148 - Secondary Traumatic Stress and The Burnout You Don't See Coming: The Invisible Wounds of Helping Professionals

Want more of this? On Substack I share longer reflections, practical tools, and honest conversations that don't make it onto the pod. Join the Burnout-Free Me community: https://amygrimmburnoutfreeme.substack.com   Episode Details: What if your job has been quietly affecting you — and you never knew it had a name? Secondary traumatic stress is one of the most underrecognized contributors to burnout in high-achieving professionals. It doesn't arrive all at once. It accumulates slowly, invisibly, the way water heats around a frog in a pot. And most people don't realize how far it's gone until they've already crossed their limit.   In Part 2 of this special Mental Health Awareness Month series, Dr. Amy Grimm goes deep on secondary traumatic stress — what it is, what makes you vulnerable to it, how to recognize it in your own body and behavior, and where to start when it comes to taking care of yourself. She walks through the Contributing Factors Venn Diagram developed by Françoise Mathieu and the TEND Academy — a powerful framework for understanding the eight risk factor categories that shape your personal stress threshold. This is one of the most important conversations in the burnout space. And nobody taught us this.   What You'll Learn       What secondary traumatic stress actually is — and the neuroscience behind why it happens       The 8 risk factor categories from Françoise Mathieu's Contributing Factors model       Moral distress, empathic strain, and systems failure — and why they matter for burnout       How to recognize secondary traumatic stress in yourself across three symptom categories       The three warning sign categories to watch for: physical, behavioral, and emotional       Where to start when it comes to managing and recovering from secondary traumatic stress   Links & Resources Substack: https://amygrimmburnoutfreeme.substack.com Coaching & website: https://burnoutfreeme.com TEND Academy (Françoise Mathieu): https://www.tendacademy.ca Contributing Factors Venn Diagram: https://www.tendacademy.ca/venn-diagram/ Missed Part 1? Listen to Episode 147: Trauma 101: Understanding the Basics of Traumatic Stress   About Dr. Amy Grimm Dr. Amy Grimm is a veterinarian, success coach, and wellbeing expert and the host of Burnout-Free Me -- the podcast for high-achieving women who are done running on empty. Real talk, practical tools, and honest mindset shifts every week.   Enjoyed this episode? Subscribe so you never miss an episode, and if this show has been valuable to you, please take a moment to leave a rating and review. It helps other women find this community — and that matters.