on maintaining caregiver resilience. As a result, I realized I need to make this my #1 goal. I love my work and accept that it will take a toll on me at times, however, the outcome of the self assessments given at the course indicate I’m burned out. I don’t want to be burned out, but I can’t deceive myself that it’s just a temporary thing. It isn’t, and if I want to continue my work (which I do) I’m going to need to take some serious steps to help myself cope with the stress.

It’s hard to even write this, because I feel quite overwhelmed just thinking about dealing with this and the anxiety that I won’t be able to do enough to help myself. But as one of my collegues said, “you are just going to have to try because if you worry too much about it then it will be hard to do anything.”

So this is the first step, to put it out there where I can’t ignore it. Putting it as my number one goal. Changing other goals that are associated with improving my resilience and doing them!

I hope in three months I will retake these self assessments and score significantly lower than I am presently. Here are the scores:

Burnout

My score 31 – high 28+, Average 27-20, low 19-

Compassion Fatigue

My score 22 – high 17+, Average 16-9, Low 8-

I’d be satisfied with being average. I hope I get there.