0:00:00.7 Professor Walden: Hello people. So we are going live, and we are as usual, waiting for folks to kind of pop in, and I always have to get my phone together. So we’re gonna do that as well. But welcome, welcome. I am very excited to have you here and to just have tonight happen, because it’s gonna be an exciting night, we have been talking very much so about taking care of the caregiver, and we are going to completely lead into that and continue to talk about that as we move forward. Alright guys, so as you guys are popping on, as you are, this is Mental Health Awareness Month, so we are continuing with that theme, and we are going to be pushing the mental health awareness for you guys and taking care of yourselves as I have been discussing and kind of leading up to. And so we’re continuing on with that thing, so I am really excited that we are going to be moving forward with this and keeping it at the forefront of your mind, that I need you guys to really, really make an effort to take care of yourselves, especially as the world is opening back up, I really want you to make sure that you have proper coping mechanisms and coping skills to take care of yourselves, as well as us dealing with all of the things that we are dealing with.
0:01:48.0 Professor Walden: I wanna make sure that you, yourself is at the forefront of your mind, always. I don’t ever want you to forget that. So take your breaks, take your PTO, all of that good stuff. So, with that being said, we have, again, with Mental Health Awareness Month, we are bringing in the new expert, okay? So the expert we have here is Miss Shana Trimble. I’m gonna read her bio and then you guys can be excited just like I am. Okay, so this is going to be Miss Shana Trimble, she is a licensed marriage and family therapist with experience in education within the world of therapy as well as the human capital industry. She’s had many years of experience working with individuals, couples, families, and teens with or without concurring disorders, as well as relationship coaching for personal and business improvement. She’s truly enjoyed helping others improve their relationships that they have with themselves and with others, and whether or not she’s helping through strength-based services or coaching. She believes in what she can do. She’s also a wife, a mother, a grandmother, a daughter, a sister, a friend. It is her belief that she can help the most when we are able to connect through our innate ability to understand each other.
0:03:14.3 Professor Walden: And not necessarily because we have experienced the same things, but mostly because we have all experienced the same emotions. So her daily thought that she’d like to leave with you is the second chance you asked for happens every day that you wake up. So with that being said, we are going to welcome Miss Shana Trimble. Yay, hello.
0:03:37.2 Miss Shana Trimble: Hello everyone.
0:03:41.3 Professor Walden: Yay! I am excited. Guys, she is going to have some giveaways that I think is going to be very helpful, so I’m letting the cat out of the bag a little bit. But definitely, I think that you all should be sticking around, should be listening. Hey, Lucy… So that she can pour into you as well as so that you can possibly reach some of these lovely little benefits that she’s going to have for us as well. So I am going to add your PowerPoints and you can take it away.
0:04:14.2 Miss Shana Trimble: Well, thank you, and welcome. And thank you for having me, and all that good stuff. So basically, I would like to say that if we were live, I would kinda run in and be like, Hey, we have some music on, but we don’t have that here, so we’ll improvise a little bit, so whatever song that you really like, have that going to your head, I know that we are running into a very late hour, so I’ll try not to take you into a very long-winded type of presentation. I want you to be able to get what I have to give and then be able to leave with some good key notes and things that you can use and then get a good night’s rest, because after all, this is self, being able to take care of ourselves. And so I’ll just quickly introduce what I’ll be talking about, so it’s all about the burnout boundaries and self-care, taking care of the care professional, and oftentimes, we do not know how to do that.
0:05:13.8 Miss Shana Trimble: So as you see in my presentation, I have my little cup going, it’s like the little steam, so it’s like necessarily, I use this image to more so tap into the thought of how we need to keep refreshed. It’s like drinking a cold cup of coffee or a cold cup of tea, like, who wants that? But that is what happens when we are suffering from a lot of burnout, we don’t really have good boundaries, and we don’t have really good self-care, then we’re no longer hot. So if we’re no longer hot we’re not as good as we can be. And that’s something that I would love for you guys to take away with that thought process. So let’s do a little icebreaker here. So based on how you are feeling, can you say it with an emoji? Like now that we are in this session together, how are you feeling? Anybody can chat or comment around how you’re feeling today based on your emotions. Are we happy? Are we sad? Are we tired? Do we not necessarily wanna be here? Do we just wanna be out shopping? Like chat in and let everybody know where you are. I know I need a new pair of shoes and I’ve been trying to get to the mall, but haven’t really worked out ’cause what I like, I don’t necessarily wanna buy. So I know that we probably all experience that from time to time. Well thank you. I got a little smiley face, so that’s a good thing at 7:12 PM, Welcome.
0:06:48.2 Miss Shana Trimble: I know a lot of us, it’s probably on the downhill. And sometimes even in at 8:00 PM, we’re like, “Do we need another cup of coffee?” So yeah, so that is a good thing that we are on the uphill and we’re still smiling and we’re not necessarily really sad, so I’ll take it. That’s awesome. So initially we’re talking about what is burnout. So the burnout is like these trigger words that everybody’s using. So now self-care is the thing. Self-care is the thing. We’re talking about burnout. We’re talking about boundaries, but there is so much into what burnout looks like, especially for the caring professional when we talk about therapists, when we talk about nurses, when we talk about doctors, or when we talk about home health aids, anybody that’s in a position to actually have the responsibility of taking care of someone else, we experience the higher rates of burnout. So that is a really big deal when you think about that. When you say okay, am I going into a profession, which is something we often don’t think about, that experience a lot of burnout?
