A Guide to Self-Care for Practitioners in Times of Uncertainty

This e-book is written for anyone who works as a therapist or clinical practitioner helping others through this time of huge uncertainty. It is aimed at those of us who find there are times when we struggle with painful thoughts and feelings in our work and our lives. What is it my client needs at this moment? Can I provide it for her? How can I help her work with uncertainty when I also feel it? How can I possibly help someone when I feel so unsure what tomorrow will bring? And we sometimes don’t know what to do with this stuff.

It can be ever so easy for us practitioners to fall into the place where we feel we shouldn’t be having difficult, scary or

worrying thoughts or emotions. Or if we do have them, we should be able to use some snazzy technique to manage our

thoughts and feelings.

This e-book is written by two practicing psychologists and therapists. We are also partners, parents, friends, sons and

daughters. In our own humanity, there are times when each of us has struggled deeply with this situation and the uncertainty of the future. We struggle with it still. And we know we’ll struggle with it in the future. We write from this perspective as we travel on this journey, together with you, in these times of uncertainty.

A key feature of this situation is that we are all in this together. As such, this e-book draws on our collective wisdom,

and it pulls together thoughts, ideas, suggestions and perspectives we have gathered from our own lives, from our colleagues, from our clients, and our friends and family. These include:

• How to persist when things are uncertain
• How to deal with uncomfortable internal experience like uncertainty and fear
• How to care for ourselves and others in difficult moments

We hope that it is useful for you in some way.