long phone conversations. And while I like conversing with other human beings as much as the next guy — it’s important to maintain good relationships and friendships — at the same time you could be spending that time doing other things. I personally would rather get all my work done and go home and spend time with my family. So I try to stay focused on work rather than having lots of long conversations, although I’ll make an exception now and then.

10. Learn to say no. This is crucial if you want to have a simplified schedule. We all receive numerous requests each day, and all of them are demands on our time. If we say “yes” to those requests, we are giving up our time and committing to doing something for someone else. But if those requests aren’t in line with our priorities, then we are usually biting off more than we want to chew. So learn to say “no” instead. Often this is uncomfortable, because we fear it means disappointing others. But learn to tell people that you just don’t have the time to commit to this right now, and often they’ll understand.

Time-saving Computer Tips

1. Disconnect when possible. This is my favorite computer tip. When I really want to focus on a task, and really get it done, I will disconnect from the Internet. Sometimes this means just closing my browser, other times it will mean disconnecting from my wireless network, and still other times I unplug the cord. However you do it, disconnecting from the Internet is a great way to get things done. Of course, you’ll eventually want to re-connect, but having blocks of time when you’re disconnected can be extremely productive.

2. Quicksilver or AutoHotkey. Quicksilver for Mac users, Autohotkey for PCs. I’ve used both an find them to be indispensable tools for getting things done efficiently. For example, we all have documents, programs, folders and websites we go to frequently — set up a hotkey to open them with a keystroke. It takes a little learning to figure out how to set these up (but you can Google tutorials), and to set up each hotkey might take a couple minutes. But once they’re set up, you’re lightning fast. You can go beyond these hotkeys for more powerful combinations, such as a hotkey to email something or resize a photo or do a thousand other things — I have probably a dozen or so I use regularly that save me hours when you add them all up over the course of a month.

3. Keyboard shortcuts for email. Similarly, your email program almost certainly has keyboard shortcuts, and if you’re not using them you should learn them. By using shortcuts for opening, sending, filing, searching and navigating through emails, you can work through a batch of emails in no time. And if you add shortcuts (via Quicksilver or AutoHotkey) for commonly used text or signatures, you can zip through your replies faster than I can go through a batch of Oreos.

4. Email filters. Let your email program do your work for you. I use Gmail filters, but programs such as Outlook or Mail.app, or what have you, all have similar filtering features. Learn to use them and set up filters for your most common emails. This will usually happen over time as you notice that you’re getting a lot of a certain type of email. For example, I get certain stats and financial reports relating to my work that I have labeled and filed by a filter, so that they never see the light of my inbox. Then I can always go and look in that label (or folder) to read those reports if I need to, but don’t need to read them when I go through my inbox. I also use filters to automatically delete emails from people who send me chain and joke emails (harsh, I know, but I get tired of those), and to file notifications from services like Facebook, Twitter, Paypal and other services.

5. Limit IM, Twitter, forums, other social stuff. You can spend all day chatting with others, or Twittering or going on online forums or social media. And while all of these tools have good uses, they can take up too much of your time if you let them. Set limits for yourself — say one hour a day to do all of these things, at a certain block of time in your schedule. You’ll have lots more time for the important tasks.

6. Stop worrying about filing. I’ve written about this before, of course, but I don’t really believe in filing anymore. Everything I do is digital these days, both online and on my computer’s hard drive. And I learned from Gmail that you can just archive something and search for it later without any problems (I’ve been doing this for two years with no problems finding things at all). So I do this with everything: files on my hard drive, documents in Google Docs and Spreadsheets, other types of online files. And my filing time has been reduced to almost zero — while I used to spend lots of time filing each day.

Tips for Home

1. Keep things clutter-free. I’m a big fan of clutter-free homes and workspaces, not only for their nicer aesthetics but because 1) it helps you to focus on what you’re doing instead of being distracted by visual clutter; 2) it’s more serene and relaxing; and 3) it saves time. How does it save time? It makes things easier to find, easier to clean, easier to navigate, and reduces wasted time reshuffling, sorting, looking through, and clearing away piles of clutter. Read more.

2. Keep things in their place. Similarly, having a “home” for everything saves time. You can have an uncluttered home but not know where anything belongs … instead, have a place for everything, and put things back in that place when you’re not using them. Make this a key habit in your life — when you’re done with something, put it back where it belongs. It takes a few seconds to do that, and saves time cleaning up later, looking for things (how many times have you lost something and searched long and hard for it?), and generally keeps things neater and uncluttered.

3. Teach kids to clean up after themselves. If you’re a parent, you know that keeping an uncluttered household isn’t easy when you have little rugrats running around making a mess every minute of the live-long day. Start your kids, from an early age, with the habit of cleaning up after themselves when they’re done playing. So let’s say they take out a bucket of building blocks and make a huge mess — that’s OK, but when they’re done, help them to pick everything up, put them in the bucket, and put the bucket back in its “home”. My younger kids like to sing a “Clean up, clean up, everybody everywhere” song as they clean. Make it a game! With six kids, this has saved us countless hours of cleaning up after our kids.

4. Prep the night before. Whether you’re single or have a household full of kids, mornings might be a rush for you. Instead, create an evening routine where you get everything ready the night before, so you can start your day off right. This might not technically save time, but it gives you more time in the morning to focus on getting important things done rather than rushing through your routine.

5. Don’t watch too much TV. I personally have wasted entire days watching TV, so I know what a big time-hole television can be. Instead, limit your TV viewing time — maybe an hour a day? — and use the time you otherwise would have been watching TV on more important things — spending time with your loved ones, exercising, writing that novel you’ve been dreaming about.

6. Plan your weekly menu. If you plan out what you’re going to have for dinner (and even lunch) each day of the week, you can save a lot of time. First, you can go grocery shopping and get everything you need all at once — in fact, if you repeat the weekly menu the next week, you can do two weeks of shopping in one trip. Second, you can prepare food ahead of time (see next item), and pack your lunch easily for work. Third, you don’t have to worry about what’s for dinner each evening — it’s right there on the menu you posted on the fridge.

7. Cook big batches. I like to make large batches of food, which is especially helpful when you have a big family. I’ll cook up a big batch of chili, veggie soup, spaghetti, or other dish, and eat the leftovers for lunch or dinner (sometimes it can be several lunches and dinners).

8. Do all your errands at once. This is the same as the “batching” tip from the work section above (as is the previous tip, and the next tip). Write your errands on an errands list throughout the week, and do them all on one day. Plan your route so you do the least amount of driving possible, and get it all done quickly. Compared to running multiple errand trips, this method saves a lot of time.

9. Do your banking online, all at once. I like to do this once every week or even two weeks … I have all my bills ready to pay (actually, most of them are set up to be paid automatically by my bank’s bill-pay system), I reconcile my online bank statement, pay the bills, check my automatic savings transfers and so on.

10. Clean in one big rush. While I like to keep things clean by cleaning as I go, there’s also the sweeping and mopping and cleaning the bathrooms and things like that … and it’s a big time-saver to do it all in one big rush. My whole family will take different parts of the house, and we’ll do the cleaning all at once as fast as we can. We’re done in 30-45 minutes, and we can relax the rest of the day. Ahhh!

11. Get your workouts done in no time. If you don’t have a lot of time but want to stay (or get) in shape, try bodyweight exercises in circuits, but make the workout more intense by trying to do as many circuits as you can in a short amount of time. For example, do circuits of pullups, pushups, and bodyweight squats (5, 10, and 15 respectively) … and do as many as possible in 10 minutes (or 20 if you’re fit). Create your own circuits with different exercises, or look for similar challenges online to mix things up. Don’t do these intense exercises if you’re just starting out — just try to do a few circuits but not quickly if you’re still a beginner.

12. Keep a great big calendar. My family stays organized with a big calendar on our fridge (which I also manually sync with Gcal because I like Gcal). Everything goes on our calendar: parties, meetings, school events, soccer games, music lessons, birthdays, volunteering dates, and so on. This ensures that we don’t overschedule, that we’re all in sync with each other, and that we don’t miss appointments or events. And one big calendar saves time because we don’t have to keep checking with each other or looking at various schedules.