0:08:01.1 Miss Shana Trimble: And so this is definitely one of those, and I’m sure as students, as coming into this career, you’re getting a taste of that as you begin to study and you see everything that’s needed, if you’re having an internship, if you having to be at a hospital, the news that you’re hearing around your profession, I’m sure that alone has tapped a little bit into burnout. So by definition, burnout is a condition experienced by workers in other professionals in which they develop depression-like symptoms as a result of aspects of their role. Burnout may manifest as showing signs of physical, mental, or emotional exhaustion as a result of stress related to excessive and prolonged stress. So you will see job and workplace, and I crossed that out for a reason, because as a caring professional, technically, we choose the careers that fit who we are as people. So you’re not only a caring professional at work, even though that is the place that may take the majority of your time during the week, you also tend to be like okay, I’m a caring professional at home. I’m a caring professional with my friends. I tend to now be seen as the person. So we have excessive and prolonged stress, meaning that even if it’s related to my job, and now I’m at work and I’m now stressed about something else that’s happening around a care person that I’m in charge of caring for at home, then guess what? We have a prolonged stress.
0:09:35.1 Miss Shana Trimble: We’re taking everything, we’re mushing it together, and as we mush it together, everything seems overwhelming. So there is something that we call bleed over and we’ll get into that, but ultimately it’s more than just job or workplace stress that can cause burnout, okay? So I just really wanna pinpoint that and let you guys know okay, don’t just look at burnout because of the definition that “they have given us.” We have to be able to manage stress because we have that stress already at work, so we have to definitely know how to manage that stress when we get home and create some type of divide. So here is the goods that with this late in the game, I am a lover of treats, and I think that everybody should have treats. So because of that, we’re gonna play a little game, and let’s check your mental stash for some cash. Okay, so I am giving away a $25 Cash App or Apple Pay or PayPal or Zelle, however you receive your quick money at the end of this based on people experience depression-like symptoms, when we are suffering from burnout. If anybody can list the most or whoever can list the maximum amount of what they think those symptoms are and get them correct, I will give you a $25 cash prize tonight. So you can go get you something to eat. You can go get you a foot massage. You can do whatever you wanna do with this $25.
0:11:14.0 Miss Shana Trimble: So I am going to start, now actually, and give you about 10 seconds to put in the chat, list as many symptoms as you think shows up when you are experiencing burnout. So one, two, three, ready, go. I would play some Jeopardy music ding ding ding ding while we were waiting, and I maybe should have added that to the slide. That would have been so much better. So the first in that can give me as many as possible, and when we click this next slide and you are right, you will get some cash tonight. So let’s see. Whoever starts chiming in. Oh yeah, that is good. That is good. So we’re coming up on, let’s say eight, nine, anybody else, and 10. Okay, so, I think the moderator will be able to tell me who put the most in, but we will go to the next slide. Depressive-like symptoms. Okay, so here is the actual list of all the things that you could be experiencing when you are experiencing burnout, and this is a huge deal, you guys. And the reason why this is a huge deal is because, especially from my position as a licensed Marriage and family therapist who deal with a lot of mental health care, and when we start talking about actually having depressive-like symptoms versus actually being depressed, this is a big deal. Because there is a certain line that we have to draw between what looks like depression and what is actually depression. Including what is causing these symptoms, right?
0:13:12.4 Miss Shana Trimble: So if you’re telling me that you’re going to work every day, and this is what you feel like. This is huge, because think about how well you’re able to do your job when this is constantly knocking at your door. Meaning that I’m unable to get out of the bed, I don’t wanna do it, I’m tired, these people are getting on my nerve. Then mistakes start happening as well, when we start talking about anxiety or being really sleepy or not being invested or interested, and those things start affecting our job. So then when people start saying, “Okay, well, how are you in the office? Because you’re making too many mistakes,” or these things are being done incorrectly, or you know, somebody watching over me and saying, “Okay, you just don’t seem like you’re here and client or, patients or clients on my side, are like upset with you because you didn’t do something. That is a really big deal, and that further frustrates you even more, and then therefore it continues to keep you on this wheel of what seems to be the burnout wheel, that if I’m not doing something good, I’m breaking down, people don’t feel like I’m doing something good, so they have negative input and then the wheel just continues to spiral, and so this is a big deal.
0:14:30.8 Miss Shana Trimble: So, I ask that you print screen this particular slide, because these are things that you need to notice if you are having these symptoms. So, if you have not been necessarily diagnosed with depression and you are noticing that, “Okay, I’m keeping track and I noticed that now I’m feeling like this, and now I’m feeling like this.” Really look at how you manage stress, look at how I’m being able to do self-care. These are big, big, big ticket items to take in consideration. So, I’ll leave this up for a second just for you guys can print screen it, ’cause I want you to be able to notice it, and then we’re gonna move to the next slide. So, things that can cause burnout. So some of the things that I notice, of course, being from my seat, and I’m sure you guys have noticed more of these or just a couple of snippets of what it could actually look like. So, ultimately, yes, there is tons of things that can cause burnout ’cause there’s tons of things that could cause stress. So, these are the things however, that us often very, very eye-catching. So as your perspective, right? People is like, “Oh, how can my perspective make me burnout?” Because of how I see things, if I’m constantly overwhelmed because how I see things, that can lead to burnout.
0:15:52.6 Miss Shana Trimble: We got chaos, and when we talk about chaos and we’re talking about emotional or mental or physical disorganization, and then being a trash can. This is a big one ’cause we take everything in and we let nothing out. Everything becomes our responsibility. So, when we see that, these are some of the key factors. Okay, so your perspective. Ongoing negative thoughts that can assist in burnout. So, when we say whether I am pessimistic or optimistic, that’s a really big deal, because how I see stress has a lot to do with how I handle it. So if I see stress as something that is, my life is technically, always overwhelmed, I don’t have enough to give, they’re always taking my last, then that changes my thought about what I can do and what I need to do for myself versus when I’m like, “Oh, okay, I got a little bit left, I can do this thing and be objective about it, and then once I do this, I’ll be able to have so much more for myself and I’ll have time.” That is a perspective, that is a mindset. So it becomes a really big deal to be able to look at that and say, when I’m thinking about burnout, how much of how I think impacts how I am feeling? And so that becomes a big deal.
