How Holding Space for trauma in your job is killing your nervous system from the inside out

Your training taught you how to hold space for trauma—but nobody told you that your body is storing every trauma story you’ve ever heard.

If you are exhausted, numb, wired, sick more often than you used to be, or quietly wondering how your calling started costing you your health, this episode explains the biological truth behind compassion fatigue.

In this episode, Dr. Julie breaks down the hidden neurobiology your training never taught you.

You’ll learn why your brain cannot distinguish between witnessing trauma and experiencing it, and how your polyvagal nervous system responds by dumping stress hormones into your body every time you listen to another traumatic story. Over years of clinical work, this creates PTSD-like symptoms—not because you are weak, but because human neurobiology is doing exactly what it evolved to do.

Dr. Julie explains how chronic exposure to trauma overwhelms your nervous system, disrupts your hormones, impairs memory and focus, weakens immunity, and erodes joy. This is not a personal failure. Burnout and compassion fatigue are occupational hazards that quietly devastate the mind, body, and soul—especially for women over 50, when estrogen decline removes a key stress buffer.

This episode also reveals where compassion fatigue lives in the body.

Dr. Julie explains how burnout embeds itself in the root chakra—the Muladhara—your energy center of safety, security, survival, self-worth, and money. When this foundation is compromised, you feel unsafe, disconnected, financially trapped, unable to set boundaries, and unsure of your own value.

You’ll be guided through a body scan practice from Week Three of In Pursuit of Soul Joy to help you locate where compassion fatigue is stored in your body, followed by a processing tool that helps you understand the thoughts and patterns connected to those sensations.

This episode gives you language for what you’ve been feeling—and practical tools to move from awareness toward healing.

Stop trying to "Self-Care" your way out of a physiological crisis.

If bubble baths and deep breathing actually fixed compassion fatigue, you wouldn't still be staring at the ceiling at 2:00 AM. Your burnout isn't an attitude problem, it's a biological pattern. You are stuck in one of four distinct "somatic signatures." Until you identify yours, you are just throwing water on a grease fire.

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Stop guessing. Find the leak. Fix the circuit.

Episodes drop every Tuesday at 5am and Friday at 5am.

This podcast is for women healers over 50 navigating burnout and compassion fatigue who want nervous-system-informed insight into exhaustion, purpose loss, polyvagal regulation, chakra healing, and embodied recovery so they can move from survival into clarity, stability, and restoration.

