Combating Compassion Fatigue Within Victim Advocacy

Victim advocacy is a free and confidential service provided to individuals who have experienced sexual violence. Due to the intense expectations associated with this role, victim advocates often suffer from mental health issues, including compassion fatigue. Compassion fatigue occurs when individuals in helping professions become overly exposed to clients’ traumatic experiences and suffer from debilitating symptoms that impact their daily lives. Through this project, I identified aspects of the role that put victim advocates at a high risk for developing compassion fatigue. I then explored methods for mitigating the negative effects of compassion fatigue including The Accelerated Recovery Program for compassion fatigue, humor as a coping technique, Eye Movement Desensitizing and Reprocessing therapy, comprehensive training efforts, personal and organizational self-care, and social support. With an emphasis on the benefits provided by social support, I developed a resource guide about the prevalence of violence in our community, aimed to help create more open dialogue surrounding sexual violence.