Self-care for professionals is vital to the effectiveness of the services being provided. Helping professionals may not consider their own needs, or they may be preoccupied with their responsibilities.
Helpers often mistakenly believe that they are invulnerable to fatigue, stress, frustration, and depression. Often, they see the needs of others and feel the responsibility to lift them up, and in the process forget about self-care.
As helping professionals, we have learned that helpers need help, encouragement, and support, too. This guide was written to affirm that for helping professionals proper self-care is both a responsibility and a necessity.
Helpers often mistakenly believe that they are invulnerable to fatigue, stress, frustration, and depression.
A Practical Guide to Self-Care for Helping Professionals
Self-care is essential for mental health professionals to stay resilient, effective, and healthy in their roles, allowing them to provide the best care for their clients.
This PDF was originally published as a wraparound guide and is an adapted version for team-based planning process.
The guide explores techniques of increasing professional self-care through supportive supervision, self-monitoring, and structuring the work environment to value and encourage strong self-care.
What’s Included
The guide explores techniques of increasing professional self-care through supportive supervision, self-monitoring, and structuring the work environment to value and encourage strong self-care.
It also includes tools that can be used to assess the current self-care status of professionals in the helping field, self-care lessons based on positive psychology, and individual and group activities.
Content coverage
- The need for self-care during crises
- Family culture and self-care
- Self-care strategies
- Peer-to-peer support of self-care
- Supervision and self-care
- Resources for Self-Care
We’ve all heard the self-care metaphor for parents: “Put your own oxygen mask on first.” But this is just as critical for mental health providers. Check out our podcast to learn more about self-care strategies for those in a position to care for others.
Get the resource
A Practical Guide to Self-Care for Helping Professionals was originally published as a wraparound guide. Download the PDF of the adapted version for team-based planning process.