Transcript

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In this episode, you'll discover that your mirror neurons are literally firing as if you experienced every trauma story you've ever heard, and it's rewiring your brain from the inside out. Empowering brilliant women in healthcare over 50 to transform burnout and compassion fatigue into renewed passion. Reigniting your spark to create a life that energizes you every single day. I'm your host, Dr. Jules. Let's get to it. Y'all, I'm sharing three truths in this episode that will completely shift how you understand your depletion. So stay with me. You need to hear them. One, the mirror neuron truth two, how compassion work leaves you unable to distinguish between their pain and yours. And three, the compassion boundary reset. So let me ask you something in your entire graduate education. Did anyone ever explain what happens in your brain when a client, a patient, the person you're working with, describes being beaten by their parent when they recount their childhood sexual abuse? When they tell you about finding their parents' body, they taught you reflective listening. They taught you. Empathic responses. They taught you treatment modalities theory, but did anyone ever explain that your mirror neurons specialized brain cells, discovered in the nineties are firing as if you are experiencing those events? No. Me neither. But I try to tell my students, here's what we know from neuroscience. A 2019 study published in social, cognitive, and effective neuroscience used MRI imaging to scan therapist brains while listening to trauma narratives. And what they found should terrify every training program in the country. When therapists listen to clients describe traumatic events, they're mere neurons. That whole system is activated in the exact same regions that would fire if they were experiencing those events firsthand. The researchers wrote Empathic engagement with trauma narratives creates neurological activity. It creates patterns that are indistinguishable. From personal trauma exposure. Now that's just not therapist, doctors, nurses, educators. When we're exposed to other people's trauma, our brain is reacting. So we're gonna read that again. It's in indis, indistinguishable from personal trauma exposure. You're not just witnessing the trauma sweet soul. Your brain is encoding that as if it's happening to you. Then there's a study in psychological trauma theory, research, practice, and policy, and it examined what they called vicarious trauma. Traumatization talked about that back in my disser in healthcare workers specifically. Okay. They found that repeated exposure to others' trauma creates measurable changes in three specific regions in your brain. The amygdala, and y'all know that's our threat detector center that will become very hyperactive, constantly scanning for danger even when you're safe at home. And the hippocampus. Your memory processing center shows reduced volume. The same pattern seen in people with PTSD from direct trauma, and then the pre prefrontal cortex. Your reasoning, your regulation center. This shows decreased activation, meaning. You lose access to the part of your brain that helps you regulate emotion and make rational decisions. Y'all, this isn't burnout. This is structural brain change from occupational trauma exposure. But here, here's where it gets even more insidious. Dr. Tanya Singer's research on empathy at the Max Plank Institute found that healthcare professionals as helpers, as healers, develop what she calls empathic distress. And this is a state where you've absorbed so much suffering that your nervous system can't distinguish between those that you're helping their pain. And your own pain anymore, it's just you're not able to do that. Her 2014 study showed that helpers, therapists, healthcare workers, educators, those who scored high on empathy measures, also showed significantly elevated cortisol levels, inflammation markers, and symptoms of secondary traumatic stress. This is important because the very quality y'all, that's making you excellent at your job. That capacity for deep empathy, that's the mechanism destroying you. A 2020 meta-analysis that was done in the frontiers in um, psychology. Uh, journal examined something called emotional contagion, especially in therapeutic settings. Now they found that we therapists happen to be a therapist unconsciously synchronize our nervous systems with our clients. Now, you know, this is true for doctors and nurses and educators as well, helpers. See when your client's heart rate elevates as they're describing their panic attack, your heart rate elevates when their cortisol spikes recounting their abuse. Your cortisol spikes when their body goes into freeze response, remembering their assault. Your body mirrors that freeze, and this happens automatically. It's below conscious awareness and it's through a process called autonomic synchrony. Your polyvagal system is literally matching theirs. Think about it, session after session, client after client, year after year. And here's the ass kicker. A 2022 study found that this synchrony persists after the session ends. After the appointment ends, after the class ends, your nervous system stays dysregulated for an average of 90 minutes post session, meaning. If you're seeing back to back people, you're nervous, you're, you're never returning to baseline. You're accumulating trauma activation with no recovery time. Research from the Journal of Traumatic Stress breaks down how vicarious trauma impacts you. Across three systems. So we've got neural, neurologically, changes in our brain structure and function, hyper vigilance, intrusive thoughts, nightmares that about client's trauma, difficulty concentrating. And then we got, we have physiologically, so this is chronic activation of your HPA axis elevated cortisol, inflammation, immune suppression. Chronic pain, digestive issues, insomnia, and we move to the psychologically, the psychological arena. Emotional numbness, cynicism, loss of meaning, questioning your worldview, feeling unsafe in the world, losing trust in humanity. Does any of that sound familiar? I know it does for me, the, the immune suppression. I'm convinced that's where my cancer came from. My breast cancer. We have to do better for ourselves because this isn't us being weak. This is occupational trauma injury. So let's talk about. Where this is living in your energetic body, because vicarious trauma doesn't just damage your brain, it catastrophically depletes your heart chakra. This chakra sits right in the center of your chest and in chakra psychology. This is your energy center of love, compassion, connection, and critically. Healthy boundaries between self and others, and this is where your capacity for empathy lives. This is where you generate the compassion that makes you very, very good at your work. And this is exactly where compassion fatigue embeds itself and begins to slowly destroy you. Here's what they, I'm a professor, have been an academic forever. I'll say we have sucked at teaching you a balanced heart chakra. If you have a balanced heart chakra, it's gonna maintain what's called compassionate differentiation, and that's the ability to fill with