13. Get a babysitter or swap babysitting. If you are a parent and don’t have time to do things, hire a babysitter so you can find the time, or swap babysitting with another parent. My sister and I do this, for example — we’ll watch her kids some days and she’ll watch ours on others. It’s great because we have more time to do things, and our kids get to play together.

14. Consider hiring someone. Sometimes it makes more sense to hire someone to do something, especially if your time is worth more money than you’re paying that person. For example, if I have a large yard that would take me five hours to maintain (it’s pretty big), it makes more sense for me to pay someone as I can earn more during those 5 hours by working. Other things you might pay someone for: other home maintenance projects, washing your car, doing errands or laundry, doing your taxes … just about anything where doing it yourself isn’t cost-effective.

What I've been up to
I'm off to Winnipeg tomorrow to offer a Compassion Fatigue Train the Trainer to the Canadian Association of School Social Workers and Attendance Counsellors. If my last visit to the Peg is anything to base expectations on, I am looking forward to a very welcoming and enthusiastic group.

Thursday night I had the privilege of presenting to a group of occupational and physiotherapists who work as preceptors for Queen's University. I would like to thank them personally here for their warm hospitality and willingness to laugh at my bad jokes! (ie the microphone). I also would like to say a special hello to Catherine D. organiser of this keynote and someone who confessed that she reads this blog - [Hi Catherine, please thank your husband/hockey coach extraordinaire for driving my son to hockey Thursday.]

Next week, I will be in Ottawa on Tuesday, working with a non-profit housing group, Toronto on Thursday, presenting to a school board and Montreal on Saturday, offering a workshop to a women's shelter. Fittingly enough, Saturday is December 6th. For some of us (Montrealers and Violence against Women activists everywhere) this date has particular painful resonance. If you are not familiar with this, I invite you to google December 6th 1989 Montreal. (How's that for low impact disclosure?)

Then, I will take a wee break and bake cookies and try and figure out what on earth is a good teacher gift. Well, that's not entirely true, I still have a "day job" as a therapist but I will be working part time for the rest of December.

I am putting the final touches on a new web store where I be will featuring workbooks and compassion fatigue training materials as early as January. I am very excited about this project as it will mean that many of you with limited professional development budgets will have the option to purchase training materials for a fraction of the price of bringing a speaker to your agency.

A few community notices:

You may already know that the Canadian blood supply is at an all time low. The Red Cross is calling for all eligible donors to roll up their sleeves before the holidays.

The Salvation Army is asking that you consider making a donation to a food bank program this month. In my community, I noticed that Loblaws and TD bank have food bank donation boxes at the front of their stores. Another way to help out is to contribute to your local mitten/winter coat drive for kids. I was invited to present a keynote this week and everyone brought a food bank donation to the meal. Maybe these are things that you already do?

My mother has always been someone with a strong social conscience: For my 12th birthday, she took me to a large rehabilitation hospital in Montreal to help out at the christmas party. I got to serve turkey dinners alongside prison parolees (who were doing their bit for the community) and was taught how to respectfully and efficiently feed someone who was physically unable to do so themselves. I must say that it was in fact probably the best birthday I had ever had. Certainly the one with the biggest learning curve. I always think about this experience as this time of year rolls around. For my own children's allowance, I stole an idea from a friend and created three jars: Spend, Save and Share. They put a third in each jar and then decide where and how they will distribute the Share portion. Granted, it might be 50 cents or 5 dollars, but it's still a contribution.

Finally, an invitation to reflect on the busy time that December can be for many of us. Are you someone who gets harried and exhausted before the holidays? If so, I would invite you to review the "musts" from the "coulds". In my extended family, we made a decision three years ago to stop giving each other gifts. We still get together and share good food and play games and music, but no more gifts. Everyone agreed and breathed a sigh of relief. (well, not everyone, a few people were disappointed). I still give presents to my children and make something homemade for a few close friends, but that's it. Grandparents asked to be excluded from this deal and be allowed to give the children something which is totally fine. But my December has become a very simple (and cheap) experience indeed.

My friend Robin is a solution-focused coach who works with individuals who want help dealing with life transitions, who feel stuck and want guidance in moving forward in their personal and/or professional lives. She is also a compassion fatigue specialist and enjoys working with helpers who need extra help in figuring out how to juggle the dance of burnout, compassion fatigue and life.

This week, I want to invite you to go read Robin's 21 day challenge to accomplishing a goal. Here is a quote from her first of 21 posts:

21 days to a new you! Wanna play?
by ROBIN on OCTOBER 21, 2008

Scientists agree that real behaviour change takes about 21 days. Do you have a goal that you want to reach, or take a big bite from? I know that many of you want coaching but worry that you can’t afford it right now. Why don’t you play along with me as I set out to break an old habit or form a new one in 21 days? I’ll provide tips, strategies and motivation and you can let me and the others know how you are making out, where you are stumbling and how you stay on track. You can remain anonymous or you can post to the message board and use your journey to inspire others.

I haven’t decided yet when we will get started, so get in touch if you want me to let you know when the 21 day revolution will begin! Send your email to robin@lifeinspired.ca (don’t use the contact page from the website until we get it up and running again).

No goal too big or too small…Come and play."

Robin Cameron

Link: www.lifeinspired.ca

If you would like to hear the show, you can access the podcast as of tonight (http://www.cbc.ca/whitecoat/index.html?copy-podcast) or wait until it airs again on CBC Radio One, on Saturday November 22nd, at 430pm.

The show is only 25 minutes long so it does not explore solutions and strategies but begins to look at the problem of burnout and compassion fatigue among medical professionals. Hopefully it's a start, to generate more discussion and sharing among helping professionals.

This is a workshop organised by Michael Kerman of Leading Edge Seminars. Although I do not know Janina Fisher, the topic might be particularly relevant for helping professionals in gaining a better understanding of how trauma affects not only their clients but also helpers themselves when working with a lot of traumatic material with clients (vicarious trauma).

Led by Janina Fisher, PhD
2-day workshop
Dates: Thursday, December 4 and Friday, December 5, 2008
Time: 9:00 am to 4:30 pm
Location: Metro-Central YMCA
Fee: $309 until Sept. 11; $339 after Sept. 11

In the context of trauma, attachment failure is inevitable and inescapable, leaving a lasting imprint on all future relationships, including the therapeutic one. Instead of experiencing therapy and the therapist as a haven of safety, the traumatized client will be driven by powerful wishes and fears about relationships, while therapeutic work on the trauma will be compromised by the client’s vulnerability to autonomic dysregulation and transference crises.

Increasingly, therapists interested in the treatment of trauma have become aware of the necessity to treat the attachment issues concurrently with the trauma issues. In this workshop, we will address the impact of trauma on attachment behaviour, the effects of sub-optimal attachment experiences on mind and body, how to understand the effects of traumatic attachment on the therapeutic relationship, and how to work with both the somatic and relational legacy of attachment.

Using interventions drawn from the spheres of psychodynamic psychotherapy, neuroscience and attachment research, and Sensorimotor Psychotherapy (a body-centred talking therapy for the treatment of trauma), this workshop will combine lecture, demonstration, video, and experiential exercises to explore —

* A neurobiologically informed approach to understanding the impact of trauma on attachment behaviour and on transference
* Strategies for overcoming the effects of disorganized attachment on the therapeutic relationship
* Somatic interventions that challenge trauma-related relational patterns
* The role of the therapist as a “neurobiological regulator” of the client’s dysregulated affective and autonomic states

By the end of the seminar, you will be able to —

* Identify trauma-related attachment patterns and styles
* Describe disorganized attachment behaviour in adults and its implications for treatment
* Discuss somatic consequences of avoidant, ambivalent, and disorganized attachment styles
* Define criteria for choosing cognitive, psychodynamic, or somatic interventions for attachment issues
* Utilize somatic interventions to address attachment issues in psychotherapy

For more info: www.leadingedgeseminars.org

Both photos from www.enneagraminstitute.com

I am writing this post on my way home from a weekend retreat, compliments of my mom. Last year, she offered to send me to an Enneagram training and particularly recommended the training on the inner critic, also called Psychic Structures. To learn more about the enneagram, visit www.enneagraminstitute.com

This training was offered by Russ Hudson and Don Riso, leading figures in the field of Enneagram Training. It was held at Don Riso’s country retreat in Rhinebeck, New York, about 2 hours north of New York city. The Fall colours were in their full glory, the Barn was a beautiful training site and the food was outstanding (thank you, stretchy yoga pants!).