0:17:10.2 Miss Shana Trimble: The thought about the trash can. This is when everyone’s problem becomes my problem. And this is a concept that has a lot of us caregivers stumped, because this is also when you start thinking about why you chose your career. A lot of us chose our career because we are what? Naturally caring people, right? So we want to be in this field. We see ourselves caring for people, we see ourselves loving people, and therefore we want to be there to help, right? So, we probably was helping in some type of capacity way before we chose our career, right? And so when we think about that, then we think about, “Okay, well, how was I handling when people noticed that I was the caregiver, what did they do with how I cared, right?” Did they appreciate and be like, “Thanks, I really appreciate,” or did they start dumping things on you, asking you for more than you could give and you begin to take that on? Or, you begin to feel like everybody’s problem is now your problem, and therefore I have to do something about it. And then guess what? When we start to behave that way and be seen that way, that’s what people see us as, right? So, then they begin to say, “Oh okay, well, I can just give it to you and she’ll do something about it, she’ll have an answer about it,” and that’s what I mean by being a trash can.
0:18:36.8 Miss Shana Trimble: Because what happens is people are able to somehow throw what they have burdens with into you and walk away and be fine, and now it’s your responsibility to do something with it, right? Either process it, cover up the smell, bag it up, you are now responsible for the trash. So, we don’t necessarily want to be the trash can people. Now, ultimately, do we wanna help? Absolutely. But do we wanna be the trash can? Absolutely not. So learning how to divide that and we’ll definitely go into that. Emotional and mental and physical chaos. This is a big deal because sometimes this may affect you. All of them may affect you, and sometimes only one or two of them may affect you. So when I say that, I say that in regards to when people say, “Oh, this is my organized chaos.” So you may go into a room and they may have everything just kind of scattered and you’re like, “Oh my gosh, how are you dealing with this space like it is?” And they’re doing just fine, right? So some people say, “Okay, the physical part doesn’t bother me, but when my emotions are everywhere or when my mind is completely overwhelmed ’cause I got 50,000 things on it, then I am not myself.” And therefore I need to figure out how to get things off of my list or out of my bucket, or clean around me, so that I don’t get overwhelmed. So that is a big deal. So you have to first recognize what are you?
0:20:06.1 Miss Shana Trimble: Do you suffer from all of them, one or two of them? And then be able to understand how do I then control that part that adds to my, or maybe what I say stacking bricks adds to my weight around how I end up feeling burned out, and that’s a big deal. So preventing burnout. So ideally, you need to establish healthy boundaries, personal boundaries and professional boundaries. Those are ideal, if you are establishing personal boundaries, the likelihood that you will be struggling establishing professional boundaries is very likely so. Practicing self-care, that is huge, and we’ll get into the boundaries, and self-care as well, but practice being prepared. Being prepared helps us not to be burned out because we’re not waiting until the last minute to think about, “Oh God, this is how I need to do it.” You prevent a lot of anxiety or just your thoughts about things, you feel like I’m prepared to be able to present how I’m feeling or what I’m doing. I don’t feel like, “Oh, I have to rush around in the last minute.” Establishing independent thinking. This is a huge thing because a lot of people get burned out when I am having to wait for somebody else to think for me, and this applies to personal and professional life.
0:21:28.9 Miss Shana Trimble: So if I’m constantly waiting on someone, I may be burned out just from the fact that I don’t know what’s happening or I can’t make the decision even though I can. So that’s something to think about. And being consistent, being consistent with yourself is so important, so when we talk about being consistent with boundaries, being consistent with self-care, you have to be the main one that protects your own burnout. So if I don’t wanna be burned out, then I have to make sure that I establish what I need and I be consistent about maintaining it. So here we are, good old boundaries, and I know you guys have probably heard this so, so, so many times, but this is really a big deal. And I can personally say that I didn’t really understand how big it was in the profession that I’m in, or my previous life until I actually was in the profession, and I saw just how not having professional boundaries really impacts our life and causes us stress that is just undeniable, right? So when we talk about professional boundaries, it’s the ability to adhere to the guidelines that prevent the lines between caregiver and the client from becoming blurred. So can anybody think about what is a professional boundary or a professional action that somebody would take that would cause them this relationship to be blurred?
0:22:52.8 Miss Shana Trimble: I can give you about a million, but if anybody can jump in and add what they think. Just give me one. They think if you did this at work with a client or a patient, it would now change the trajectory of our relationship, and they would no longer look at me as the professional. Any takers?
0:23:27.6 Professor Walden: There’s a slight delay sometimes, but I’m gonna answer for them, so I’m like, Oh, somebody’s in getting personal, hugs maybe.
0:23:36.6 Miss Shana Trimble: Yes. Hugs. Getting personal now we’re off topic, we’re talking about our personal business so when she said, getting personal that is absolutely. Because sometimes we will over-share, right? So if we’re with a client and we’re started… Okay, we are talking about their meds, and now we’re talking about, “Oh my husband takes these meds. And if he don’t take his meds, he be cheating.” Or if this happens, this happens that his heart rate and I can’t control it and now, my kids. All of that then changes somebody’s view of you, right? Because now we’re looking like, “Oh wow. Okay, what’s going on in her life?” So that changes the professional. I love when she said hugs, full body hugs with other professional staff and things of that nature, and just being too close in a personal space. You have to understand, “What is my professional stance? How do I want people to see me?” And so that has a lot to do with my behaviors, what I share. Now, does that mean that I can’t be personable? Absolutely not. So we always wanna come across personal. We are in a caring profession, so we want people to know that I generally care about you, and so that’s the personal part, being personal is when we kinda cross the line. So how do you know when a boundary is in danger?
