1. Prevention of Compassion Fatigue
Louise Beck, MSW, LICSW
Beck Cognitive Therapy Associates
YAR 2016

2. Empathic Resonance Key feature in caregiving relationships
Self compassion is essential in helping care givers thrive in their roles

3. What is Self-Compassion?
Mindfulness
Common humanity
Self kindness

4. LK Meditation Training the mind to be more loving and compassionate
Dose dependent
Language, concentration and connection
Power of words
Page 80

5. Signs of fatigue Disturbed sleep
Avoiding thoughts and feelings associated with the situation
Distress, intrusive thoughts
Our attention wanders away from the person we’re suppose to care for
We become irritated or angry, sometimes even hateful, toward those we are caring for

6. Not a weakness, a sign of being human!
We all have our limits to how much vicarious suffering we can bear
When it’s too much we start resisting and we get fatigued

7. Typical advice we get to alleviate fatigue
Exercise
Attend workshops
Work less
Get supervision
Delegate responsibility
Spend time with friends
Draw boundaries

8. What is the limitation of these strategies?
They are important self care strategies
Often motivated by self kindness
But take place off the job
So in the midst of suffering these strategies don’t help

9. Too much compassion?
Actually need more, but different, to alleviate caregiver fatigue

10. Letting go of Resistance
Mindfulness opposite of resistance
The wish that our moment to moment experience be other than it is
How do we know we are resisting?
What we resist, persists
Suffering = Pain x Resistance
What we can feel, we can heal
Page 52

11. Compassion and Empathy
What is the difference?
Empathy involves emotional resonance, feeling the feelings of the other person
If just feeling the suffering of others without having the emotional resources to hold it
We will fight against it, and burn out
Compassion is empathy plus love
This is a positive emotion, an energizing emotion

12. Giving ourselves compassion
When we are experiencing empathic pain
As well as giving compassion to those we care about

13. Threat Defense System We are both the attacker and the attacked
Cortisol released…emotionally painful and related to conditions like anxiety and depression
Reptiles and mammals
Mammalian care-giving system evolved
System triggered by 3 main factors
Warmth, soothing touch, gentle vocalizations
Page 30, 27

14. Jama, 2009 article
“Physicians with burnout who use self-care without self awareness may feel as though they are drowning and barely able to come up for air, whereas self-care with self-awareness is like learning to breath underwater.”

15. Matthieu Ricard Empathy without compassion Empathy with compassion

16. Buddha:
“You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”

17. Video
Empathy

18. When we are experiencing empathic pain
We give ourselves compassion
As well as compassion to those we care for
Otherwise become depleted and less able to give

19. Dali lama said (2000)
For someone to develop genuine compassion towards others, first he or she must have a basis upon which to cultivate compassion, and that basis is the ability to connect to one’s own feelings and to care for one’s own wellness….
Caring for others requires caring for oneself

20. Practice:
Self-compassion for caregivers

21. Poem
Awakening Rights by Mark Nepo

22. Resource Guide www.CenterforMSC.org Center for Mindful Self-Compassion
Chris Germer
Kristen Neff
Matthieu Ricard
Louise Beck, Amesbury, MA