I appreciated many aspects of this training: the topic was fascinating, the presenters were extremely knowledgeable and there was a mix of participants from all corners of the world with a wide variety of backgrounds and professional training. What I enjoyed most was that I was not there as an expert in anything (except, maybe, my own mistakes in life!). I was not there as a therapist, as a compassion fatigue specialist or as a mother. I was just there, watching, listening, talking to others and also having the opportunity to sit quietly, take a nap in the middle of the day or read. I think that everyone in the room had far more knowledge of the enneagram than me and it was enjoyable to just be.

In fact, it was incredibly restorative. I wouldn't have said that on day one, which ran until 11pm which is far too late for almost anyone and certainly too late for me who likes to be in my pjs by 9pm. But somehow the mix of activities made it feasible.

I also learned to meditate in a way that I have never really been able to, other than when I am running. Hudson and Riso began each teaching portion with a meditation so we all got to meditate briefly 6 times each day. Their meditation method was new to me and made me want to learn more about ways to meditate when back home. A fellow participant directed me to Itunes, where she said you can download free meditation podcasts. It's worth a visit.

Of course, we don't all have a fairy godmother who sends us to retreats and we can’t always travel across the country to attend a retreat (this was the first one I have ever attended), but the key elements of a retreat could be achieved closer to home:

Stepping outside of our daily grind, being fed by someone else, having access to down time, learning new ideas, resting and meditating.

If you have interests and hobbies outside of work, maybe it could be centered around this interest: a weekend retreat at a friend’s cottage with your watercolours, a half day workshop on a craft with a night at the bed and breakfast.

If your best friend is a helper, and her birthday is coming up, maybe you could offer her a weekend retreat of her own (take her kids for a day, offer to house swap so she doesn't stare at her laundry pile) and sign her up for a yoga class.

October is always a busy training month but this one takes the cake. I am just back from Timmins and Oshawa, I will be in Edmonton this week, then teaching at the Crisis Institute next week and then off to upstate New York for a three day course on the first weekend of November. I am not complaining, mind you, but my training schedule has meant that I have had to put a few projects on temporary hold until things quiet down a bit. The workbook is there, waiting to be proofread and sent to the printer, as are the questionnaires from the book project, which have been carefully filled out and returned and are awaiting my rapt attention. November will be a time for these projects, I hope.

Part of the dilemma when you have a private practice and a consulting business is finding the right balance between the two: I enjoy working individually with clients and do not want to stop doing clinics, and I also enjoy the workshops and training. Finally, I like to have time to read and write and think and come up with new ideas.
This is the eternal quest for the ideal schedule. Something that is not necessarily attainable but I keep on inching towards a closer approximation.

What would your ideal schedule look like?

However, never a slave to work, I am someone who protects my down time carefully and make sure I get plenty of sleep and good food and exercise. Today, Sunday, I prepared a spaghetti squash casserole and apple crisp for tonight's supper, went for a run in the gorgeous Fall morning, parented (an ongoing activity...!) and read a fascinating article on Dr Stephen Hwang, (see Globe and Mail Toronto section Saturday October 18th). Dr Hwang is a leading researcher in the field of homelessness who also works as a family doctor at Seaton House, Toronto's largest homeless shelter. I highly recommend you take a few minutes to read about this deeply caring man. Then I found a lead for a tasty $9.95 portuguese wine that tastes like it costs $14.95 and a recipe for a fragrant vietnamese soup. That, to me, is a day well spent.

Experience has taught me that there are some key things that need to remain intact even when I am busy to allow me to retain my equilibrium: plenty of sleep, healthy eating, exercise and some fresh air. Do you know what those are for you?

Friendly people, open hearts and minds, bilingual city, clear blue skies. What more can I say?
Thank you Timmins for your warm welcome, your constructive feedback and ideas. I had a wonderful visit here meeting a wide range of helping professionals. It was worth the bumpy trip in the ageing 12 seater airplane from bearskin airlines.

Nuts and bolts is the title I use for posts that have highly varied content. So here goes:

I am writing from Timmins which is in Northeastern Ontario. Last night, on my way here, I was amused to read the Bearskin Airlines airplane prospectus which described every port of call on their trajectory as "gateway to the north" "entry to the north" "portal to the north". They all seem to be competing for that tag line. Which one is the actual gateway to the north? All of them, I suspect, for various reasons. It's wonderful to be able to speak French everywhere I go, or franglais which is my favourite language, and, it seems, favourite for Timmins francophones as well.

I read a couple of interesting blog entries today which I invite you to visit.

1) www.zenhabits.net "Success isn't a competition" Leo, the author of this blog, lives in Guam (I think, I'll need to double check that) but far away from the gateway to the north, anyhow. I like his unpretentious look at stress reduction. He has a lot of good material on the blog. Go take a peek

2) www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/

This is Tim Ferriss' blog, author of the bestseller "The Four Hour Workweek"
Now his book and his blog won't appeal to everyone. But if you are self-employed, or an entrepreneur, I highly recommend you read one of his latest posts called "Harnessing Entrepreneurial Manic-Depression: Making the Rollercoaster Work for You"
As someone who has been self employed for the past decade, I could completely relate to this post and agree with all of it.

Here is a brief update on what has been happening in the compassion fatigue solutions world:

I have been travelling nearly every week so far this Fall. I was in Montreal last week presenting at a rehabilitation hospital, this week I am off to Timmins in Northern Ontario, then Oshawa and Edmonton. Clients have been from the fields of healthcare, addictions, corrections and social services. It has been very interesting to meet helpers from such diverse fields and hear about their specific challenges given the work that they do and the clients they work with. I was also interviewed for my favourite radio show "White Coat, Black Art". Working with the media is always nerve-wracking as you speak for 45 minutes and they then reduce it to 8 minutes. I just hope they can respect the spirit of the message I was trying to convey. This show will apparently air in November, I will keep you posted if you are curious to hear it.

I am working on several things right now: starting interviews for the book, proofreading the compassion fatigue manuals that will be available for purchase in the coming weeks, and finalising details of upcoming training, more on this below.

Train the Trainer

I am very pleased to announce that the two day Train the Trainer workshop will be offered again in March and June, in Kingston, On. I will be sending a formal annoucement in the coming weeks. I already have 35 people on the waiting list so if you want to take this training, I encourage you to enroll as soon as you can to avoid disappointment.

The Manager's Guide to Stress, Burnout & Trauma in the Workplace, Kingston, May 2009 with Dr Pat Fisher

I have been wanting to offer a workshop to managers for a very long time. The Manager’s Guide to Stress, Burnout & Trauma in the Workplace Program has been specifically designed to assist managers as they address the problem in their workplaces and its impact on the staff they lead.

Patricia Fisher, Ph.D., R.Psych., L.Psych.
President & CEO.

Dr. Patricia Fisher is a clinical and consulting psychologist who has specialized in the field of workplace traumatic and systemic stress over the past 20 years. She has authored 6 texts and numbers of research papers on the subject, and is a frequent presenter at international conferences and professional meetings. Active as a clinician, researcher, and consultant, her work also includes program design and evaluation, curriculum development and training, policy development and organizational planning. Dr. Fisher’s work has focused on the needs of public service personnel in high risk areas such as human and social services, law enforcement, corrections, emergency services, and health care. More recently, the scope of application has increased to include a wide range of high stress private and public sector workplaces. Dr. Fisher has led the expansion of Fisher & Associates into the United States and currently resides in New York, while making periodic visits back to Canada

Stay tuned for dates and registration forms. To receive advance notification, please join our mailing list.

