Self-care is critical for effective and ethical counseling practice and this inspirational book offers diverse, realistic perspectives on how to achieve work–life balance and personal wellness from graduate school through retirement. In addition to the authors’ unique perspectives as professionals at different stages of their careers, guest contributors—ranging from graduate students, to new professionals, to seasoned counselors—share their experiences and thoughts about self-care, including what challenges them most. Both personal and conversational in tone, this book will help you to create your own practical self-care action plan through reflection on important issues, such as managing stress, establishing personal and professional boundaries, enhancing relationships, and finding meaning in life. "Counselors face the obstacle of remembering to care for themselves while focusing on caring for others. In Counselor Self-Care, Drs. Gerald Corey, Michelle Muratori, Jude Austin, and Julius Austin lead 52 contributing authors in a book rich with living events and defining moments. Multiple stressors are described and met with multiple solutions. There is so much great content here that can be embraced by those who do the noble work of being present for others." —Tom Skovholt, PhD, LP, Professor, University of Minnesota; Author of The Resilient Practitioner: Burnout and Compassion Fatigue Prevention and Self-Care Strategies for the Helping Professions, 3rd Edition "Self-care is often discussed in counselor training and supervision, but not in its full scope. Counselor Self-Care provides breadth and depth by addressing the many facets of self-care. The authors combine personal narratives and anecdotes from experienced mental health professionals with self-assessment questions and self-care improvement strategies. The level of vulnerability and insight from the authors, and those who share their stories, is informative and rare to find. Assign this book as reading for yourself, your students, and your supervisees to motivate nurturing of the self." —Philip Clarke, PhD, Associate Professor, Wake Forest University *Requests for digital versions from ACA can be found on www.wiley.com *To request print copies, please visit the ACA https://imis.counseling.org/store/detail *Reproduction requests for material from books published by ACA should be directed to [email protected]

Self-care is critical for effective and ethical counseling practice and this inspirational book offers diverse, realistic perspectives on how to achieve worklife balance and personal wellness from graduate school through retirement. In addition to the authors unique perspectives as professionals at different stages of their careers, guest contributorsranging from graduate students, to new professionals, to seasoned counselorsshare their experiences and thoughts about self-care, including what challenges them most. Both personal and conversational in tone, this book will help you to create your own practical self-care action plan through reflection on important issues, such as managing stress, establishing personal and professional boundaries, enhancing relationships, and finding meaning in life.--Publisher's website.

Psychotherapy is an increasingly stressful profession. Yet therapists spend most of their time helping clients deal with their stress, not caring for their own. This book is designed as a tool for the experienced counselor, junior therapist, and graduate student, as the issues confronted and discussed herein are relevant to anyone in the field, regardless of experience or expertise. Dr. Weiss has written a book in an easy, conversational tone, filled with concrete examples and blending research findings, clinical experience and theoretical approaches into practical suggestions and sound advice. The book is divided into three parts, discussing therapist concerns and questions that are continually raised, and providing practical tools based on clinical experience and research findings. It will be useful to all mental health professionals who have felt the strain of their practice.

Counselor Wellness: Caring for Self to Care for Others underscores the importance of self-care for counselors in order to maintain an ethical, life-giving practice and minimize the risks of burnout, compassion fatigue, and secondary trauma. The book provides valuable insight regarding the inherent risks and challenges that come with serving others. It contains timely research and practical strategies for reducing stress and preventing the deleterious effects that can derail personal and professional effectiveness. Each chapter begins with a reflection from a counselor, setting the stage for robust discussions about the rigors of counseling practice and the personal challenges many counselors face. The chapters feature cutting-edge research and evidence-based approaches to recognizing, intervening, and preventing threats to emotional well-being. Case illustrations and guided exercises personalize the reading experience and help readers draw connections between the material and their everyday lives. Key topics addressed include the increasing complexity and severity of clients' issues, the cost of empathy, ethical issues, developing a personal wellness orientation, and resiliency. Designed to help counselors prioritize self-care in order to support the successful care of others, Counselor Wellness is an exemplary resource for pre-service counselors, as well as those in practice. Richard D. Parsons, Ph.D. is a professor of counselor education at West Chester University. He has over 40 years of university teaching experience and has had a private clinical practice for over 30 years. Dr. Parsons serves as a consultant to educational and mental health institutions in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware. He has authored or co-authored over 90 books, book chapters, and professional articles. He earned his master's and doctoral degrees from Temple University. Karen L. Dickinson, Ph.D. is an associate professor and graduate coordinator of counselor education at West Chester University. She has 13 years of university teaching experience and over 30 years of experience as a teacher and school counselor in the K-12 education system. Bridget Asempapa, Ph.D. is an assistant professor of counselor education and the coordinator of the school counseling certification program at West Chester University. She has a dual license in professional school counseling and clinical mental health counseling.

Self-Supervision synthesizes past and current literature on the theory and practice of self-supervision and provides counselors and human service professionals with a plan for the pursuit of independent professional growth. Beginning with a historical overview and discussion of the counselor-client relationship, boundary transgressions, the counselor's family-of-origin and unresolved issues, and disclosure styles, the author provides the reader with a foundation for understanding the issues that must be examined when evaluating one's own work. He then outlines the reflective process and describes the actual practice, guiding principles, and strategies for self-supervision. Finally the author presents several proactive measures for counselor self-care that readers will find useful.

Therapists are often expected to be immune to the kind of problems that they help clients through. This book serves to demonstrate that this is certainly not the case: they are no more resistant to difficult and unexpected personal circumstances than anyone else. In this book Marie Adams looks into the kind of problems that therapists can be afraid to face in their own lives, including divorce, bereavement, illness, depression and anxiety and uses the experience of others to examine the best ways of dealing with them. The Myth of the Untroubled Therapist looks at the lives of forty practitioners to learn how they coped during times of personal strife. CBT, psychoanalytic, integrative and humanistic therapists from an international array of backgrounds were interviewed about how they believed their personal lives affected their work with clients. Over half admitted to suffering from depression since entering the profession and many continued practising while ill or under great stress. Some admitted to using their work as a ‘buffer’ against their personal circumstances in an attempt to avoid focusing on their own pain. Using clinical examples, personal experience, research literature and the voices of the many therapists interviewed, Adams challenges mental health professionals to take a step back and consider their own well-being as a vital first step to promoting insight and change in those they seek to help. Linking therapists’ personal histories to their choice of career, The Myth of the Untroubled Therapist pinpoints some of the key elements that may serve, and sometimes undermine, counsellors working in private practice or mental health settings. The book is ideal for counsellors and psychotherapists as well as social workers and those working within any kind of helping profession.

Mental health professionals spend their days helping others, but who is there to help them when stress and burnout threaten their own well-being? Filled with self-assessments, journaling exercises, and activities designed to facilitate renewal, growth, and change, this timely book helps clinicians help themselves with coverage of career threatening issues, such as fear of failure, loss of confidence, and the financial stress and loss of autonomy that many clinician's experience as a result of managed care and its constraints.