Vicarious trauma is a process of internal change resulting from empathic engagement with survivors of trauma or a person in the process of going through a traumatic incident. Anyone who engages empathically with traumatic incidents, such as childhood abuse, torture, and the relating stories can potentially be affected by vicarious trauma. This can be a particular problem for therapists, doctors or other health care professionals in addition to teachers. In fact anyone that has a high level of empathy can experience this strong and totally overwhelming trauma, which essentially does NOT belong to them. Vicarious trauma can also be linked to PTSD, a re-traumatisation of your own experience. It can also be known as secondary traumatic stress, compassion fatigue and/or burnout.
Why does it happen
People who are naturally, kind, compassionate and empathetic are very open to the experiences of other people. Empathy is often described as both a blessing and curse. It is a blessing when a trauma survivor feels fully and truly heard and validated for their experiences which can help on their healing journey. It is a curse to the empath when they become traumatised themselves by the experiences of other people which can feel very overwhelming.
Common signs of vicarious trauma:
Here are some common signs to be aware of are:
- feeling overly involved emotionally
- your life feels “overtaken” by the relationship
- feeling the need to take action, even when the incident may have taken place a long time ago, and already have been dealt with
- experiencing ongoing feelings of anger, rage and sadness about the other person’s traumatic incident
- experiencing bystander guilt, shame, feelings of self-doubt
- becoming preoccupied with thoughts of the other person when you are not with them
- dreaming of the trauma that you have been told about, and experiencing panic attacks
- over-identifying with the person, literally feeling their pain
- depression as a result of what you have heard, leading to loss of hope, and loss of faith in humanity
- avoidance of the person because of the effect it is having on you or seeking them out to reconnect
- distancing, numbing, detachment, cutting patients off, staying busy.
- finding it hard to maintain professional boundaries, in relation to a client which might include trying to do more for them than your job requires, taking them on as a friend or feeling overly responsible for their welfare
Strategies for reducing the risk of vicarious trauma
In order to reduce the risk and avoid vicarious trauma, try the following:
- Increase your self-observation – think about what trauma is yours and what belongs to the other person
- If you are a professional, seek supervision where you can be totally honest about your situation
- Remember your professional boundaries -Don’t overstep or take on extra responsibility because by doing so you are not teaching the person to take care of themselves.
- Balance your caseload – don’t work just with trauma – mix it up a bit
- Take regular breaks, take time off when you need to.
- Seek social support from colleagues, family members.
- Use peer support or mentoring to debrief
- Learn about how to put in energetic boundaries around yourself for the future
Overcoming Vicarious Trauma
- Remember you are experiencing someone else’s trauma. Remind yourself it doesn’t belong to you.
- Have a ritual to let it go – relates to energetic boundaries and how to protect yourself
- Have a good self-care routine
- Take care of your physical as well as your mental wellbeing – go for walks, be in nature, mindfulness
- Maintain a healthy work/life balance – have outside interests.
- Therapy for your own trauma or difficult past
Being empathic is also being compassionate and the world needs more of that, so stay kind but stay protected.
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