Hosted by Gluckstein and Associates
Here is information from their flyer:

Presenters:

Anna B. Baranowsky, Ph.D., C.Psych.
Founder and Director of the Traumatology Institute (Canada), presents a
resiliency enhancement program that is both didactic and experiential and is
designed to turn Compassion Fatigue into Compassionate Rejuvenation.

Karl LaRowe, M.A., LCSW
International speaker and author, Karl LaRowe is one of the leading authorities
on transforming compassion fatigue into energy and engagement.

REGISTRATION + INFORMATION

Due to the popularity of this Seminar & Workshop we encourage you to register early as space is limited.

Early Bird Registration:

• Before October 1st, 2008, the registration fee is $85.00
• After October 1st, 2008, the registration fee is $100.00
• Registration includes Continental Breakfast, Lunch & Workshop Materials.

To register, call Gluckstein & Associates LLP 416.408.4252

For more information: www.compassionfatigueseminar.com

That's what Quill and Quire had to say about Tilda Shalof's two books: "A Nurse's Story" and "The Making of a Nurse"

I devoured these two books in 48 hours. Could not put them down.

Tilda Shalof is an intensive care nurse who works in Toronto and has been in the field for over 20 years. She is also a gifted writer and storyteller. I found her books riveting for two reasons. The first is that I have always loved hospitals (go figure, I know that is rather unusual) and found her account of working in the ICU absolutely fascinating. She describes the dynamics between nurses, dealing with doctors and residents, patients and their families, particularly when things go wrong.

The second thing I found fascinating about these books was her description of the challenges of the work on nurses' emotional and physical well being. In "The making of a nurse" she describes the phenomenon of somatic empathy perfectly: “[patients] needed to feel that I was steady and in control, but I couldn’t always offer them that security. I caught their emotions as if they were contagious. Sometimes, merely being in the presence of a patient, family member, or even another nurse, who was flustered, anxious, or angry would affect me, and I would respond in tandem.“ [...]

“I’m panicking,” she said in a tremulous voice. I looked around the room for a chair and luckily, just then, the technician caught her as she keeled over. Full-blown panic had finally done her in […] I exhaled, I hadn’t realized how shallow my breathing had become, how tight my chest was, how jittery I felt. I had caught a bad case of her panic” Tilda Shalof, (2007, p.130)

This is a concept that I discuss at length during my half day and full compassion fatigue workshops. Babette Rothschild explores several concrete strategies to deal with this somatic empathy in her book Help for the Helper (2006).

One caveat: A colleague of mine who has a great deal of experience in acute care nursing did warn that Tilda's books may be retraumatizing for anyone who has worked in critical care or has experienced ICU first or second hand as her descriptions are quite detailed and very accurate. (thank you for that, Jan)

I'm off to Montreal this week, to present at the Jewish Rehabilitation Hospital, then Timmins next week for a one day presentation in the community. This has been a full and busy Fall with a lot of writing and workshop design and more to come. It's a wonderful profession. Truly.

Betting on Mental Health for Seniors
Making Connections between Gambling and Mental Health. What are the odds?

Date: Tuesday November 25th, 2008
Where: The Canadian Mental Health Association – Kingston Branch, 6 Ordnance Street, Kingston, ON
Time: 8:30 – 4:00
Cost: $25.00 Includes snacks, lunch and A Problem Gambling Prevention Clinical Manual for Service Providers with handouts

A Collaborative Partnership Between The Canadian Mental Health Association Kingston Branch:Brenda Miller and Options for Change:Chris Myers

To Register: Call Brenda: 613-549-7027

Doctor: "I have some great news for you!"

Me: "ok, wonderful, what's the diagnosis then?"

Doctor: "Oh it's a very benign problem that can easily be solved with one minor change to your diet"

Me: "Great, I'm a healthy eater so no problemo. Tell me what to do"

Doctor: "No caffeine, ever. No coffee, no tea, no diet coke, no pepsi, no dark chocolate, no green tea, no nasal decongestants or cough syrups. That's it. You'll be right as rain."

Me: "WHAT? But that's terrible! Can I have decaf? Please tell me I can at least drink decaf?

Doctor: (clearly realising she has an addict on her hands): "Yeah, sure, decaf is fine but only one a day. It still has trace amount of caffeine in it you know."

So there you go, that day last week marked the end of my long love affair with coffee. Luckily I don't eat much chocolate so that's not so bad. But coffee... the taste, the aroma, the anticipation when I hear the cappucino maker frothing... (I once worked in a coffee shop for a whole summer and lived on lattes and leftover muffins. I was one wired barrista).

What has been interesting about this has been to note my friends and acquaintances' reactions. Coincidentally, most of them were clutching a disposable cup of coffee while I talked to them about it. All of them looked horrified, as though I had told them about a terrible diagnosis I had just received. "Oh my goodness, that's awful! Poor you!" One joked "Sorry, we can't be friends anymore!

Then, three days of headaches, fatigue and basically thinking about coffee all the time.

Phew.

Now that I am on the other side, I realise that when I get up in the morning, I can in fact engage in conversation with my children right away and don't have to shove them out of the way to make a beeline for the coffee pot.

Interesting.

I am not suggesting that any of you coffee drinkers out there should quit, but I was a bit shocked to observe how strong the withdrawal symptoms were for someone who is a 2 cups a day gal.

I am most interested in the fact that I can no longer rely on caffeine to keep me going if I am tired during the day. (Bad night's sleep? no problem, I'll just have a cup of coffee at lunch). So interestingly, no being able to drink coffee means I have to have even better self care in general. And when I'm tired, my choices are power nap or brisk walk outside instead of sitting at my computer with one more cup of joe.

See you later coffee!

The Fall training is starting in earnest this week, with a presentation in Hamilton at a Trauma conference and a one day Train the Trainer workshop in London. I have spent a great deal of time writing the Train the Trainer manual, so sadly I am all worded out for what is normally a favourite activity of mine - the weekly blog. I am also busy putting the finishing touch on the Walking the Walk workbook which will soon be available to purchase online and by regular post. This workbook will lead readers through the full Walking the Walk: Creative Tools for Transforming Compassion Fatigue one day workshop. It was designed for distance learners and those who enjoy learning at their own pace. The workbook offers a comprehensive description of compassion fatigue and vicarious traumatization and leads the reader through many experiential activities designed to target specific areas in their personal and professional lives. It offers concrete strategies to making a real change in your life as a helping professional.

If this is of interest to you, please visit this space in a few weeks to receive notification of the workbook launch.

Things are heating up around here. I have been very busy putting the final touches to the One and Two day train the trainer workshops scheduled for September and November and I am trying to find a superlative that adequately conveys the excitement I feel at finally getting a training workbook completed after all this time and simply at having had enough uninterrupted time to just write and think.

For participants planning to attend a train the trainer session in the Fall: I have created a new web page (a Train the Trainer site) which can be found at cftrainers.blogspot.com

For now it's all going to be deposited there, but I may reorganise it all later so it makes more sense. Just bear with me, if you please.

If you are coming to a training session with me this Fall, I invite you to go have a look and subscribe to receive updates.

There are still a few seats left to attend this one day Train the Trainer course in London. Please note that this workshop is also going to be offered in Winnipeg November 28th.

This workshop is designed for helping professionals who wish to become compassion fatigue educators and trainers.

Details on the London Training:

Compassion Fatigue Train the Trainer - the One Day Course
September 17th, 2008
Women's Community House, London, Ont.
With Françoise Mathieu, M.Ed. CCC.
Hosted by Solutions on Site

Develop the skills and knowledge base to deliver a creative and practical Compassion Fatigue workshop in your agency or community. Based on the fundamentals of Françoise’s inspiring one day Walking the Walk workshop, this training will teach you how to deliver a workshop that incorporates a combination of solo, small group and whole group activities.

