194 The Professional Counselor | Volume 14, Issue 2 Implications for Counselors The knowledge gained from our study offers both suggestions for how clinicians can approach counselors in personal therapy and broader advocacy for the profession to increase engagement in counseling. In terms of clinical practice, participants often emphasized the struggle in assuming the client role, as they were most comfortable with the typical power differential in their professional work. This phenomenon was especially salient in the participant voices of this study; vulnerability and role adjustment were crucial themes of their experience. Therefore, it may behoove clinicians to maintain awareness of this possibility or discuss it within personal therapy. For example, Moore et al. (2020) suggested engaging in conversations about interpersonal stress, self-care, and burnout within the supervision relationship; however, we purport that clinicians of clients who are also counselors could facilitate intentional space to address these issues in counseling. That being said, mental health professionals may find benefit in balancing attending to the person of the counselor with focus on professional identity due to the barrier of role adjustment presented in this study. Neswald-Potter and colleagues (2013) suggested the use of the Wheel of Wellness Model developed by Witmer and Sweeney (1992) to facilitate an integrated approach in promoting wellness in counselors: spirituality, selfdirection, work and leisure, friendship, and love. Finding meaning in all life tasks could assist clinicians in balancing professional and personal concerns in working with counselors as clients. Wellness is often associated with self-care practices in counseling. Self-care is not a novel topic of discussion in counselor training or professional practice. However, in light of this study’s findings, we aim to describe therapeutic interventions for mental health professionals who may have counselors as clients. Coaston (2017) summarized much of the literature on self-care for counselors and recommended several strategies for interventions in three main areas: mind, body, and spirit. Concretely, interventions may include mindfulness, boundary setting, time management, cognitive reappraisal writing activities, stretching, moral inventory, and listing life principles (Coaston, 2017; Posluns & Gall, 2020). Finally, Bradley et al. (2013) outlined a variety of creative approaches to counselor self-care, as well as facilitative questions that may lend well to opening dialogue in a therapy session. Example questions include: (a) What are the indications that you are doing well and healthy? (b) Which things in the environment can be changed to help you continue to grow? and (c) Do you experience this emotion or pattern of emotions frequently? How did you respond? These suggested self-care interventions are only useful if counselors attend personal therapy, and in the results of our study, participants described how stigma remained a barrier. Clinicians may consider normalizing thoughts and feelings related to stigma in order to encourage engagement in counseling. Sommers-Flanagan and Sommers-Flanagan (2018) defined normalization as the therapist’s use of indirect or direct statements that reframe client problems as contextual responses to the difficulties of life. Therapists use normalization to depathologize client concerns and convey implicit acceptance of the person of the client. Varying degrees of normalization skills include psychoeducation, reframing, and self-disclosure (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2018). Reducing the stigma of accessing counseling as a counselor may need to begin with normalizing it during training. Knaak et al. (2014) reported that the most effective anti-stigma interventions incorporate social contact, education, personal testimonies, teaching skills, and myth-busting. Therefore, creating space for anti-stigma interventions in professional development activities (e.g., conference presentations, continuing education sessions) as well as incorporating these strategies into counselor training (e.g., class or group supervision) may advocate for engagement in counseling across the counselor profession spectrum. Additionally, a follow-up study examining counselors seeking therapy to improve their own clinical efficacy with clients may also serve as a way to decrease stigma.
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