Staff support
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Staff Support and Self Care Leaflet
East Lothian Council has produced bereavement, loss and grief guidance for school staff.
It can take a lot of emotional energy to support children and young people through a bereavement or loss, so it is very important that you look after your own wellbeing throughout the process and seek support if needed.
Supports
Staff health and wellbeing is paramount when you are supporting children and young people who are experiencing bereavement and loss. There are a number of steps that can be taken to avoid staff becoming overburdened or distressed.
Policies
Use your organisation’s policies and protocols to help give you the confidence and support to deal with children and young people experiencing bereavement and loss, for example managing critical incidents, child protection and additional support needs.
Line manager/supervisor
Staff require support and supervision to work confidently, professionally and effectively with children and young people experiencing bereavement and loss. The levels of support required will vary according to the staff member’s particular circumstances, for example their role and experience. In addition to formal supervision and training staff may find some or all of the following helpful:
Offloading: Opportunities to ‘let off steam’ and discuss the difficult issues and feelings around working with children and young people experiencing bereavement and loss.
Recognition: Acknowledgement and appreciation of the challenges of this work and for efforts and progress made.
Sharing ideas: The chance to discuss the work with others, sharing ideas and gaining insights.
Training
Access training to help you support children and young people experiencing bereavement and loss. Staff can identify training needs and training opportunities with their line manager.
Occupational Health/Employee Assistance Programme
East Lothian Council has an Employee Assistance Programme that provides confidential support for you at work on all matters relating to your health and wellbeing. This includes access to specific programmes and counselling services.
PAM Assist is a free and confidential life management and personal support service that is available to East Lothian Council employees 24 hours a day, any day of the year. You can access this service by calling 0800 882 4102. Alternatively, you can visit the EAP website for further information http://www.pamassist.co.uk/
Healthy Working Lives - Listening Ears
A Listening Ears service is being developed through a team of volunteers - colleagues who have received mental health first aid training to be helpful empathic listeners and signpost you to appropriate sources of support if required. A list with volunteer names and contact details is available on the authority’s intranet.
When recieving support
Share Feelings
Talk about how you are feeling and share your experiences. Just knowing that others are affected can help you to feel less alone and more able to cope. Informal peer support in the staffroom can be a welcome opportunity to talk through issues and concerns and reduce feelings of inadequacy by jointly talking through strategies to help.
Anticipate having emotional reactions
It is perfectly normal to be emotionally affected. However, recognise that in order to help others, you need to feel reasonably strong yourself. Previous losses in your own life may resurface. Do not be afraid to say if it feels overwhelming. This is not a sign of weakness, but a recognition that we all have our limits. It takes courage to tell someone.
Factors which can contribute to overload
Witnessing pain and distress experienced by the families.
Feeling unskilled in dealing with emotional responses.
Physical exhaustion as a result of emotional trauma.
Poor communication between school and families or other carers.
Points to consider
You do not need to be an expert to provide effective help
Many people feel inadequate and out of their depth when faced with adults or children experiencing deep sadness or trauma. Being alongside children who are hurting can remind us of our own vulnerability and immortality. Most teachers and school staff are caring individuals who naturally have the characteristics required to support bereaved children. You can do this by being there for them in school and building a relationship with them.
Professional Boundaries
When working in a school environment it is very easy to take on too much. Getting over-involved is not helpful to either yourself or to the bereaved child or adult. Remember that you cannot carry their grief for them, but you can share their journey by being there for them and being aware.
Help Others
If you become aware that a colleague is stressed or affected by a death in your school community, or know that they have experienced a bereavement themselves, find the time to ask how they are.
Have information to hand
Have information guides (available within the guidelines) to hand when you are meeting with children, young people and their families. Share these with them to support their understanding and responses. You may also want to signpost families to organisations that support children, young people, parents and carers.
Know your own limitations
Always try to be realistic with the amount of support that you can give. It is much better to offer something small but constant rather than a grand gesture that is going to be difficult to deliver. Providing a listening ear once a week and sticking to it is more meaningful than the offer of help anytime when inevitably that cannot be achieved within a busy school environment.
Self care
Take care of yourself
Make time to do something just for you, give yourself a treat. Physical exercise can be extremely helpful.
Running on empty
Working in a school involves giving lots of your time and energy; supporting a bereaved pupil may compound this, resulting in depleted resources. It can be difficult to ask for help when we most need it as it takes energy and strength. Some of the signs to look out for include feeling physically exhausted and overworked, an inability to delegate and generally not feeling on top of things.
Triggers
If you have been recently bereaved it is recommended that you do not work directly with a bereaved child or young person until you feel ready.
Vicarious Trauma
Vicarious Trauma can impact anyone who provides support to other people who are suffering.
Vicarious Trauma comes from the idea that we cannot regularly see and hear other people's suffering and trauma without being somewhat affected by this ourselves.
By supporting children and young people through bereavements and trauma, it is sometimes the case that this will have an impact on the wellbeing of the individual providing support. If you would like to find out a bit more about vicarious traumatisation you can visit this website, which provides further information on this area.
How to recognise Vicarious Trauma
Vicarious traumatisation can be indicated by a number of things such as:
Feeling you are no longer good at your job
Feeling a lack of hope or meaning in what you are doing
Feeling increasingly disconnected and isolating yourself from others
Feeling a lack of motivation for everyday life and self-care
Feeling obsessed by the person you are helping or desperately wanting to avoid them
Feeling overly anxious about your own loved ones
The VT Monitoring Checklist can be used as a way to screen yourself for the feelings, thoughts, behaviours and physical symptoms which, over time can indicate Vicarious Traumatisation.
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Building resilience to Vicarious Trauma
Increased awareness, support and self-care help to build a helper's resilience, improve well-being and soften the impact of VT.
Research suggests four elements that are the pillars to build VT resilience in helpers.
Awareness: what can I feel in my body?
Connection: do I reach out?
Balance: is my life balanced at work and home? Do I make enough time for me?
Compassion: do I recognise what I find in myself with kindness, as a friend would?
These four pillars are useful for all helpers to engage with individually, but it can also be helpful to join up with someone you trust to monitor for signs of vicarious trauma and encourage each other to build up resilience.
References
Child Bereavement UK - Supporting a Bereaved Pupil (lgfl.org.uk)
Vicarious Traumatisation - Help for the Helpers Website Vicarious Traumatisation - Help for the Helpers | Vicarious Trauma | Vicarious Traumatisation | Burnout (vicarious-traumatisation.com)