Prerequisites to attend:

To fully benefit from this training session, you need to have either:

A minimum of one day of prior training in Compassion Fatigue and/or Vicarious Trauma and a good working knowledge of the basic concepts related to compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma

OR

If you do not have prior training but wish to attend, you can prepare by completing the following steps:

1) Read the following two articles: Running on Empty: Compassion Fatigue in Health Care professionals and Transforming compassion fatigue into compassion satisfaction: Top 12 Self Care tips for helpers which you can obtain by going to my website: www.compassionfatigue.ca, and clicking on Resources and Links. You will see the articles there as pdfs. I can also email them to you: whp at cogeco.ca

2) Watch the 1.5 hour video "The Basics" which can be found at http://www.ohtnmedia.org/ohrdp/conf_2008/video_07/
or view it by going to my website: www.compassionfatigue.ca and click on resources and links and then on multimedia

3) Complete the compassion fatigue self test and review your scores. To receive this self test automatically, email: thingy at aweber.com (change the "at" to an @)

4) Visit this blog's archives and have a read

In order to benefit from this training, you must have completed either of the prerequisites.

For More info:
www.sosworkshops.ca
Solutions On Site, 143 Forward Ave, London, On
Phone: 519-640-2030

But first of all, let's briefly look back at a more peaceful time (ie a week ago when I was still on holidays) and the view I had the privilege of staring at for 2.5 weeks while I just sat and looked out. There was so much weather happening that there was no need for any other entertainment. Rain, thunder storms, rainbows, loons swimming by, more clouds, sunshine, a small thunder storm, a big puffy could, sunshine, rain etc. This was how the day would unfold. I sat, ate, read a bit, chatted, ate some more, played badminton with kids, ate (did I mention that one already?) went for long kayak rides in the bulging flooded creeks and primarily just sat and stared out at the lake. Needless to say it was wonderfully restorative.

I am going to be fairly non communicative for the next while as I am busy working on two key projects: the Train the Trainer workbook and the interviews for the book project (see previous posts for more info on both). So do come back for a visit, but I don't expect to be fully back to my weekly posts until mid September. Hasta Luego as they say.

Yup, that's my foot. I am going on holidays for 2.5 weeks starting July 23 so the office will be closed during this time. I look forward to the holiday, of course, but am also really excited about the upcoming interviews with helpers and the other projects that are currently brewing. Meanwhile, I would like to recommend a wonderful radio show that is also on podcast, (if you haven't heard it yet) and a lovely movie totally unrelated to this work.

Radio show/podcast: White Coat, Black Art, on CBC radio

Movie: Once, an Irish musical. Lovely, funny, touching and trauma-free.

See you in August.

Françoise

Are you a helping professional with a story to tell? Have you struggled with, conquered, rollercoasted and danced with compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma during the course of your career? Do you have some insights and stories you would be willing to share? Maybe you have some strategies that have made a significant difference for you and have allowed you to remain healthy and well in this career?

I am writing a book on helpers and CF and am looking to interview nurses, social workers, teachers, doctors, lawyers and helpers of all kinds who would be willing to contribute to this project.

How it will work: you have the choice of remaining anonymous or being identified, as you wish. If you start the process saying you are comfortable with your name being used, you will still get to preview the material before it goes to press and can decide to amend/edit/remove any identifiers you are not comfortable with. You are in the driver's seat.

You will have the option to be interviewed by phone (or in person if you live close enough to me) and I will record our conversation, or to fill in a questionnaire that I will send you via email, after which I may do a telephone interview to follow up on some key points. If you are completely comfortable with being public about this process, I may request for videotaping, but again you are in the driver's seat and I will not use any material without your express written permission.

Curious? Potentially Interested? Have questions? Call me: 613-547-3247 or email: whp at cogeco.ca (you have to change the at to an @ - this is just a way to block spam robots).

I have written elsewhere in this blog about my frustrations with the highly variable quality of continuing education for helping professionals.

One of the primary reasons for which my friend Robin and I created the CF workshops in 2001 was to offer something that we would enjoy attending. We had been to dozens of training courses that promised (but failed) to deliver tools and strategies that we as clinicians were starving for. Since, in addition to this, I spent my entire early school life bored out of my mind (reading novels on my lap to survive from Grades 1-10), I have become a rather tough workshop participant. No, that's not entirely true, I am very polite. I may not say much at the workshop per se, but truth is I am internally drumming my fingers in exasperation and writing cribs notes for a future novel or next week's groceries on my lap.

All of this lengthy preamble to say that it was with very low expectations that I enrolled for a one day course on assessment tools for trauma work last week. I arrived at the workshop feeling neutral, hoping to learn something. In fact, it turned out to be a wonderful training day where I learned a lot and was attentive and awake to the instructor the entire day.

The first 10 Minutes

There are several things that the instructor did in the first 10 minutes that indicated to me that this was going to be a good workshop. First, she drew us in by sharing some information about the type of client cases that she sees. Brief storytelling and relevant case examples are always great ways to start, in my opinion.

Secondly, she expressed concern (and therefore offered validation) that the material we were going to work with was potentially very dry and may not be easy to digest in a one day intensive format. Yet she taught us how to use the tools with highly informative case examples and drew us in to a rather dry topic.

Thirdly, she had mastery - she has been teaching on this topic for many years, and her expertise anchored the workshop.

Finally, she was very genuine and confidant about her material and her work.

A few Key Things to observe

If you are a trainer yourself, or interested in becoming a trainer, I would invite you to pay close attention to a few key things during the next workshop you attend:

1) Observe the first ten minutes of the workshop: How does the presenter draw you in? How does she set the stage for the day?

2) Does the trainer deliver on the promised deliverables?

3) Pacing of the day: respecting agreed upon times for breaks/lunch etc.

4) Staying focused on the task at hand - not allowing questions from the audience to derail the workshop yet being able to answer them succinctly and effectively

5) Genuineness

6) Warmth

7) Mastery of the topic: Confidence and Competence

I lucked out last week - the trainer had the competence and confidence to deliver a good workshop. Competence came from her wealth of experiences as a trauma specialist, (and clearly top notch clinical training) and confidence came from doing what she loves and doing it very well (training others in trauma work).

8) Sense of humour

9) Approachability

That's my quick list. Not all good trainers are warm and approachable, but it sure makes for a nice learning environment.

So, if you are trauma workers, maybe you want to know who this was after all this?

Good take a look at my recommended list of trainers, her name and workshops are listed: Natalie Zlodre at the Hincks in Toronto. A job well done in this learning curmudgeon's opinion.

If you would like to view a 1.5 hour talk on CF/VT, here is yours truly at the Ontario Harm Reduction Conference in Ottawa in March 2008. If you like the content of the video, share it with your pals, and please give my contact information along with it: email: whp at cogeco.ca, blog and website addresses.

www.ohtnmedia.org/ohrdp/conf_2008/video_07/

If you are potentially interested in hiring me to come present to your agency, this will give you an idea of my style although this was not an interactive workshop given that it was really short, and it should also be mentioned that my train was late and I arrived at the conference 8 minutes before starting the talk so I was a little frazzled. The cab driver who picked me up at the train station said to me "Hello! Where are you going?" and I said "Oh, I am SO late, please take me to the Delta, I am supposed to give a talk in 10 minutes" and he turned around in his seat, looked me straight in the eyes and said "I WILL get you there in time, I promise you" and off we went, on the most hair raising taxi ride I've ever had in Ottawa (that's not saying much though, as I used to live in NYC and once had a yellow cab burn all 24 red lights we encountered to get us home). But I digress.

If you know of good multimedia resources on CF out there, email me or write a comment to the blog. My goal is the create a "one stop shop" for Compassion Fatigue Solutions and the more resources we can find and share, the better.

