#Selfcare: Stress Busting Techniques for the Mental Health Professional

1. #Selfcare: Stress Busting
Techniques for the Mental
Health Professional
Roxy Riefkohl - Siegrist, PhD, LPC - S

2. Learning Objectives:
• Participants will be able to identify their own
personal and professional stressors.
• Participants will gain specific information and
awareness of how their personal and professional
life are affected by these specified stressors.
• Participants will be given tips/tools to implement
to de-stress which will benefit their own life and
the clients/patients that they seek to help.

3. Are you stressed?
•Take a minute to determine your level of
stress.
(Stress Symptom Checklist)

4. Progressive Muscle
Relaxation

5. What is causing your stress professionally?
What is causing your stress personally?
•Lets Identify…

6. What are the causes of stress (occupational hazards) for
the mental health professional?
• The stress of our role, as professionals working with people in distress
• The demands and importance of clinical and professional responsibility
• Varied and often quickly shifting role demands
• The challenge of managing the intimate, confidential and nonreciprocal nature of the
client/therapist relationship
• Isolation in the work context
• Role characteristics that make mental health professionals prone to burnout (e.g., responsibility
for people vs. things, limited control over outcomes, limited resources, high level of
involvement)
• Vulnerability to vicarious traumatization from empathic engagement with traumatized clients
• The changing standards in the profession (e.g. decreased support for psychotherapy, an
increased intrusion of legal and business concerns into therapeutic practice, increased
documentation requirements)
• The stress related to the business of practice (e.g. decreasing revenue and autonomy, managed
care demands)
• The interactions between personal stresses and the demands of our work
• Utilizing the person of the therapist as a therapeutic tool

7. How does this stress affect your professional life?
• Damage to your career, including:
– Professional Isolation
– Job Dissatisfaction
– Loss of credibility
– Unprofessional Behaviors
– Ethical Violations
– Lawsuits
– Attrition
– Burnout
• Damage to clients, including:
– Malpractice
– Suicide
– Boundary violations
– Loss of faith in therapy
– Worsening client symptoms
– Guilt
– Despair

8. How does this stress affect your personal life?
Physical Symptoms
(Ex: headaches, nausea, etc.)
Emotional Symptoms
(Ex: irritability, depression, etc.)
Behavioral Symptoms
(Ex: Crying, Anger outburst, etc.)
Cognitive Symptoms
(Ex: concentration problems, confusion, etc.)
Relational Issues/Stress

9. Comfortable/Safe
Place Activity

10. How can you de-stress??
Personally:
Life Balance! Pay attention to balance in work, rest and play.
Make personal self-care a priority. Attend to your physical and
spiritual well being, as well as your emotional and
psychological health.
• Pray/Meditate/Mindfulness
• Seek personal psychotherapy and other resources for health
as needed
• Nutrition/Exercise/Sleep
• Fun/Social/Entertainment/Hobbies

11. How can you de-stress??
Professionally:
• Maintain professional connections and Consult
• Develop reasonable and realistic expectations about
workload, responsibilities and capabilities
(aka: Boundaries!)
• Identify sources of support for your work and use
them.
• Take regular vacations/Mental Health Days

12. http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/conditions/co
ping-stress-checklist

13. Stress Prevention and Protective Factors
How will you do it?
Self Care Plan
Physical Psychological
Emotional Spiritual
Relationships Workplace
Overall Balance What might get in the way?
What negative strategies do you need to avoid? What has worked in the past?
If you implement your plan, how might you feel? Who/What to add for accountability?

14. Add a Slide Title
- 4
Resources
American Psychological Association. (2014). Retrieved from
http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/stress/2013/stre
ss-report.pdf
Da Costa, B, Pinto I. (2017). Stress, Burnout and Coping in
Health Professionals: A Literature Review. J
Psychol Brain Stud. 1:1.
Mental Health America (2017). Coping with stress checklist.
http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/conditions/c
oping-stress-checklist
Rabin, S., Feldman, D. , & Kaplan, Z. (1999). Stress and
mental health strategies in mental health professionals.
British Journal of Medical Psychology, 72, 159–169.
Shallcross, L. (2011). Taking care of yourself as a counselor.
Counseling Today.

15. Thank you for
being here and
what you add
to our
profession.
Please practice
selfcare.
My Best,
Roxy