0:24:58.5 Miss Shana Trimble: Guidelines that protect you and the client are now being violated, or you see that, “Oh, I can do this or, oh, I can do that, it’ll be okay if I do this, it’ll be okay if I do that,” after they have been clearly defined, then that’s something that we need to say, “Okay, well, maybe my professional boundaries are not that strong.” And decisions are being driven by emotions versus process and procedures. So when you have process and procedures in place to protect you, then they are there to protect you, so you first need to understand why these processes and procedures are in place and then be able to connect them to a purpose for me, right? So if I don’t think that the process has anything and it doesn’t make me feel good, then I may not follow it, right? But ideally, is it about feeling good or is it about process and procedures? It’s about process and procedures. So despite how I may be feeling that day, how somebody may make me feel that day when they say, “Oh, okay, well, can you just give me a few extra pills to take home?” I feel like they may need them, absolutely not, right? So that is when we start talking about being able to separate, make decisions based on emotions versus process and procedures, when I’m at work, it’s process and procedures, I can be personable, and I’m definitely gonna feel emotions, we’re in a caring professional.
0:26:18.9 Miss Shana Trimble: So you think about, okay, you know, this person is hurting, they’re crying, they’re this, I feel bad for them. And we do, right? As professionals, we still have emotions, but ultimately can I put them in a place where I’m not making decisions on the emotions that I feel, because it is no way that we can be a caring professional and not feel some of the things that we are seeing and hearing and dealing with if we are human. Robots, absolutely. Us, absolutely not. So tips for creating boundaries, right? So those tips is identifying the boundary, why the boundary is required? What is it protecting? And that goes back to when I say, “Okay, if the boundary is there to protect you, it’s there to protect the clients or the patients, it’s there to protect my life,” because ultimately, I know that we talked earlier, some of you guys are moving into a realm, where you’re studying and you’re trying to get your license, you trying to get in this field and a simple lack of not following a boundary that is associated to a process and procedure can change your entire life, and that is not necessarily a good thing, right?
0:27:30.9 Miss Shana Trimble: So we have to be able to say, “Okay, it’s protecting me,” my boundaries protect me, because that’s what they do. I tell my clients often, “Look at your boundaries as kind of red and white buttons, and even maybe some pinks.” We got some red buttons that are there to be protected. Nobody can touch them, nobody can hit them, they set off alarms. They require me to take action, they have something that I need to do, and then of course, there is a white button that’s like if those things happen they don’t really have an impact. So ideally, we are creating our life and understanding when we’re talking about our professional life around those red buttons that we’ve identified. Another thing is identifying personal strengths and weaknesses and limits, and that is a big thing when we’re creating boundaries, because we’re not necessarily saying, “Okay, I’m really weak in this area, so I need to create a boundary around here that helps me,” and I use my strengths to do that, to hold me accountable, knowing my limits, knowing where I’m weak, when I say, “Okay, when I see these clients in this way, or I see this patient in this way, this really breaks me down,” and we’ll talk about this as we go into self-care, then I need to put something in process that allows me to process that, okay?
0:28:48.9 Miss Shana Trimble: So that gives me a minute to be able to get my boundaries and get my footing so that I can say, “Okay, now I can do this,” because there will be times without a doubt that you will be emotionally tested. It’s just inevitable. Establishing a personal stance that is consistent for self and others. Practice what you preach, this is so huge, and we say practice what you preach, practice what you preach. Practice what you preach, means that not only what I say matters, but my behaviors demonstrate the type of person that I say I am. If that is a big deal when you start talking about your professional stance as far as what your employer and your co-workers can trust that you’ll be the same person when you show up, that you’re not necessarily taking risk that will impact not only you, but them too. And that’s when we talk about others, so that you’re looking out for the entire thing that you are responsible for. So when we talk about moving in a way. I, me personally, I am responsible for my clinicians, so I’m the head of my group, so I can’t go out and represent my company in a negative way, and then that would necessarily impact them, right? The clients that seek us out, the kind of clientele that they want to have or the number of clients that they’re able to see because people start backing out, so that’s a really big deal, right?
0:30:18.9 Miss Shana Trimble: You not only represent yourself, but you also represent your employer, and that’s something I want you to take from that. And you create boundaries based on who you are, and that goes back to understanding your strengths and your weaknesses. Be able to learn and understand what do I need as a person, whether I already know what I need and I create a boundary around that, or I have identified that I need something, and so then I create a temporary boundary around that so that I can while I’m working to strengthen that weakness, okay? And then create a action plan. Action plans mean that when the boundary is in danger, I have a plan on what I am, what I should be doing, the actions that I need to take to ensure that that boundary is protected, and that’s a big deal because a lot of times, even though we create boundaries, we don’t necessarily know what we’re gonna do next, right? So if somebody does something to the boundary or steps over the boundary, or the boundary is in jeopardy, now what? It was a boundary and now I’m mad because you didn’t respect it. Okay, yeah, you are just mad, but necessarily what action do you need to take for yourself to make sure that the boundary is respected and that there is some footing or there’s maybe some verbal things that I said, “Okay, I’m gonna let people know that this is it.” And then maybe give them another opportunity to fix it and/or I may need to back out.
0:31:44.5 Miss Shana Trimble: I may need to report something, I may need to change something that I’m doing, or the relationship that I have with somebody. So these means that I need a action plan put in place around my boundary, because your boundary ultimately protects you, okay? And then, of course, respect your own boundaries, so it doesn’t really make sense for you to go through all of this, and create the action plans, create the boundaries, and then you yourself don’t withhold them, right? So then that’s ultimately irrelevant. So you don’t want to have a boundary stance and then turn around and, you know, I don’t necessarily need to respect my boundaries, my boundaries are for other people. No, your boundaries are for you, okay? So the idea or the reason why I have this lady in this blooming meaning that, her brain is growing and flourishing, is because when we talk about boundaries, you need to be open for change and you need to be open for growth. And the reason why I say that is because you grow, you change, hopefully. You don’t stay the same. Your ideas change about things. There are things that now I’m strong at, so I don’t necessarily need to necessarily focus on that anymore. Because now I am faced with this challenge. So I’ve established these boundaries at this phase in my life. They’re going well. I got those together.