I am going off to Toronto today to attend a workshop (rather than deliver one, which is a nice change). This will be on Trauma Assessment in preparation for the Three day Crisis Intervention training that I offer along with Dr Mike Condra in October here in Kingston: www.crisisinstitute.com

Image from treehuggingfamily.com
It's been wonderfully slow here in Kingston during the last couple of weeks. Kids are out of school, enjoying action-packed day camps, coming home completely exhausted (instead of wired and grumpy which is how they are when they come home from school, which makes you wonder about school but that's for a whole other blog that I'm sure already exists).

We have had time and energy (or rather I have, they always have the energy) to make homemade ice cream, popsicles, bread, and butter, just for fun. The kids were laughing at this burst of homemaking inspiration I showed and said "what's next mom? candles? soap? our own wool?" I told an academic friend of ours (who self declares himself to be a real A-type personality) about making butter and he almost fell off his chair laughing. He simply could not imagine ever making butter in his whole life. It just seemed like a complete waste of time to him.

When things slow down, I am always struck by the energy that is available to do the extras in life. If I walk in the door at 530pm after a long day at work and the kids greet me with "mommy, can we paint?" I sometimes feel like running away back into my car (or bursting into tears perhaps) and sometimes I feel completely relaxed and would happily paint/build a lego robot/call a friend and chat about their problem or any other extra activity like that.

So, what determines if it's going be a "let's paint" kind of day, or a "leave me alone" kind of day? The kids are the same kids on both occasion. The difference lies, of course, in the adult and how depleted/tired/overextended that adult is... the kids are rarely any different from the last time they suggested something spontaneous and active.

The comedian/positive psychologist Loretta Laroche says on the topic of dinner and good food: "What do you smell when you come home from work? The microwave?"

Is this totally obvious to you? Do you have the self awareness to be able to gauge your level of depletion on your way home from work? Have you identified what activities are more or less depleting for you? Is it direct client work? Teaching? admin and meetings? Is some type of client work more depleting than other kinds of client work? Have you made anything from scratch lately? Or maybe you are someone who needs to get out of the kitchen and stop making everything from scratch. I had a client who used to feel she had to bake something for every special event at her son's school, and bring in a craft project and some other cool and creative activity. All until one day, the teacher asked her to stop as she was making all the other parents feel bad and it was overwhelming the teacher! This client had a full time job and two young kids and was running like a hamster in a wheel. So her homework was in fact to stop making everything from scratch...

Have a great Slow week, if you can.

Welcome to this new feature on the Compassion Fatigue Solutions blog called My top 10 CF solutions.

This new addition to the blog will be updated periodically whenever inspiration strikes.

For a primer on Compassion Fatigue and Vicarious Trauma, visit my website and download a comprehensive (yet I think highly readible) article on the topic (go to www.compassionfatigue.ca click on Resources and then on “Running on Empty”) This article was originally printed in the Magazine Rehab and Community Care and has been reprinted in several allied health trade journals since then.

The first post in the Top Ten series will be on the concept of Low Impact Disclosure, or Controlled Debriefing which is a simple yet high impact strategy that helping professionals can implement immediately in their workplace and homes. I am currently finishing a longer article on this concept, but had promised recent workshop participants that I would post something on the blog so here it is, in draft form.

This is a concept that has generated lively discussion at my recent workshops, so if you want clarification, disagree or want to add something, please do not hesitate to either post a comment here, or email me.

After a difficult session….
Are you sliming your colleagues? Are you being slimed?
Can you still be properly debriefed if you don’t give all the graphic details of the trauma story you have just heard from a client? Would you like to have a strategy to gently prevent your colleagues from telling you too much information about their trauma exposure?

(For those of you who are slightly grammatically challenged, the “iming” in sliming is pronounced the same way one pronounces slime, not limb (therefore slimeing not slimming). This is not about weight reduction though you may lose a few pounds of other peoples’ baggage through this strategy…)

"Helpers who bear witness to many stories of abuse and violence notice that their own beliefs about the world are altered and possibly damaged by being repeatedly exposed to traumatic material." (Pearlman et al, 1995)

When helpers hear and see difficult things in the course of their work, the most normal reaction in the world is to want to debrief with someone, to alleviate a little bit of the burden that they are carrying. It is healthy to turn to others for support and validation. The problem is that we are often not doing it properly. The problem is also that colleagues don’t always ask us for permission before debriefing their stories with us.

Two kinds of debriefing
Many helpers acknowledge that they occasionally share sordid and sometimes graphic tales of the difficult stories they have heard with one another in formal and less formal debriefing situations. Debriefing is an important part of the work that we do: it is a natural and important process in dealing with disturbing material.There are two kinds of debriefing that take place among helpers: the informal debriefing, which often takes place in a rather ad hoc manner, whether it be in a colleague’s office at the end of a long day, in the staff lunchroom, the police cruiser or during the drive home, and the second form of debriefing which is a more formal process, and is normally scheduled ahead of time (peer consultations, supervision, critical incident stress debriefing).

Part of the problem with formal debriefing or prebooked peer supervision is the lack of immediacy. When I have heard something disturbing during a clinical day, I need to talk about it to someone there and then or at least during the same day. I used to work at an agency where peer consultation took place once a month. Given that I was working as a crisis counsellor, I almost never made use of this time for debriefing (or much of anything else) as my work was very live and immediate. A month was a lifetime for the crises I witnessed. This is one of the main reasons why helpers take part in informal debriefing instead. They grab the closest trusted colleague and unload on them.

A second problem for some of us is the lack of satifactory supervision. If I came and administered a satisfaction scale right after you leave your supervisor’s office, I am sure that you would be able to give me a rating on how satisfying/useful that process was for you. Sadly, the score is often rather low for a variety of reasons (having sufficient time, skill level of the supervisor, the quality of your relationship with them, trust etc).

Are you being Slimed during informal debriefs?

The main problem with informal debriefs is that the listener, the recipient of the traumatic details, rarely has a choice in receiving this information. Therefore, they are being slimed rather than taking part in a debriefing process. Therein lies the problem AND the solution.

Contagion

Sharing graphic details of trauma stories can actually help spread vicarious trauma to other helpers and perpetuate a climate of cynicism and hopelessness in the workplace. Helpers often admit that they don’t always think of the secondary trauma they may be unwittingly causing to the recipient of their stories. Some helpers (particularly trauma workers, policy, fire and ambulance workers tell me this this is a “normal” part of their work and that they are desensitized to it).

Four key strategies to slow the progress of slime

In their book Trauma and the Therapist: Countertransference and Vicarious Traumatization in psychotherapy with incest survivors, Laurie Pearlman and Karen Saakvitne put forward the concept of “limited disclosure” which can be a strategy to mitigate the contamination effect of helpers informally debriefing one another during the normal couse of a day.

I have had the opportunity to present this strategy to hundreds of helping professionals over the past 7 years, and the response has been overwhelmingly positive. Almost all helpers acknowledge that they have, in the past, knowingly and unknowingly traumatized their colleagues, friends and families with stories that were probably unnecessarily graphic.

Over time, we renamed it Low Impact Disclosure (L.I.D.). What does it look like exactly?
Low impact disclosure suggests that we conceptualise our traumatic story as being contained inside a tap. We then decide, via the process described below, how much information we will release and at what pace. Simple as that.

Let’s walk through the process of L.I.D.
It involves four key steps: self awareness, fair warning, consent and low impact disclosure.

1) Increased Self Awareness
How do you debrief when you have heard or seen hard things?
Take a survey of a typical work week and note all of the ways in which you formally and informally debrief yourself with your colleagues. Note the amount of detail you provide them with (and they you), and the manner in which this is done: do you do it in formal way, at a peer supervision meeting, or by the water cooler? What is most helpful to you in dealing with difficult stories?

2) Fair Warning
Before you tell anyone around you a difficult story, you must give them fair warning. This is the key difference between formal debriefs and ad hoc ones: If I am your supervisor, and I know that you are coming to tell me a traumatic story, I will be prepared to hear this information (for more on this read Babette Rothschild's newest book Help for the Helper, where she explores the concept of trauma exposure and helper preparedness)

3) Consent
Once you have given warning, you need to ask for consent. This can be as simple as saying: “I need to debrief something with you, is this a good time?” or “I heard something really hard today, and I could really use a debrief, could I talk to you about it?” The listener then has a chance to decline, or to qualify what they are able/ready to hear. For example, if you are my work colleague I may say to you: "I have 15 minutes and I can hear some of your story, but would you be able to tell me what happened without any of the gory details?" or "Is this about children (or whatever your trigger is)? If it's about children then I'm probably the wrong person to talk to, but otherwise I'm fine to hear it."

