OPINION:
Is climate change driving you to despair? Read this.
Retrieved 10-16-17 from https://ensia.com http://bit.ly/2gIN9l6
To
maintain our capacity to address climate change, we need to recognize and
address the trauma it creates.
September
19, 2017 — The damage climate change does in terms of loss of life, health and
property has been under the microscope of researchers for many years. Only
recently, however, have the mental health impacts of climate change, including
the impacts on people working in climate change research, policy and related
fields, been subjected to scrutiny. The award-winning biologist Camille Parmesan described becoming
“professionally depressed” as a result of her research on climate change in a 2014 Grist interview. Previously, she was
quoted in a 2012 National Wildlife Federation report on the
mental health impacts of climate change on scientists: “I don’t know of a
single scientist that’s not having an emotional reaction to what is being lost.
Some of these people have been studying a particular reef or a particular bird
or a particular mammal for 40 to 50 years. And to start seeing it die off is a
very hard thing.” Referring to an ocean reef she has studied since 2002, she
added, “It’s gotten to be so depressing that I’m not sure I’m going to go back
to this particular site again, because I just know I’m going to see more and
more of it dead, and bleached, and covered with brown algae.”
People
whose work is related to climate change need to recognize that they are
susceptible to a special kind of stress due to the overwhelming nature of the
problem. Such work can lead to psychological trauma, shattering our deeply held
assumptions and beliefs about the way the world works and our role in it. This
in turn can lead to burnout and disengagement.
To
protect ourselves and our communities and maintain our capacity to continue to
address climate change, we need to understand, recognize and respond to climate
trauma.
What
Climate Trauma Looks Like
Climate
trauma is a term coined by filmmaker and social justice advocate Gillian
Caldwell in a 2009 blog post “Coming out of the closet: My
climate trauma (and yours?).” It is used to encompass toxic stress and
psychological trauma from living with the consequences of climate change as
well as the knowledge of those consequences. For individuals, it can come in
acute and chronic forms, per a 2017 report from the American Psychological
Association and ecoAmerica, “Mental Health and Our Changing Climate: Impacts,
Implications, and Guidance”:
Acute:
- Trauma and shock
- Post-traumatic stress
disorder
- Compounded stress (e.g.,
when climate trauma exacerbates other stress-related problems, such as
substance abuse, anxiety disorders, and depression, or when natural
disasters lead to increased risky behavior)
- Impact on physical health
- Strains on social
relationships
Chronic:
- Aggression and violence
- Mental health emergencies
- Loss of personally
important places
- Loss of autonomy and
control
- Loss of personal and
occupational identity
- “Ecoanxiety” (concern for
the well-being of current and future generations in the face of climate
change)
Evidence
of climate trauma can be found on the website Is This How
You Feel?, which provides a forum for climate scientists to share
their feelings about climate change. Comments posted to the site include words
and phrases like “dismayed,” “powerless” and “overwhelmed.” One contributor
writes of his concern that “we will leave behind a fundamentally degraded
planet for our children.” Another writes, “My overwhelming emotion is anger.”
What
Can Individuals Do?
The
2017 ecoAmerica report offers these suggestions for addressing climate trauma
at an individual level:
- “Build belief in one’s own
resilience.”
- “Foster optimism.”
- “Cultivate active coping and self-regulation”
- “Maintain practices that
help to provide a sense of meaning.”
- “Promote connectedness to
family, place, culture, and community.”
Bob
Doppelt, director of The Resource Innovation Group, recommends
building presencing and purposing skills to cope with
climate trauma. These include:
- Stabilize your nervous
system by centering yourself (e.g., use meditation to lower
“fight-or-flight” hormones triggered by stress).
- Take stock of your personal
skills and internal and external resources.
- Observe your reactions and
thoughts without judgment and with compassion for yourself.
- Notice moments of growth,
insight and new meaning.
- Remember the values you
want to live by.
- Find hope by making choices
that increase the well-being of yourself, others and the environment.
- Help others.
Other
suggestions from climate professionals gathered at a session on climate trauma
I organized and co-led at the National Adaptation Forum in May 2017
include:
- Release the need to be
right.
- Stay offline after work.
- Talk to and hug friends.
- Cultivate a sense of humor.
- Walk dogs for the Humane
Society.
- Adopt a contemplative
practice.
- Participate in outdoor
activities like gardening and hiking.
- Practice yoga.
- Sleep.
Caldwell’s
suggestions, based on the advice of forensic psychiatrist Lise Van Susteren, one of the co-authors of the
2012 National Wildlife Federation report cited above, include:
- Take care of yourself
physically and spiritually.
- Remember that you are not
alone.
- Participate in activities
not related to climate.
- Reinforce boundaries
between your work and personal life.
- Connect with colleagues
without talking about climate.
- Remember that your fears
are realistic but your expectations of yourself might not be.
- Don’t overwork.
- Don’t do climate-related
work at night.
- Admit what you are going
through.
- Recognize symptoms of
burnout.
- Don’t give up.
What
Can Organizations Do?
Climate
trauma researchers have suggested ways to deal with the issue on an
institutional scale as well. The 2012 National Wildlife Federation report
suggests these organization-level responses:
- Create comprehensive plans
and guidelines for mental health practitioners, first responders and
primary care professionals for dealing with climate trauma, with priority
given to training those who serve the most vulnerable populations.
- Work to better assess,
diagnose and treat individuals with climate-related mental health
problems.
- Estimate and compare the
costs of addressing the psychological effects of climate change and
ignoring the problem.
- Develop and deploy
government mental health incident response teams.
- Develop helpful models for
positive individual and community action (e.g., the “health belief model”).
- Factor the psychological
implications of climate change into public policy development.
It
also recommends that the mental health community help the public and leaders
become aware of how climate change is affecting us and what we can do about it
and advocate for protecting people from climate change.
Taking
Care of Ourselves and Each Other
The
discussion of climate trauma rose to a new level of intensity after the 2015 Esquire article “When the End of Human
Civilization Is Your Day Job” presented the stories of several climate
scientists coping with fear, despair and depression. Since then, the question
of how to create a community of practice to support climate change workers
dealing with climate trauma has been left largely unanswered. Particularly in
the U.S., with its current political climate, this is a hard time to be working
on climate change. In order to keep this good work moving forward and not burn
out under the pressures of the current moment, those of us trying to address
climate change in our day jobs need to be aware of the stress we face and do
what we can take care of ourselves and each other.
Editor’s
note: The views expressed here are those of the author and not necessarily of
Ensia.