0:33:08.7 Miss Shana Trimble: Now, I’m in another phase of my life where I need to create another set of boundaries. So example is, maybe I’m now just an employee. And I’m doing everything that I need to do an employee. And I have boundaries around that. But then as I grow in my job, I may now become a supervisor. And as I become a supervisor and I’ve grown into another position, I need boundaries around my title now. So know that just because you establish boundaries now, that doesn’t mean that you won’t need to establish new sets of boundaries later. So I want you to be pretty open to know that boundaries are more so like a living item. It should grow and change with you. Some will stay the same, but some will be added as you continue to grow. Alrighty, here we go. Self-care, the big trigger word. So self-care, what is it? Anybody have an idea on what self-care is? Or necessarily why we need it. Let’s tackle that first. Anybody who can chime in on why you think you need self-care?
0:34:35.7 Miss Shana Trimble: Okay, so let’s see. Balance, yes. Balance is a big reason why you need self-care. Well, self-care is the practice of taking an active role in protecting one’s own well-being and happiness, particularly during periods of stress. So that’s the definition for self-care. But what I want you to focus on is where it says active role. It’s not a fly-by-night type of thing where I think about it only sometimes, or I think about it only when I need it, or I think about it only when something is said. It’s active. I’m taking an active role. So when do I need to activate it? Ideally, it needs to be constant. It needs to be consistent. So when we say constant and consistent, meaning that I really need to establish a routine around self-care. So I need to be able to say, “Okay, I need to do self-care for me.” So how do we do that though? So it’s actually reviewing your moods, your personal progress reports, your responses from others, your stress levels. All of these things are really important as to identifying why you need it. There is a point where we actually should keep some type of record, whether it’s mental or emotional or whatever the case may be, of how we are doing. And sometimes we don’t know how we’re doing just from checking in on ourselves. But a lot of times, we know what we’re doing, how we’re doing based on other people’s responses to us.
0:36:16.5 Miss Shana Trimble: And we tend not to necessarily hone in on that. So if we notice, let’s say for instance, everything is going well, I don’t know how many mothers are in the crowd, but I would definitely attest to this. As a parent, I can probably much know when I have a attitude or when something is going on by how my kids respond to me. I can also tell like when I am overly exerting or when I am angry or when I’m responding in angry because I’m just tired or frustrated by people like, “Oh, okay.” Or what they’re saying, “Oh, she always mad,” or, “She always angry.” And all of a sudden, you know, your face is always frowned up. Because those responses from others is an indication to me that, “Oh, well why am I always doing that?” So that can be an indication alone that I need some self-care. I need to take a break. I need some time. Another thing is just understanding my overall mood. Have I changed? Has life changed me? Has stress changed me? I used to be so happy and going and stress free. And now I feel just ultimately bogged down with so many things.
0:37:29.0 Miss Shana Trimble: That means that, guess what? I need a break. I need some self-care. So I always say when stress is high, self-care should be higher. The idea is to create and maintain balance. And you can’t do that when either stress is higher than self-care or they’re running neck and neck. You can only do that when your self-care is higher than your stress. Can you out beat the burnout and all of the things, the negative things that come with it? So establishing self-care. How do you do that? Identify who you are. What do you enjoy? What makes you happy? What helps you feel rejuvenated? That’s a big deal. Because oftentimes, we assume that self-care has something to do with what everybody’s advertising right now, running commercials, right? So the commercials tell us that, “Oh, we need to take a bath, or we need to go get a foot massage, or we need to go have a drink,” There is so many ways. Don’t get caught up with only what they advertise for you to spend your money. ‘Cause that can be a stressor, if you’re trying to establish your self-care around what you have to buy all the time, when you might not necessarily have the money. So ideally, how do I create self-care around things that actually help me, even when I cannot necessarily access all other things? Everybody should have a self-care kind of goodie bag.
0:39:00.0 Miss Shana Trimble: So that means I have a couple of things that I like, I have a couple of things that I enjoy, that I can actually easily access when I need them. Yes, of course. Yoga class, wonderful. Dancing, absolutely. Going to the skating rink, if anybody still skate, I know I do, but we have all of those things. However, not all the time can we get to those extra-curricular activities outside our home. Sometime when we get home, we don’t have that, and especially and a lot of you guys going into the nursing field, the idea depend on what shift I work, all of those things may not be available all the time. So what happens to the things that I can easily access, a good story, or I had to end up giving myself my own foot bath or foot massage, or listening to music or zoning in, all of these things are there for you. So don’t just hone in on what’s advertised, but hone in what you actually enjoy, and sometimes we forget about what we enjoy, so sometimes we have to reach back, and/or be open to creating new things or learning new things.
0:40:11.4 Miss Shana Trimble: Sometimes when our mind is focused on something that interests us that we’re trying to learn, then that too can be self-care. Self-care is not always just laying on the couch and zoning out. For some people it is, but for some people, it’s not. And that’s okay too, if you’re actively enjoying what you are doing. Another thing is create a sustainable action plan, and don’t be afraid to mix it up. So take my goodie bag and I may have this here or that, this on Monday and I’m doing this on Wednesday. It doesn’t have to be the same thing all the time. You don’t necessarily want to get bored with it, but what you do want to do is making sure that it’s an action plan, meaning that I’m just not using it when I need it, but I’m actually using it often, so that I already have something in place that seems very natural that I know I can use daily or weekly or whatever to unwind and get me back to my center. Another thing in that resource bag is knowing when to ask for help. So a lot of times as caring professionals, we miss this part a whole lot, that’s why I dive it and probably drill it into my staff that therapists need therapists because of all the things that we hear and see, and deal with, it is important for us to have somebody that can help us release that.