4) Low Impact Disclosure
Now that you have received consent from your colleague, you can decide how much to turn the Tap on (I know this isn't proper English, but it will do for the time being). Imagine that you are telling a story starting with the outer circle of the story (ie the least traumatic information) and you are slowly moving in toward the core (the very traumatic information) at a gradual pace. You may, in the end, need to tell the graphic details, or you may not, depending on how disturbing the story has been for you.

Questions to ask yourself before you share graphic details:

Is this conversation a:
Debriefing?
Case consultation?
Fireside chat?
Work lunch?
Parking lot chat?
Children’s soccer game (don’t laugh, it’s been done)
Xmas party?
Pillow talk?
Other…

Is the listener:
Aware that you are about to share graphic details?
Able to control the flow of what you are about to share with them?

If it is a case consultation or a debriefing:
Has the listener been informed that it is a debriefing, or are you sitting in their office chatting about your day? Have you given them fair warning?

How much detail is enough? How much is too much?

If this is a staff meeting or a case conference, is sharing the graphic detail necessary to the discussion? Sometimes it is, often it is not. Eg: discussing a child being removed from the home, you may need to say "The child suffered severe neglect and some physical abuse at the hands of his mother" and that may be enough, or you may in certain instances need to give more detail for the purpose of the clinical discussion. Don't assume you need to disclose all the details right away.

Final words: I would particularly recommend applying this approach to all conversations we have. In social settings, even if it’s a work dinner or something with all trauma workers, think to yourself; is this too much trauma information to share?

Some additional suggestions:
Experiment with Low Impact Disclosure (LID) and see whether you can still feel properly debriefed without giving all the gory details. You may find that at times you do need to disclose all the details which is an important process in staying healthy as helpers. And at other times you may find that you did not need this.

Have an educational session followed by conversation at your workplace about this concept.

Low Impact Disclosure is a simple and easy CF prevention strategy. It aims to sensitize helpers to the impact that sharing graphic details can have on themselves and their colleagues.

I will write more on this concept in the weeks to come, and I welcome your thoughts and comments.

This poem was written by a therapist colleague of mine who has worked in this field for many years. She is someone who reflects deeply on the cost of doing this work, on the rewards and the pain that we can experience when our clients suffer terrible losses. She also made some very important changes to her schedule and her work/life balance in a way that now allows her to do this challenging work without being damaged by it. Those changes took an incredible amount of courage and humility, and I think that she will reap the benefits tenfold. If anyone "walks the walk" it's her. She has asked whether she could share this poem with our CF community, but wishes to remain anonymous.

this work

my ten year old heart imagined
mothering a tidy orphanage
full of grateful kids
with names beginning with J,
carefully cleaned ears,
and brand new matching bedspreads.

thirty odd years later, I would cry out,
why do I do this work, this work
so beyond lists, Q-tips and the Sears catalogue
that I quake
when I open the door to yet another babe
swaddled in such unspeakables,
abandoned with such artifacts:
the chased painting still at last
beside the Barbie shoes below the school bus,
the truck at the bottom of the icy lake
cleared for the grandkids' hockey games,
the bullet through the crimson pillow
where escape plans had tossed and turned,
the sticks and vegetables that had heard
such pleadings as no plant could imagine,
the seven year old Chapstick tasted
and set back by the ever empty baseball glove,
and today, just today, the cap and gown
to be donned the day after the funeral.

and I buckle and stagger once more
under the weight of this work, this work,
all but forgetting the shared breath,
the symphonic bouquet,
the tender arms of just last week,
wondering why, why
I cannot simply know the rose and the fire
in their exquisite words,
and the importance of keepsakes
in the light of our teal glass inukshuks,
marking the way for us and our followers,
lost and found in snow’s infinite textures
melted and sheening on our souls’ skin
and in our soft open eyes.

"It's amazing how long it takes to complete something you're not working on."
--R.D. Clyde (from Bill O'Hanlon's newsletter June 16, 2008)

That quote is from an email that I recently received from Bill O'Hanlon, solution focused therapist/writer/workshop presenter extraordinaire. Bill has focused some of his vast energy in developing products and training for aspiring authors and workshop presenters (go to www.billohanlon.com and follow the various links) as well as offering excellent psychotherapy workshops.

The quote struck me as it made me think of all the projects, ideas, future dreams some clients share with me but never finish. I am sure you have experienced this too: sometimes, once you have heard about an idea more than 5 times (say, from a friend), and time has passed and nothing has progressed, you tend to lose a bit of enthusiasm at hearing about the idea. Yet, the holder of the idea seems no less deflated or discouraged: they savour thinking about all the various permutations of the project, delight in it, dream big, and then, some of them return to not moving on it.

I once worked with someone who never seemed to complete anything, although she was first in line to critique and complain about every organizational issue under the sun. I had a wonderfully wise work colleague who used to say of this mutual coworker: "but Françoise, what you don't understand is that she feels as though complaining about the problem is indeed working on resolving the problem. It feels like progress to her and in facts takes quite a lot of energy out of her."

Sometimes, I think that job burnout can be a bit like that: the bitch sessions behind closed doors after a staff meeting give us the illusion of progress towards resolving the problems at hand but in truth we are not truly making progress on fixing the root cause of the problem, are we?

Anyhow, all of those thoughts were sparked from that quote and were not what I meant to write about!

Asking and Receiving:

I have been working on marketing resources and ideas to offer my Train the Trainer participants in November. One of the writing projects that is nearly complete is a booklet on "Developing and Delivering a Workshop for Helpers: 10 Key Steps." I will aim to finish this in the next few weeks and post it on my site (I will charge a small fee for it as it has taken a huge amount of time and energy to write). I guess this is meant to contradict the starting quote. This booklet has been collecting dust for about a year and now that it's back in live mode, it is completing itself surprisingly quickly...

During my research I came across Bill O'Hanlon's website: www.paidpublicspeaker.com
I saw that he was selling an ebook on becoming a paid public speaker. I was intrigued and wanted to know whether it would provide valuable material to my workshop attendees. But I don't necessarily need the book myself, so I sent him an email asking for a preview copy...

4 hours and 40 minutes later, the ebook was there, in my inbox!

Thanks Bill. Isn't that impressive and generous?

I will review the book for the blog in a few weeks. So far, it looks excellent but I prefer finishing my marketing booklet before reading it fully (I don't want to cross-contaminate what I am writing, writers among you will relate I suspect).

This is a tip for all of you out there interested in developing a workshop and wanting to preview books for it. Ask. Explain what your purpose is. You may very well receive.

Women helpers (and men too, for that matter), if you haven't read them yet, I would recommend that you add these to your summer reading list:

Nice girls don't get the corner office and Nice girls don't get rich, by Dr Lois Frankel and that you visit her website: www.drloisfrankel.com

Here is more information about her, from her website:

"Dr. Lois Frankel literally wrote the book on coaching people to succeed in businesses large and small around the globe. Nice Girls Don’t Get The Corner Office and Nice Girls Don’t Get Rich are international bestsellers translated into over twenty-five languages and featured on the TODAY Show, CNN and CNBC, in the New York Times, USA Today, and in PEOPLE and TIME Magazines. Business Week named Corner Office one of the top ten business books of the year when it was released. Based on early sales and press, See Jane Lead, a new book about why women make natural leaders for our time and how to harness your own leadership talent, is headed for similar popularity.

Combining her experience in human resources at a Fortune 10 oil company with a Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Southern California, Dr. Frankel is a pioneer in the field of business coaching. Her book Stop Sabotaging Your Career (formerly titled Overcoming Your Strengths), based on her coaching experiences, is a must-read for both men and women. For the past two decades her unique formula has helped thousands of people to create winning strategies to achieve superior career success and business goals."

