CLINICAL EDITOR’S COMMENTS:


Practicing gentle self-care will help play therapists defeat the dark side of trauma work.


The Dark Side of Trauma Work Healing trauma can be incredibly meaningful and rewarding; however, there is also a dark side to this work. Researchers consistently recognize that helping professionals are at risk for vicarious trauma, compassion fatigue, and burnout


(Figley, 2002; Mathieu, 2012). Play therapists,


in particular, may be at heightened risk for professional and personal impairment, because “children naturally provoke adults’ desires to         al., 2018, p. 2). My own journey into this profession has taught me the importance of self-care in preventing such impairment and in allowing me to continue this important work.


  truth of trauma work is that too many promising early career clinicians leave the profession (Kinman & Grant, 2011), or stop working with children, because they do not receive adequate support and learn the importance of implementing effective self-care (McCann et al., 2013).  long-term intimate relationships, developed drinking problems, and experienced depression and fatigue as a result of doing this work.


Trial by Fire                and had been sexually abused by her father. I felt wholly unprepared and deeply inadequate as I stumbled to help her. I was fortunate enough to have a Registered Play Therapist – Supervisor (RPT-S)  tray and hundreds of miniatures. Armed with encouragement from my supervisor and seminal texts in non-directive play therapy (e.g.,      had been sexually abused. The most helpful advice this supervisor ever gave me was to make sure I spend time with non-traumatized children. I follow this advice to this day.


After graduation, I took a job as an in-home family therapist working with children who were at risk for out-of-home-placement. In addition to the intensity of this crisis work, I was on-call 24/7, preventing my nervous system from ever fully regulating. I started to suffer from some symptoms of impairment, including sleep disturbance, intrusive images and thoughts, emotional exhaustion, irritability, and drinking more frequent glasses of wine at the end of hard days. Despite my passion for 


quit this in-home position after only a year in order to recharge my depleted batteries, and I started getting serious about wellness and self-care. I simultaneously dove into private practice, where I was largely providing play therapy to sexually abused children through the crime victim compensation program. Although this precipitated a steep and unpleasant learning curve involving court testimony, it also was a beacon for developing skills related to boundary setting and standing up for myself and for my child clients.


Tapping into the Light To further educate myself, I volunteered to serve on the Taskforce for Child Sexual Abuse Prevention at the local child advocacy center. Through this work, I was introduced to, and eventually became a facilitator for Darkness to Light, Stewards of Children®, a nationally  prevent childhood sexual abuse. I have facilitated trainings to groups of childcare workers, parents, doctors, teachers, and therapists. In doing so, I feel empowered and hopeful for the future, feelings that can be 


Few of us enter this work fully


understanding the myriad of ways it can negatively impact our wellbeing, and many of us lose sight of how


invasive and detrimental that impact can be over time.


As play therapists, we have been called to not only help children heal, but also to call out dysfunctional family patterns, and to advocate for children in the family system, in the classroom, and in the courtroom. We need to bring the dark issues of childhood sexual abuse to light proactively to protect children, to empower them to share their experiences, and to model for them what healthy relationships look and feel like (Darkness to Light, n.d.). A Darkness to Light® research study involving over 80,000 educators provides evidence that child sexual abuse prevention training can produce direct, positive outcomes for children (Townsend &  into the light helps, and practicing self-care allows us to hold onto hope, to continue to empower ourselves and others, and to reconnect with our passion for this work and for life.


www.a4pt.org | June 2019 | PLAYTHERAPY | 21


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