Professionals Cry Too

This week I'm going to write about professionals and emotions. In my past career as a low level nurse and support worker, the image of professionalism often meant not showing our true emotions to our clients or their families or even each other. We were encouraged to be emotional walls of strength that anything could be thrown at. That we would be impervious to any harm. Our clients could scream abuse at us when they were diagnosed with some kind of horrible condition. At times over the slightest provocation clients would have angry outburst directed toward nursing staff. In disability services as a support worker it was common place for clients and their families to use us as emotional whipping boys. If we complained we were told it's all part of the job. Things have changed now, thank goodness. However, there is still a bit of confusion about if it is ok to show our emotions. What are the consequences of suppressing these deep felt emotions and how can we deal with them in a professional way. Hopefully this week's blog will be helpful to you in finding a healthy balance and ways to deal with sadness.

There was method to this madness of emotion suppression. It isn't a great idea to drop to the floor in fetal position and cry when your clients  die or divulge a horrible past secret. You do have to remain strong in these caring roles. However, there is nothing wrong with crying about these things in moderation, seeking out some counselling yourself which is outside supervision. Employing some tactics to allow yourself to leave your work at work. To acknowledge that your clients are important to you and having a cry is human. Being a counsellor, nurse or doctor doesn't stop you from being human.

Some of the things you can do to prevent yourself from burning out are maintaining some healthy life practices. Not taking on more than you can handle, getting adequate rest, allowing yourself to process the sadness you feel when a client passes away. I worked for a wonderful organisation that promoted processing grief. They held staff meeting specifically for the nursing staff to talk about the person or people who had died. This was really helpful it usually entailed meeting somewhere for food and talking about all the things we loved and didn't love so much about these people we had cared for, over sometimes years. There was laughter and tears in these staff meetings. It was a lovely way to send our clients off. We were also given 6 weeks free counselling every year. Some nurses took up this option some did not. Some nurses were invited to the meetings/dinner some came along, some did not. I know that this experience was very good for me. It was lovely to hear the stories of the clients special moments with each of the staff. I never worked for another place that offered this kind of support however, I do wish that more organisations did something similar to this.

There is a lot of research being done at the moment around carer burnout, grieving and nursing in Palliative care. The impact on professionals who are working with patients who have a high mortality rate is also being research broadly. Hopefully this will assist professionals who work in this area of care and support to be acknowledged, not only by their peers also within the wider community. Understanding that it is really ok and human to experience strong emotions when the people we care for die. Death is part of the living experience, as is grieving for the people who die. There is so much opportunity to grow when we experience these emotions and reflect upon our experience as professionals in these roles.  In particular our role in caring for people who are dying. Irving Yalom talks about the experience of working with people who are dying as heightening his own experience of living. If we suppress our feelings, we run the risk of not growing as humans and as professionals. I think it is a lovely tribute to lives of the people we care for if we acknowledge our own grief when they are gone from our lives.

In conclusion, I would like to say thank you to all the clients I have cared for and their families for enriching my life. I would also like to thank all my fellow nurses for their wonderful input into my professional growth which I'm sure will make me a much better counsellor and psychologist.

References

Burtson, P. L., & Stichler, J. F. (2010). Nursing work environment and nurse care: relationship among motivational factors. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 1819-1829.

Cocco, E., Gatti, M., deMendonco Limma, A., & Comus, V. (2003). A comparative study of stress and burnout among sstaff caregivers in nursing homes and acute geriatric wards. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 78-85.

Juthberg, C., Eriksson, S., Norberg, A., & Sundin, K. (2010). Perceptions of conscience, stress of conscience and burnout among nursing staff in residential elder care. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 1708-1718.

Kaur, D., Sambasivan, M., & Kumar, N. (2013). Effect of spiritual intelligence, emotional intelligence, psychological ownership and burout on caring behaviour of nurses: a cross-sectional study. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 3192-3202.

Peters, V., Houkes, I., de Rijk, A., Bohle, P., Engles, J., & Nijhuis, F. (2016). Which resources moderate the effects of demanding work schedules on nurses working in residential elder care? A longitudinal study. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 31-43.

Yalom, I. (2010, June 10). Dr Yalom 1-3 Death & Existential Psychotherapy. Retrieved October 11, 2014, from youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-1dfH_kVZA