So many trauma therapists have been hurt in therapist spaces: judged, dismissed, or made to feel like being human made them less professional. In this reflection, I share what happened when I finally experienced a different kind of room, one where I didn’t have to perform or prove anything to belong.

Feeling numb in session or second-guessing everything you say doesn’t mean you’re a bad therapist, but it might mean you’re burned out. In this post, I share how to recognize the signs of disconnection, release your “professional armor,” and use tools like Watch the Fire to process vicarious trauma, prevent compassion fatigue, and stay human in trauma work.

Burnout doesn’t always look like exhaustion. For trauma therapists, it often starts with quiet disconnection—from your clients, your body, and the part of you that loves this work. This post explores how that happens, why it’s not your fault, and what loosening your armor might unlock.

If you’re bracing before every session like you’re stepping onto a battlefield, you’re not broken — your nervous system is doing its job. In this post, we’ll talk about how vicarious trauma shows up in the body, why white knuckling isn’t the answer, and how a simple somatic shift can help you stay present and grounded with your clients (and yourself).

What happens when you’re the one grieving — and still holding space for others? In this post, I share what it looked like to keep doing trauma work while grieving the death of my dad in early COVID. Not to offer a blueprint, but to open the conversation. Because our grief shows up in the room too. And that matters.

We have all had a moment as a trauma therapist when we wondered whether we could still do trauma work. Asked ourselves if this work has ruined us. So then, how do we start to answer this question?

If you’re coming home from sessions totally wiped — not just tired, but disconnected — this isn’t about you being too sensitive. It’s about vicarious trauma. In this post, I share 3 real reasons naming it can shift how you feel, how you show up, and how you get support.

We’re fluent in the language of trauma, including vicarious trauma. But what about the moments that soften us, nourish us, help us stay? This blog explores vicarious resilience — not as a reframe, but as a nervous system truth. It’s what happens when we let in the good. And it matters more than we think.

Therapists are constantly told to prioritize their mental health — but rarely given the space or structure to do it. This post explores what sustainable care really looks like, how the Trauma Therapist Trauma Response Continuum can help you name your experience, and why slowing down isn’t weakness — it’s survival.

Peer support isn’t a luxury for trauma therapists — it’s real mental health care. In this post, we’re naming the power of peer connection to interrupt isolation, regulate our nervous systems, and remind us we were never meant to do this work alone.

You know what burnout feels like. But what if it’s something else?

This Mental Health Awareness Month, we’re naming vicarious trauma — not as a failure, but as a valid, human response to doing this work.

Because when you can tell the difference, you can finally ask for the support you actually need.

Therapists talk about mental health all the time — but rarely our own.

This Mental Health Awareness Month, I’m sharing what it looks like to stop whispering about anxiety, depression, and vicarious trauma… and start naming them out loud.

Because being human doesn’t disqualify you from this work. It’s what makes you great at it.

Whether you’re sharing a resource, offering a word of encouragement, or simply naming a glimmer from your work—you’re doing more than helping someone else.
You’re strengthening your own resilience.

When equity is missing in trauma therapy, it doesn’t always look loud or dramatic. More often, it looks like brilliant, compassionate trauma therapists quietly leaving the work they love—not because they can’t handle the weight of the stories they hold, but because the systems around them make it almost impossible to stay.

Some days, you leave your office feeling like a ghost of yourself. 

You’ve held space for client after client, absorbed stories of deep pain, made SO MANY clinical decisions—all while holding yourself together.

But when the workday ends and you slam the laptop shut for the day, the work doesn't just disappear.