0:41:38.7 Miss Shana Trimble: So same thing for any other caring professional, we get into a lot of things in a lot of people’s lives, and all of it that we see can be kind of overwhelming sometimes. So don’t be afraid when you need to release to actually ask for help. Another thing around self-care is asking for help for daily tasks. Okay? So I don’t know how many of you guys have done this or are doing it now, but a lot of times when we are burnt out from work, we still feel like our second life got all of the stuff that we gotta do, and we gotta somehow get it all done. We still gotta be the super person at work, we gotta be the super person at home, and we gotta be on at 100%, performing at 100%, 100% all the time. That is unrealistic. When you push yourself to that level, you have eliminated your self-care and you have definitely set yourself up for burnout. So the idea is don’t be afraid to ask for help. So not just from a therapy realm or a best friend where I can vent realm, but if I need help washing the dishes or not, okay, I may need some help. I may need some help with something that I have going on in my life that I may be able to lean on somebody that may have been saying, “Okay, yeah, I can help you do this.” If you have that as a resource, don’t be afraid to lean on it. If you don’t have that as a resource, I encourage you to find resourceful things that can provide you some type of assistance or help with your life to help you not get so burned out. Okay?
0:43:16.7 Miss Shana Trimble: So I will say this, understand how to take care of yourself. One of the most important things you will ever, ever, ever, ever learn, because what we have not done is we have not taught ourselves from being little, we’re not necessarily taught, “Oh, take care of yourself. Do this for yourself.” It seems like we’re only start hearing that when we started being stressed out, or when we become adult and we’ve already not necessarily figured out how to do it, so that you hear people say, “Oh, girl,” or “Oh, dude, you need to really just not be so stressed out. Find some time for yourself. Do something for yourself. Take care of yourself.” But then we don’t necessarily know how to do that. We hear it, but we don’t necessarily know how to do it. And so these are the skills and things that we’re talking about about burnout and boundaries and self-care that helps you ultimately learn how to do that and that is so important. So I’ll end that by saying, “Okay, what’s at the risk if you don’t continue burnout, no boundaries, no self-care?” You. Because guess what? I tell people all the time, including my clinicians, if something happens to you because you are unable to manage stress, and the reality is, stress causes physical distress, and we’re talking about heart attacks, we’re talking about strokes, we’re talking about all these negative things that can happen with us when we do not balance stress.
0:44:36.9 Miss Shana Trimble: And if something happens to you, your job will replace you. Life goes on after you. And so the reality is, I am responsible for making sure that I am good. So you need to be able to manage your stress because those patients will be seen by another nurse, believe me, just like what happens if you call out, that will happen if you pass away. So I want ya’ll to really think about, “Okay, how do I make sure that I’m taking care of myself?” Okay? And so to help you guys do that, I do have a little something for you. Because this is, I was invited and I so, so solely appreciate it, I will upload to my portal that allows you to make appointments, this group, the MP Collective. And from that, you are able to get a free 30-minute, 45-minute check-in with me should you feel like you need it, to either help you establish boundaries, talk about self-care or just vent, for free. So you can do that and I will upload it and you will be able to schedule it, as part of the MP Collective and just be able to use it at your will. I will keep it open until the end of the year, so you don’t necessarily have to feel like you’re in a rush to get it done, but it will definitely be there for you until December of 2022. Okay? So I wish you all so, so, so, so much advancements, and cares, and blessings and all those good things as you dive into your career and your profession. But remember, take care of yourself ’cause the only person who know how to do that is you. So thank you.
0:46:26.7 Professor Walden: Thank you. Yay, that was so good. So I have a couple of takeaways because I usually give them homework. But it will not be homework per se. What it’ll be is more pointers, talking points that you brought up. And so one of the things that you said that kind of resonated was, “Don’t be a trash can.”
0:46:51.9 Miss Shana Trimble: Absolutely.
0:46:52.9 Professor Walden: And so, it’s very funny because I absolutely understand that, coming from an administrative background. I always used to tell my employees, “I don’t wanna be putting out the fires. You should be putting out the fires. My job is to make sure that you know how to put out the fires.”
0:47:11.0 Miss Shana Trimble: Absolutely.
0:47:11.6 Professor Walden: Not that I put them all out.
0:47:14.0 Miss Shana Trimble: Absolutely, absolutely.
0:47:18.4 Professor Walden: I love the trash can reference because we do tend to do that and we take on everyone’s feelings and thoughts and all of that. And I never thought of it as being a trash can.
0:47:31.0 Miss Shana Trimble: Yeah. ‘Cause then now you’re responsible for it, right? So what are you gonna do it with it because they’ve went on, right? They took it out with you and they’ve went on. They’re like, “Okay, I’m fine, I gave it to her and she’s dealing with it or whatever.” And then you see them later, you’d be like, “Wait, why are you not stressed? You are not even working it like this?” And they be like, “No, I’ve gone from it.” And you have now been the keeper of their trash.
0:47:55.1 Professor Walden: They’re completely happy.
0:47:58.7 Miss Shana Trimble: And they are no longer stressed. And you’re like…
0:48:02.0 Professor Walden: I know. And that’s what Lucy said. Lucy said she’s like, “I feel like my family’s trash can.”
0:48:07.9 Miss Shana Trimble: Absolutely. Because when you are a caregiver, how are you not a caregiver everywhere else in your life?
0:48:13.3 Professor Walden: Everywhere.
0:48:13.9 Miss Shana Trimble: And so you present yourself as so. And they then say, “Okay. Let me give it to her. She’ll take it.” So yes. Yeah, I can definitely relate, Lucy. I’ve been myself. But you know what? When I put the lid on my trash can and I didn’t put a new bag in there, they stop.
0:48:32.6 Professor Walden: And that could leads to the next one when we’re talking about boundaries. So I have told people this, and I think I’ve said it in one podcast, and she didn’t quite enjoy when I said it. But I said I truly believe in boundaries, especially, especially with my family. And that is up to and including my mom, and I don’t have problems hurting feelings. I will let y’all know very candidly, I have hurt my mother’s feelings many a day. Because as I’ve gotten older, I have established my own boundaries, which are obviously very different from hers. They are from a generation that they don’t have boundaries, you just kind of take it. But I unbeknownst, not knowing what it was when it became the “boundaries” word, began saying, “No. I don’t like that. I don’t want you to do that. I’m not gonna do this.” Just kind of things that… And I am very big on feeding my own soul. So if it doesn’t work for me, if it doesn’t work for my family, I don’t do it. And so that includes possibly participating in activities with my mother or that kind of stuff.
