Compassionate Towards Ourselves: A Tool for Personal Recovery and Therapeutic Work of Peer Specialists

Abstract

Objective. Self-compassion is part of recovery for many people who experience mental illness. Peer specialists are mental health professionals who have experienced mental illness and use their recovery experiences to facilitate the healing of others. This research explored how peer specialists view self-compassion in their work. It also examined they perceive their profession.

Methods. Seven peer specialists working in a psychiatric hospital participated in individual qualitative interviews. They were asked about their personal experiences and self-compassion and how these served to support others. They were also asked about their perceptions of the peer specialist profession. Interviews were thematically analyzed.

Results: The results showed the peer specialists were occupied with self-judgment, compared themselves to the patients and the professional team (doctors, nurses, and psychologists), and saw a disparity between their experience-based knowledge and professional knowledge. They mentioned three components of self-compassion.

Conclusions and Implications for Practice: The finding that the peer specialists had developed self-compassion during the recovery process and used it as a model for their patients indicates a need to develop guidelines and promote awareness of the importance of self-compassion in the training of peer specialists. A job definition of peer specialists who work in psychiatric hospitals should be developed.

Impact and Implications Statement

This study investigated job perceptions and personal experiences of self-compassion among peer specialists who work in psychiatric hospitals. The findings highlight peer specialists’ need for greater role clarity and better training. Such guidance should be directed at helping peer specialists utilize self-compassion in their work.