Vicarious Trauma: How to safely work with trauma-exposed individuals

Most people enter caregiving, healthcare, or other frontline work because they want to help others. But what happens when hearing trauma stories and witnessing suffering begins to take its toll on you? This is where vicarious trauma comes in. It’s a hidden cost of caring that can affect individuals’ mental health and well-being. 

In a webinar with Dr. Krystle Martin, Clinical Psychologist at EHN Guardians Gateway, she unpacks what vicarious trauma is, how to recognize its signs, and what individuals can do to manage and prevent it.  

What is Vicarious Trauma? 

Vicarious trauma refers to the emotional residue that builds up when individuals are repeatedly exposed to others’ trauma stories or distress. Unlike burnout or compassion fatigue, vicarious trauma is specific to being a witness to trauma where you are absorbing pain, fear, and grief second-hand. 

Vicarious trauma can shift a person’s worldview. You may start seeing the world as less safe, feel emotionally numb, or have trouble trusting others. Recognizing this distinction is key, because while burnout or compassion fatigue might improve with rest or workload adjustments, vicarious trauma requires targeted awareness and support. 

Symptoms of Vicarious Trauma 

Symptoms of vicarious trauma can look different for everyone, but there are common patterns to watch for: 

• Emotional signs: irritability, sadness, numbness, or hopelessness 

• Cognitive changes: difficulty concentrating, intrusive thoughts, or cynicism 

• Physical symptoms: headaches, fatigue, or disrupted sleep 

• Behavioural shifts: withdrawal from social activities, avoidance, or unhealthy coping strategies (e.g., substance use) 

These changes often happen gradually, making them harder to identify until they significantly affect daily life and work performance. 

Practical Strategies and the Physical Environment 

Dr. Martin discusses the practical strategies that you should implement in your life to safely manage vicarious trauma. Her practical strategies include how you organize your schedule if you work with trauma-exposed clients. By limiting the number of clients you see in a day, leaving short breaks between client sessions, and scheduling heavier cases at the start or end of the day, that can help prevent emotional overload. It’s also important to have a variety of work like seeing clients only a few times a week while doing other tasks like research, consulting or teaching at a university, so that you are not constantly working with trauma-exposed individuals. A well-organized physical environment further supports emotional separation. If you create a designated workspace and step away from the desk during breaks or lunch, that helps maintain clear boundaries between professional and personal life. 

Boundaries and Managing the Slime 

In addition to structuring the workday, setting strong boundaries is key to preventing the buildup of emotional strain. You can set boundaries by maintaining set hours for client communication, and avoiding work-related discussions at home. Dr. Martin also talks about the concept of “slime.” Slime refers to the details of a story that puts an emotional weight on us. Sometimes, we can accidentally pass that emotional weight on to others by sharing the distressing stories with them. If you’re looking for support from someone else, remember to let them know there is a story you want to share with them that has a heavy emotional weight to it and ask for consent before telling them the story. Overall, it’s important to manage boundaries with ourselves, clients and colleagues. 

Emotional Response 

Even with strong boundaries in place, emotional reactions are an inevitable part of trauma-related work. To regulate these emotions, Dr. Martin suggests taking a few moments before each client session to reflect, stretch, or breathe deeply to help create the emotional readiness needed for emotionally heavy conversations. During client sessions, it’s natural to feel empathy or sadness in response to your client’s story. Be transparent about your feelings to your client and understand that your emotional response is purely based on responding to what the client said. By acknowledging those feelings calmly and professionally, it can strengthen trust with your client without compromising composure.  

Caring for Self and Combating Impacts of Trauma 

Ultimately, managing vicarious trauma is about ongoing self-care. Maintaining healthy routines like getting adequate rest, exercise, and nutrition, creates a strong foundation for emotional resilience. Taking regular breaks, planning vacations, or simply allowing time for rest between demanding work periods prevents vicarious trauma. Finally, switch your attention to something else that would take your focus away from work. For example, Dr. Martin has been focusing her attention to the clouds in the sky after her client sessions. If you focus your attention on something else, it can take your attention away from the emotional distressing stories that you’ve just experienced with your client. 

By combining structured work habits, firm boundaries, emotional awareness, and meaningful self-care, you can continue supporting others and prevent vicarious trauma. 

Looking for more information? 

If you work in healthcare, first response, or any trauma-exposed profession, prioritizing wellness is not optional, it’s essential. For a deeper dive into this topic, watch the full webinar with Dr. Krystle Martin on vicarious trauma. 

If you or someone you care about is struggling with concurrent trauma and addiction, PTSD, or a psychological injury, we’re here to help. Fill out our admission form to get the conversation started.   

Watch the Webinar – Vicarious Trauma: How to safely work with trauma-exposed individuals

With Dr. Krystle Martin – Clinical and Forensic Psychologist.

Helpers regularly encounter stories and circumstances in their roles that are emotionally taxing. Additionally, there is evidence that supporting others who have experienced trauma can take a toll on our own well-being. This webinar will provide participants with the opportunity to examine their own experiences, including being aware of their signs of vicarious trauma and strategies to look after their own personal mental health and wellbeing.

Date: Wed., November 20, 2024
Time: 12pm – 1pm EST

Learning Objectives:

• Describe how working with trauma can lead to vicarious trauma
• Identify symptoms of vicarious trauma
• List strategies for preventing and/or managing distress associated with vicarious trauma

Thank you for your interest in our upcoming webinar. We have a maximum capacity of 1000 registrants, and once this limit is reached, registration will be closed.

The content presented in this webinar was accurate at time of broadcast.