0:49:47.4 Miss Shana Trimble: Definitely.
0:49:49.4 Professor Walden: I understand being a family trash can and then putting the lid on, like you said, and just being like, “Nope. No more. I’m not doing it.”
0:49:57.7 Miss Shana Trimble: Yeah. “It’s, I’m not open for that,” right? And those boundaries help us keep the trash lid closed.
0:50:05.2 Professor Walden: Yeah. Yes, yes.
0:50:06.4 Miss Shana Trimble: So, you have to first take the action of putting the lid on the trash can and then you stack it with the boundaries to make sure they are not able to just take the trash lid off.
0:50:17.7 Professor Walden: Yeah, I love that, because the thing is, and I brought it up to say that you will hurt people’s feelings. Their feelings will get hurt. They will wanna get an attitude with you.
0:50:30.0 Miss Shana Trimble: Absolutely.
0:50:31.3 Professor Walden: They will think something is wrong with you for doing that because you are no longer allowing them to walk all over you or do something that does not feel good to you. You are now stopping it.
0:50:43.8 Miss Shana Trimble: Absolutely.
0:50:43.9 Professor Walden: So they will get angry. So I wanted to bring it up so that people brace themselves for it. But remember their anger is a ‘them’ problem.
0:50:52.1 Miss Shana Trimble: Yes.
0:50:52.9 Professor Walden: You are not angry. You’re just happy. You have established boundaries.
0:50:57.4 Miss Shana Trimble: Yeah. But you’re in a good space, And you know what? We’ll take it. I’ll take that even a step further because when we think about boundaries, and we think about family, yes, that’s one thing. ‘Cause it seems a little bit more difficult there, right?
0:51:08.9 Professor Walden: Yeah.
0:51:09.0 Miss Shana Trimble: Because of our personal connections and our emotions and things that come with that. And then we don’t want people to suffer, feel bad and all those other kind of things that we consider that we don’t necessarily have to. So that’s where I am, where I teach people how not to do that. But then we also have clients and patients and things like that. That want you to cross professional boundaries or put yourself at risk because of how they feel they should be getting treated, or what they want from you, or what they want you to do. And that is therefore another level of boundaries that we really have to look at. So when you look at, and I say this because I’ve been in the hospitals and had to do psych evaluations and things like that in those units where people are like, “No. You give me this or you give me that.” And guess what? No. You know what I’m saying? So then, didn’t do they try to intimidate you, so you can give them something will cross a boundary that you know you’re not supposed to cross. So that too is if I’m easily intimidated. Or if I’m easily stomped on or stomped down, and I tend to be very bendable. Those are things that I need to learn about myself so that I can set boundaries around that type of behavior or my type of response until I’m able to get stronger in that area. And that’s a big deal too.
0:52:20.4 Professor Walden: Yeah, and that is a part of that self-check that I talk about. So we can never be above it. So if you notice that people approach you in the same way every time, then it’s something that you are projecting that they are picking up on and that is the onus on me to, one, establish the boundaries, and then two, what is that thing that they’re picking up on that they keep walking all over me? Because I don’t like it.
0:52:46.1 Miss Shana Trimble: Yes, exactly, exactly. It is so, so, so important. It becomes so invaluable. Self-checks, so important. Check-in, we check in with everybody else. I’m an advocate of checking in. I’ve been with my husband 30 years, and I still check in with him to say, “Okay, we good? We still good? We still on the same page? We still on the same goals?” ‘Cause hey, people change their mind.
0:53:06.4 Professor Walden: They change their mind.
0:53:09.5 Miss Shana Trimble: And so if we do that, then we also have to do it with ourselves too. Am I still good? Am I at a place where I wanna be emotionally, mentally, and physically? And so, we technically only check in with ourselves physically. Only when we’re not tore down. I just stubbed my toe. I got a cut. I got a headache. I take something for that, but we don’t necessarily check in with the mental and emotional part. Okay, the last week I’ve been really emotionally reactive. I respond to things that everything makes me feel like I wanna cry or I feel attacked all the time. I’m feeling like a victim all the time this week. Okay, what is happening? What is going on? So those are definitely self-checks, and then sometimes we find out about the bleed-over, which means that something that’s happening in one section of my life, I’m now applying to this section of my life and everything is going bad. And that perspective then gives us the burnout because we were feeling totally overwhelmed, when we need to apply what’s happening to the whatever it is, and not our entire life. So you gotta figure out how to balance that.
0:54:14.2 Professor Walden: I love that. I love that ’cause that is when people are just like the bleed-over, as you call it is when people are just like, everything is going wrong, and I had one of those not too long ago. I think I ended up wasting a juice in my car, and it was the ugliest tears. My kids were so confused. They were just like, “Dad, mom’s crying. She’s crying over juice,” and he was like, “She’s not crying over juice.”
0:54:44.0 Miss Shana Trimble: Exactly. Exactly. Exactly.
0:54:47.4 Professor Walden: It’s that one thing, that slight thing that takes you over, but I definitely wanted to bring those things up because I know we talk about them in a light way, but some of these will be difficult and they will be difficult conversations, and the things that we’re also telling you, you can see in your peers as well. So if you are starting to notice something with your peers and your colleagues who work around you, do your due diligence and be like, “Something’s going on,” like, “What?”
0:55:29.0 Miss Shana Trimble: And sometimes people don’t necessarily notice it, and so that’s when, just like you’re receiving responses from other people, they may not be noticing that they’re receiving so you be like, “Hey, you okay? I noticed that you’re kinda off,” or, “Your mood is off,” or, “I noticed that you got… ” So it’s okay ’cause sometimes people don’t know how to self-identify, and so when we are talking about when we are working as nurses and the healthcare professionals and we working on units, and we working with teams, that’s a whole system. So when parts of the system start breaking down, guess what happen? You are impacted. You are now, you know, now we gotta take another load or we gotta do something to help somebody out or now work. So you are impacted by your system. So it’s important for you to check in with your system.
