Overcoming Barriers to Implementing Self-Care Strategies in Social Work
by Sarah Hessenauer, Ph.D., Katherine Drechsler, DSW, and Charles Zastrow, Ph.D.
Despite the many resources on self-care that exist (including Grise-Owens, Miller & Eaves, 2016; Cox & Steiner, 2013), social work practitioners, social work students, and clients sometimes fail to implement needed self-care strategies. There are many reasons why this can occur. However, a few main reasons are procrastination, poor time management, and/or fear of change (Zastrow & Hessenauer, 2019).
Below we have listed some of the reasons for failing to implement self-care strategies, along with recommendations for overcoming those barriers:
Procrastination
- Many of us know exercising 30 minutes or more nearly every day is very important to our health. The following are examples of why people fail to achieve this self-care objective. Maria has never found an exercise program that she likes, so she procrastinates in trying to find a new exercise strategy. Karen is a mother of two young children and is working full time at a nursing home. She believes she will wait until the children are attending school full time to start an exercise program.
One way to address procrastination is to get support from others. Having a therapist, life coach, or joining a support group (such as a yoga class, Weight Watchers, or AA) may help social workers be accountable and make the hard changes required to live healthier lives.
Poor Time Management
- Social workers have to juggle a lot of responsibilities, from paperwork to working with clients to managing their own personal lives. At the office, Hannah easily gets distracted playing games on her phone and has to stay late to complete her work. Ethan spends too much time watching Netflix at night, causing him to sleep late and arrive to work late.
Each of these individuals could benefit from tracking exactly how they are spending their time over a few days, a few weeks, or a month. Putting it in graph form can help individuals see where they are spending too little or too much time. It may also be helpful to start setting goals, identifying those things that need to be accomplished immediately as high priority (or nearly the highest) goals. Ranking A level goals (high value) to C level goals (low value) is also an option. In setting goals, it is important to list them on a sheet of paper (or electronically) and assign realistic time frames for completion.
Fear of Change
- Wiest (2017) stated that “self-care is often an unbeautiful thing….and is often doing the ugliest thing you have to do” (p.1). The unpleasant thing can be breaking up with a significant other, looking for a new job with less pay but better hours, moving out of a home where we are “comfortable,” or cutting ties with a toxic friend. Julie is in an on-again, off-again relationship. She knows the relationship is not healthy, but she is fearful if she ends it for good she might not find anyone new, and she is afraid of being alone. Anthony has a co-worker who is always negative. When Anthony is around his co-worker, he always ends up feeling bad about himself. He hates to hurt other people’s feelings, so he agrees to hang out with his co-worker when asked.
Talking to a friend or a professional may assist in examining these situations. Motivational interviewing (MI) assesses an individual’s willingness to change. Prochaska and DeClemente (1984) identified stages in the change process: pre-contemplation, contemplation, preparation, action, maintenance, and relapse. The goal of MI is to help the individual move through the stages to make positive change.
Self-care is not always an easy process. Self-care may require us to step out of our comfort zones and do things differently. It is accepting our faults, identifying the people in our lives who pull us down, questioning decisions we have made, starting a new exercise program, addressing any health challenges, and making changes to become better people, not just social workers.
Social workers must be willing to take their own advice and try techniques that help identify our negative thinking and behaviors if we truly want to practice self-care. Social workers need to confront the stigma or negative beliefs that can come with asking others for help. Social workers are continually asking clients to make necessary changes; now social workers need to make those changes.
References
Cox, K., & Steiner, S. (2013). Self-care in social work: A guide for practitioners, supervisors, and administrators. Washington, DC: NASW Press.
Grise-Owens, E., Miller, J., & Eaves, M. (2016). The A-to-Z self-care handbook for social workers and other helping professionals. Harrisburg, PA: The New Social Worker Press.
Prochaska, J.O., & DiClemente, C.C. (1984). The transtheoretical approach: Towards a systematic eclectic framework. Homewood, IL: Dow Jones Irwin.
Wiest, B. (2017). This is what self-care really means, because it is not all salt baths and chocolate cake. {Blog post]. Retrieved from: https://thoughtcatalog.com/brianna-wiest/2017/11/this-is-what-self-care-really-means-because-its-not-all-salt-baths-and-chocolate-cake/.
Zastrow, C., & Hessenauer, S. (2019) Empowerment Series: Social Work with Groups (Tenth edition).
Sarah Hessenauer, Ph.D., MSW, LCSW, is an associate professor in social work at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.
Katherine Drechsler, DSW, LCSW-SA, is an assistant professor in social work and the field coordinator at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.
Charles Zastrow, Ph.D., is professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. Charles has written numerous social work textbooks, including: Introduction to Social Work and Social Welfare (12th ed.), Generalist Social Work Practice (11th ed.), Understanding Human Behavior and Social Environment (11th ed) with Karen Kirst-Ashmann and Sarah Hessenauer, and Social Work with Groups (10th ed) with Sarah Hessenauer.