Frankel's books are clearly written, down to earth and inspiring.

Compassion Fatigue Train the Trainer Workshops:
2 courses being offered in the Fall


The One Day Course
London, On. September 17th, 2008
(Sponsored by Solutions on Site)


The Two Day Intensive Retreat
Kingston, On. November 13-14th, 2008
See below for more information

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These Train the Trainer Workshops are designed to take you deep first, to gain a thorough understanding of your own relationship to CF, then go into the didactic details (what to teach, how to teach) and finally talk about the mechanics of the whole process (how to customize this for your own work needs/goals etc.).

If you wish to begin exploring the process of becoming a trainer and are looking for some tools to get started, the One day Course is a good start. If you are ready to become a Trainer, the Two day Course is best.

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Compassion Fatigue Train the Trainer:
The One Day Course
Wednesday September 17th, 2008
Women's Community House, 450 Clarke Rd, London, On.
9:00 am-3:30 p.m.

Prerequisite: Participants must have completed prior training in Compassion Fatigue and/or Vicarious Trauma, ideally a minimum of one day CF training in the past and have a good working knowledge of the basic concepts related to compassion fatigue and vicarious trauma.

Develop the skills and knowledge base to deliver a highly creative and practical Compassion Fatigue workshop in your agency or community. You will receive a training manual and the option for further coaching as you take the first steps to becoming a CF trainer.

Upon completing this course, you will have materials and resources to begin the process of designing your own training program. You may want further coaching/training from WHP as you hone your skills.

To register: contact Solutions On Site
Tel: 519-640-2030
Web: www.SOSworkshops.ca

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Compassion Fatigue Train the Trainer Workshop
Two Day Intensive Retreat
Nov. 13-14th 2008

**Only 5 spaces left**

Great food, beautiful location. A nice starting point for a two day intensive retreat to become (or hone) your skills as a compassion fatigue trainer.

Registration Form can be downloaded from from WHP's website.

Workshop Size: Spaces is limited to a maximum of 20 participants (only 5 spaces left as of June 10th.)

Cost: $435 plus $45 for materials which includes training manuals, handout templates and power point on CD.
Total cost: $480.00 CAN incl gst.

To Register: Send a cheque, payable to WHP, in the amount of $100.00 to 837 Princess Street, Suite 300, Kingston, On. K7L 1G8 **balance of payment ($380.00) must be paid by October 1st to secure your enrollment. Please note that the $100.00 is not refundable. Cancellation policy is on our website.

Certificates of completion will be provided.

Prerequisites: This workshop is aimed at helping professionals and educators in the helping fields. No prior Compassion Fatigue training required but a basic working knowledge of the topic would be best (by reading some of the titles listed below ahead of time).

Workshop Description: Some past participants of our one day Compassion Fatigue workshop (Walking the Walk) expressed an interest in receiving help in designing a workshop to bring back to their communities and developing skills and knowledge base to deliver compassion fatigue workshops themselves. This train the trainer workshop offers tools, handouts, strategies, training material and marketing strategies to adapt Walking the Walk to your community's specific needs (and to your own presentation style). You do not need to have attended WtheW in the past to benefit from this training.

Because of the small size of the group, we will customize certain aspects of the training to your specific needs. A questionnaire will be sent ahead of time to establish your needs/goals and objectives and aim to fulfill as many of these as possible.

For more details and outline: www.compassionfatigue.ca or email WHP@cogeco.ca

Photo: Aldas Baltutis (www.peakfreaks.com)

Ok, just to be clear, I personally will never ever attempt to climb Everest. I barely survived the panoramic elevator of the CN tower last year and couldn't watch when my kids stepped on the Tower's glass floor. The reference to Everest is related to something that I was privy to last weekend and has made me reflect on various self-care topics. More on this below.

I am working on a more academic blog entry that I will post later on next week if time allows, on my favourite compassion fatigue solution called Low Impact Disclosure. Stay tuned!

I have had a busy past few weeks, visiting folks in Waterloo Ontario (student counselling service), Toronto (children's rehab hospital) and London (work life balance workshop for homeless shelter workers and child protection workers and a variety of other helping professionals).

For the latter, I was asked to design a new full day workshop on work/life balance, which led me to some very interesting research on current data on workers and their challenges. I spend untold (hundreds) of hours trying to design something that would be meaningful and useful to helpers since, let's be honest, we all know what work/life balance is all about in theory. But the aim was to encourage participants to really identify key goals and challenges that were realistic and achievable. I received some very positive emails after the workshop, with participants saying that they had gone straight home and made some very concrete changes to their schedule to try and get a handle of how work creeps into their home lives. That's very rewarding to hear and I could not have asked for more encouraging feedback. If you are interested to know more about this workshop, email me: whp at cogeco.ca

I have a wonderful dilemma right now of needing to decide where to channel my CF Solutions energy in June: Finish the book? Finish the podcasts and ecourses? Interview helpers for the blog? Finish the Train the trainer workbook? (this course, which will be held in Kingston November 13-14 is 3/4 full already, fyi. Join the mailing list if you want to be sure to receive information on training).

Meanwhile, as I ponder these dilemmas of productivity, let's return to Everest.

One of my favourite relatives was visiting us from England a few weeks back. Jackie is a mental health counsellor who lives in the Lake District (and she runs a great procrastination workshop, if any of you are interested to know more about this, email me). Jackie lives in an area full of mountaineers, and we have been following the Everest climb of a friend of hers on www.myeverest.com

If you want to read an incredibly moving account of climbing Everest, go take a look at these folks who risk their lives for this expensive and rather crazy venture. What struck me reading a recent entry on the Everest blog had to do with the exhilaration that is clearly experienced when you actually make it to the top after weeks of acclimatization to the altitude, and every other risks and discomfort that accompanies such a long journey. Listening to the podcasts of climbers who just made the summit, hearing such pure emotion in their voice and an experience that they are trying to convey to their loved ones, made me somehow vaguely understand what drives them to this. Of course, this is also called a massive adrenaline rush, and can be come really addictive in and of itself. But it made me reflect on ways in which we, the non Everest climbers, can experience a miniature version of this elation in our daily life.

What's this drive all about? There is clearly a part of this quest, pushing the limits of human capacity that is almost pathological (to some) and very personality based. As an aside, I was very amused by my recent trip to an amusement park with my two children who both opted out of almost all rides as "too scary, too bumpy, too fast, too high". We ended up on the ladybug rollercoaster and the little pirate ship that goes splash splash. Clearly not breeding risk takers here.

But the other side of it, the passion is what intrigues me.

When was the last time you felt a rush of pure joy and excitement? What were you doing?

I can think of big and small versions of this feeling: big ones - crossing the finish line after my first half marathon (the nurse at the finish thought I was hyperventilating and sick but I was actually just plain crying with disbelief that I had completed this race). Another big one would be giving birth (well, no, being just done with giving birth was a huge rush, the actual process was not exactly exhilarating). A neighbour of mine just received her Master's degree after years of part time studying and juggling numerous personal demands. A friend of hers told me the graduation was incredibly moving.

I'm pretty sure you can all conjure something up like this in your own life.

But what would be smaller examples in day to day life? For me, examples would be getting to the top of Fort Henry Hill during a run and looking at the sun drenched thousand islands meeting Lake Ontario and smelling a type of sweet grass that grows up there. Having a challenging clinical day ahead but looking forward to going over to my best friend's house for a drink and a chat once the kids are in bed. Taking a loaf of bread out of the oven and inhaling deeply. Smelling the side of my son's head, just by the temple, when he's asleep.

A client of mine said to me yesterday: I would much rather work 2 days a week at a job I love and have just enough money to survive than work full time at a job I hate.

Somewhere along the continuum, without having to be a mad freestyle parachute jumper or an Everest climber, there is something that fuels us, that makes us get up in the morning and look forward to the day and the challenges it offers us.