Animal Welfare Professionals

Hello everyone! I am the Program Manager for the Trauma-Informed Training Program at the Vancouver Humane Society in Vancouver, BC, Canada.

One of our programs is about compassion fatigue and burnout, and mitigating them. Related to that, I have one question for everyone here: 

How do you and your organizations currently manage mental health and wellness time in your organization?

#OrganizationalManagement

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Sareeta Lopez, she/her
Program Manager
Vancouver Humane Society
https://vancouverhumanesociety.bc.ca/trauma-informed-training/
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After 4 years of being a volunteer which includes animal care, fundraising, social media and now, also as a part-time office staff member, I am finding an increasing need to unload. My family doesn't particularly like to hear me talk about the shelter all of the time, which totally perplexes me. But in one of the Compassion Fatigue Resources that was attached to this conversation, I found a great article from HeARTs Speak of 'Where do our Stories Go?' This will be very helpful to me, I'm sure. Thank you for having this great community of support!

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Karen Olson
Volunteer Caregiver & apparently Fundraiser Coordinator
Thompson River Animal Care Shelter (TRACS)
Thompson Falls, MT
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All,
 I recently completed a course by Jessica Dolce offered by the University of Florida,  "Compassion Fatigue Strategies". I highly recommend the course!!
I am a physician but I took the course as I am a shelter volunteer and see the effects on the staff and volunteers--I wanted to both understand and help.
The course was helpful to me for my "day job" as well.  I feel the materials and the instructor were spot on for understanding emotions, feelings, etc that are part of the work but most importantly how to COPE and stay in the game (as we are all so needed!). 
I am hoping that in the future a course could be more compact and specifically designed for shelter staff as the course itself did require many hours and I doubt most shelters would be able to "afford" the time.
Susan Murphy
Volunteer (IACS)

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susan murphy
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Original Message:
Sent: 04-05-2023 05:54 AM
From: Karen Olson
Subject: How do you handle staff mental health & wellness time in your organization?

After 4 years of being a volunteer which includes animal care, fundraising, social media and now, also as a part-time office staff member, I am finding an increasing need to unload. My family doesn't particularly like to hear me talk about the shelter all of the time, which totally perplexes me. But in one of the Compassion Fatigue Resources that was attached to this conversation, I found a great article from HeARTs Speak of 'Where do our Stories Go?' This will be very helpful to me, I'm sure. Thank you for having this great community of support!

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Karen Olson
Volunteer Caregiver & apparently Fundraiser Coordinator
Thompson River Animal Care Shelter (TRACS)
Thompson Falls, MT
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Hi Sareeta, 
The impact on mental wellness within rescue and shelter communities is not addressed nearly enough and something I haven't even seen discussed until this post.  Also, I don't feel that rescuers themselves recognize how  real these issues are until they become overwhelming. I hope to read more on this topic. 

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Nicole Fedoryka
Volunteer
Don't Bully Us Rescue
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