0:56:17.5 Professor Walden: I like that. I like that. But yeah, there’s a lot of good little points here. So we’ll make a little talking sheet and you can also use this with your patients. So your patients who you have very good, especially when you have good rapport with them and you’ve seen them a couple times, you start to know your patients, and if you have those candid conversations and as you are about to start listening to them or starting to do their assessment, and you’re having these conversations, but it’s triggering all these, all your spider tingling senses are going off like, “Yeah, they’re a trash can.” These are things that you can address with them as well. So don’t be afraid to not only put yourself first, but to be recognizing it in other folks ’cause I think that’s part of another thing that’s not happening societal-wise is that we’re seeing it, but we’re not acknowledging it and saying something like, “I think something’s wrong and you might need to go take care of yourself.”
0:57:20.4 Miss Shana Trimble: Absolutely.
0:57:21.5 Professor Walden: So I appreciate that Shana so much.
0:57:25.1 Miss Shana Trimble: Absolutely.
0:57:26.5 Professor Walden: And it has been so fun. So I’m gonna talk to them for a second and show them a few things and just hang out for me.
0:57:32.3 Miss Shana Trimble: Okay.
0:57:33.4 Professor Walden: Fantastic. Alright y’all, so that was amazing. So if you missed it, remember that it is always recorded and you can watch from the beginning. So you can watch the replay as it goes up in your dashboard, but I also wanted to take this time out to mention to you that this is our last Facebook Live situation on here in the group. So I am excited moreso than anything else. We are moving to circle.so and I wanted to give you a good peek. You should all have the invitations in your email. So we are leaving Slack, going to Circle. We are leaving Facebook and going to Circle. So if you do not enjoy being on Facebook, which I know many of my members don’t enjoy that, don’t worry. We’ve taken care of that for you. We have heard you, and so we are going to allow you to download the app. So hopefully, let me see. Share screen, and we are going to share this screen. So this is your Circle community. Your community will be these discussion boards as well. They will likely change in some names, but this is you guys right here. So we’ll make sure that we put that up. As you can see, I’m obviously Professor Walden here, but I have the Academy as well. So my students who are doing the Academy, they too are on Circle, but you will not be able to see them. They are in their own little community.
0:59:23.2 Professor Walden: But we haven’t started putting the spaces up quite yet, but you are getting the invites, and so I can see that Vicky Allen’s in here. Natalie’s in here, Nikiche’s in here. So some of y’all have gotten your invites so that you are able to join. Clarissa’s in here. Fill out your bio. Hey, Cali. So we are all in here. So people are getting their invites. This is an app, so you will need to download it if you have an iPhone, because it is iOS only on app, however, if you have an Android don’t worry about that. Just go through your browser. So whatever internet that you use. So if you use Chrome on your phone, you can enter through Chrome on your phone and you too will be able to access the communities. It functions much like Slack. It’s gonna be a good time. We’ve got a lot of things coming up for you, so there’s gonna be a lot more activity. I know it’s been a little bit slow, but there’s gonna be a lot more activity in there ’cause we’ve got some new ideas, some new plans. So it’s gonna be pretty darn exciting.
1:00:39.0 Professor Walden: So we are excited, and utilize this space. My Academy members, they utilize this all the time. They love it. So these are my notifications. Those are for the Academy, but I want you guys to utilize this space in the same way. We’re gonna be dropping things in here. We’re gonna be creating this space for you and changing some of those names of the discussion boards, but I’m excited about it. We’re gonna drop videos in here. You can go live in here. We will also be moving to, what we’re gonna do so we can maintain our portal is we’re going to have lives, but we will drop it in here as a post, and there will be a Zoom link. So we’re still gonna utilize a Zoom link so that it can be recorded and uploaded to your portal for anybody who is missing, or if you miss it, so that you can still have it. But we can do all kinds of fun things. I’m gonna post some little videos any kind of, if I don’t feel like typing, I can record a little video, drop it in there for y’all, and you will have access to it. So it’s gonna be exciting. I am really excited about it. Also, you guys know that we are going to open up the doors of the MP Collective towards the end of the month. So make sure you tell your friends and all of that good stuff. I still have the document for you of what to do when you walk into your office. I’ve got the coding pieces down which covers the documentation.
1:02:30.2 Professor Walden: So there’s just a few little things that I want to add to it before I drop it to you and that you have the entire document. So that way it’ll be really useful for you to have as you are walking into your clinic so that you know what to do and how to do it. Okay? So I’m excited. If you have not accepted the Circle invitation, please make sure you do so. I will see you over there. I am gonna start posting over there, and Lucy, I’m gonna start posting some of the journals and things. I’m gonna post it over in Circle, so you guys should all have the invite, okay? With that being said, I’m gonna be respectful of your time. I so appreciate you joining and talking to you guys, and I will see you guys a bit later. If you have any questions, you know where to find me, circle.so in our community. Bye.

My name is Shana Trimble. I am a licensed marriage and family therapist with experience and education within the world of therapy as well as the human capital industry. I have many years of experience working with individuals, couples, families, and teens with or without concurring disorders as well as relationship coaching for personal and business improvement. I truly enjoy helping others improve the relationships they have with themselves and others. Whether I am helping through strength-based services or coaching I believe in what help can do.
I am also a wife, a mother, a grandmother, a daughter, a sister and a friend. It is my belief that we can help the most when we are able to connect through our innate ability to understand each other. And not necessarily because we have experienced the same things, but mostly because we have all experienced the same emotions.
My daily thoughts is “the second chance you asked for, happens every day you wake up”
~Shana Trimble, LMFT