Some of you reading this already know, but for those that don’t I am a child therapist. I work with kids who have experienced trauma and need help processing their experiences. I love helping kids and their families. I love partnering my education and formal training with my lived trauma experiences because it allows me to create a therapeutic environment that has proven to be effective. Currently, I’m in a season of pivoting from my current area of work to a different area that will allow me to work with children as well as their families. I’m excited for this pivot because I want to spread my work around to others instead of staying in one place.
In the past this excitement would have been dimmed because of the guilt I often felt about leaving one group of kids to start working with a different group. I felt guilty because I didn’t want to disappoint the kids or become another adult in their life that left. Luckily, I have always been aware of the possibility that working with kids who have experienced trauma could and probably would trigger me. Therefore, I have spent time in therapy and time on my own processing my trauma as much as I can so that I could provide effective support to the kids.
I’ve been working on this skill for years and in this moment, I feel proud of myself for doing so because I don’t feel any guilt about my pending pivot. I feel like this can be an opportunity for me to model a positive goodby for the kids and really use the space to explain to them that it’s me not them, as cliche as that sounds.
As I write this post I continue to not feel guilty because I’ve done what I can for this group, and more importantly my mental health comes first. While I love what I do, it has reached a point where the expectations of my job duties are hindering my mental health. I’m feeling more weighed down with anxiety. I’m feeling unappreciated and undervalued. I’m feeling trauma exhaustion and work exhaustion at the same time. I’m at the point where something has to give, and while old me would have chosen the job, present me is putting my mental health first.
It’s hard being a trauma survivor with the purpose and passion to help other trauma survivors because of the closeness of our trauma. It’s hard to not be weighed down by their trauma because I connect with it so much. While I acknowledge this and give myself space to process this, I can no longer allow my purpose to outweigh my sanity. I have to put myself first because if I’m not good how can I continue to effectively help kids? I can’t.
So, while there are several kids I work with who will have a hard time when I leave, I can no longer allow that to keep me stuck in a place that isn't good for me. I will miss the kids, but the seeds have been planted and it’s time to find another garden to plant more seeds.