342: Micro Self-Care For Helping Professionals with Ashley Davis Bush

<div>Welcome back to Therapy Chat! This week, host Laura Reagan, LCSW-C revisits an episode from 2016 on a very important subject - self care for helping professionals! Ashley Davis Bush, LICSW is a psychotherapist in private practice in southern New Hampshire with over 30 years’ experience. </div> <div> <p>Ashley has written several self-help books, including <em>Transcending Loss</em> and <em>Simple Self-Care for Therapists.</em> She is a regular contributor to the Huffington Post and has some great tips to share with us today about improving our relationships to self-care. Join us!</p> <p><strong>What you’ll hear in this episode:</strong></p> <ul> <li>Ashley loves her work and counts it a privilege to be part of peoples’ lives. Her private practice is in her home, and it’s “<strong>a fun job, watching life unfold in front of you.”</strong></li> <li>Even the simple choice of working from home can be a self-care choice.</li> <li>Ashley’s work focuses on grief, couples, and anxiety, but self-care is a common thread that is woven into her work with all clients.</li> <li>Ashley says that much of her practice patterns itself after her books.</li> <li>Her most recent book introduces the idea of “micro self-care.”</li> <li>“Macro self-care”practices are the big things that we normally think of regarding self-care, but micro practices are short, simple things that can be done in 1-2 minutes.</li> <li>Ashley focuses on self-care to avoid burnout, which she categorizes as “little b” and “BIG B” types of burnout.</li> <li> <ul> <li>“little b” burnout is when you are exhausted at the end of the day or week. You may need a good night’s rest or a few days off to regenerate and recover.</li> <li>“BIG B” burnout is when you need to leave the field because you can’t take it anymore.</li> </ul> </li> <li>Ashley addresses “vicarious trauma,” in that ALL therapists do some sort of trauma work.</li> <li>Personal and professional experience can cloud the lens with which we see the world, but life’s pains are a constant trauma.</li>