How to cope with compassion fatigue
It’s defined as a sense of emotional exhaustion triggered by a widespread period of distress. It’s not callousness. And it’s not just you
What does one say to someone in distress and reaching out? How does one condole with a different person every day? Is there a cure to the numbness each new piece of bad news brings? The feeling of emotional exhaustion triggered by a widespread period of distress is called compassion fatigue. It leads to a reduced ability to empathise and process grief or loss. It is also called the negative cost of caring.
Compassion fatigue is a feeling that has become familiar to psychotherapists and counsellors in the pandemic. Now, it’s a feeling familiar to the general populace too. “People are in situations that no one can be prepared to handle, from health emergencies to the associated panic,” says Vandana Choudhary, clinical psychologist at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Delhi. How have the therapists been coping? It helps to acknowledge your own suffering, lean on peers, learn to take breaks from it all, and make time for the things you love, they say.
1. Acknowledge that you are suffering. This is a collective grief that we are experiencing, and we should not try to be robots because we are not, says Choudhary. “The panic people are experiencing when someone is in the hospital, the grief when they lose someone, I can identify with that too because I’m also going through panic, grief and the sense of helplessness,” she adds. “Acknowledging that yes we are overwhelmed and vulnerable will help individuals express themselves, and create a feeling of collectiveness, leading to people being better able to help each other.”
2. Lean on peers. Most of the people you know are overwhelmed right now too, and just knowing that can help. Talking to peers helps acknowledge the problems you’re facing and confirm that others are facing them too. “The sense of solidarity that people from the same profession are giving each other can help a lot,” says Choudhary. Therapists’ WhatsApp groups offer steady encouragement and understanding, adds psychologist Seema Hingorrany. “I’m a trauma expert and I have my trauma groups and we give a lot of encouragement to each other there.” Spending too much on these groups can add to the fatigue too, so keep it to one or two half-hour slots a day.
3. Acknowledge that you are doing all you can. So much is not in one’s hands right now, says Choudhary. “For the lay person that translates as vicarious trauma. In such a time, one needs to look for one’s own control boxes — what is that they can do (call and check in on people, forward messages that contains helpful information).”
Pragya Lodha, a Mumbai-based clinical psychologist, says she has dealt with this sense of guilt herself. “Many of my psychiatrist friend and colleague are frontline workers doing Covid duty in hospitals, while I work from home. Sometimes that leads me to ask, am I doing enough?” Lodha says. “Then I remind myself that I’m doing my bit and helping people as much as I can. And I remind myself that guilt doesn’t help.”
4. Learn to take breaks. Create downtime that is free of work and free from pandemic news. Monitor how long you are spending on social media platforms, and adjust that time as needed. Lodha has all but given up Instagram. “I log in when I’m doing an IG Live and then I immediately log out again. I stopped using Facebook in July and haven’t gone back,” she says.
Some find it difficult to log out precisely because there’s such a continuous outpouring of grief and loss, giving rise once again to the question of whether they should be doing more, and whether it is ethical to turn away. “It’s important, as a person, to show compassion to yourself too,” Choudhary says.
5. Make time for the things you love. It could be crochet or cooking, playtime with the kids or watching a TV series. Make time to be yourself again, and a good way to do that is to spend time doing the things that brought you joy. “When it gets really overwhelming, we are learning to say no to unscheduled sessions unless it’s an emergency,” says Lodha. “That allows for some time with family or to do calming things like gardening or just sitting outdoors not talking and looking up at the stars.”