someone. Without becoming them to witness suffering, without absorbing it, to hold space, without losing yourself. But when you're doing the trauma work all day, every day with no energetic protection, your heart chakra gets blown wide open. The boundaries between your experience and theirs just dissolves. Research published in the complementary therapies in clinical practice in 2020, examined biofield measurements in healthcare workers, and they found that therapists with compassion fatigue showed what they called energetic boundary dissolution. In the heart center, meaning the energy field around their chest area was permeable and chaotic rather than coherent and boundaried, you're literally leaking energy from your heart space because the protective boundary that should exist there has collapsed. And underactive are blown out. Heart chakra shows up as y'all. And I know I talk about, I mean, I repeat these things because one, I know we don't learn something the very first time we hear it, but two, because it's so imminently important that it's on your radar and you're taking care of yourself. But here's what happens if your heart chakra is blown out. Huh. It's gonna show up as the inability to receive love or care. You can give endlessly, but you can't let anyone help you. And codependent relationships. You've lost the boundary between caring for someone in being responsible for them. And chronic grief and heaviness in your chest. You're carrying everyone's pain in your heart and respiratory issues, heart palpitations, upper back pain. Your physical heart area is manifesting the energetic depletion, and then there's isolation. And inability to connect authentically. You're so full of others' emotions. There's no room for your own. So loss of joy, beauty, lightness. Your heart is weighed down by accumulated suffering. Oh, sweet soul. Does any of that sound familiar? That crushing weight on your chest, that feeling like you're carrying the world's pain. Or maybe the numbness, the inability to even feel your own feelings anymore because you're drowning in everyone else's and you've just lost sight of them. No, that's not burned out. That's heart chakra Collapse from occupational compassion s exposure, your, and here's what makes this even worse. Most of us in these helping professions have been taught that good helpers are self-sacrificing. How dare you ask for something for yourself. You're here to help. Putting yourself first is seen as selfish and boundaries. You're just being a bitch. That means you don't care and you know that's not true. This programming gets embedded. In our heart chakras creating what I call compassion without protection. You give and you give, and you give. With no energetic boundaries, no recovery time, and no refilling of your own, well, you become the empty cup. And the system loves this because burned out helpers keep showing up. Keep saying yes, keep taking on more. They just do it while dying inside. Okay, sweet. So if what I'm sharing is resonating. In any manner if you're recognizing yourself in this mirror neuron activation or heart chakra depletion, I want you to know there's a comprehensive roadmap for recovering from this. My book In Pursuit of Soul Joy, a 12 week guide for overcoming burnout and compassion fatigue, I walk you through the complete nervous system restoration and chakra healing process. It includes the neuroscience, the chakra psychology, and the somatic practices. You need to recover your energy, your boundaries, your joy, and week by week you'll rebuild that compassion fatigue. Well, you'll rebuild what compassion fatigue destroyed from understanding the biology of your exhaustion to restoring each chakra system to creating sustainable, holistic self-care that actually protects you. You can find. My book, wherever books are sold, or grab from my website, www julie merriman phd.com. Check out a few freebies I have on there to help you get back to you as well. I invite you to do it while the spark is still lit. Okay, now let's get back into the practice that will help you start restoring your heart chakra today. So before I teach you this practice, you need to understand why bubble baths and yoga classes haven't fixed your compassion fatigue, and don't be wrong. Those are lovely things that are precious to me, but they don't address the core problem. Your nervous system is dysregulated from trauma exposure. Your mirror neurons are still firing and your heart chakra has no protective boundary. You need an integrated practice that addresses all three levels simultaneously, neurological. That's the regulation you're gonna get, energetic boundary restoration, and somatic embodiment. That's why the compassion boundary reset is for you. It does all those things. So this is a 10 minute practice you can do between sessions, between classes, between appointments after work, or whenever you feel that crushing weight in your chest. All you need is a quiet space and something to write with afterward. So phase one is nervous system down regulation. So you stand up, you place both hands, flat on your chest, one on top of the other, right over your heart. Feel the pressure of your hand. Fill your heartbeat under your palms, and I want you to create a humming sound. Literally hum hum. The vibration of humming activates that vagus nerve through your vocal cords and chest cavity. You hum. For 30 seconds. You feel the vibration in your chest under your hands. Research from Dr. Steven Purges Polyvagal. Theory shows that vocal vibration through humming stimulates your ventral vagal system, the part of your nervous system responsible for safety and social engagement. You're literally using sound to tell your nervous system. We're safe. We are now safe. Threat has passed. I want you to pause. Take three. Normal breaths, not deep breaths, just natural. And then hum again for 30 seconds. Repeat this pattern, three times hum. For 30 seconds. Breathe for normal. Three breaths hum for 30 seconds. Then you're gonna move to phase two, the heart chakra boundary visualization. Keep your hands on your heart. Your eyes closed. If it feels safe. Visualize your heart chakra as a green sphere of beautiful, vibrant light in the center of your chest, right behind your hands. I want you to see that clearly. And here's the important part. Notice if that green light is dim or bright. Small and contracted are blown, wide open, clear or muddy with other people's energy. Do not judge what you see. You are just curious and noticing. Now visualize a golden boundary, like a golden eggshell forming around that green light. This boundary is permeable enough to let love flow, but strong enough to keep others' trauma from flooding into your energy field. See this golden boundary completely, fully around your heart chakra. This is your energetic space, protected sovereign boundaried, and say out loud. And I mean, speak it. My heart is compassionate and boundaried. I can witness suffering without absorbing it. I am safe in my own energy. And you repeat that three times while holding the visualization of your green heart chakra protected by that golden boundary. And then you move into phase three, somatic boundary embodiment. So you drop your hands by your sides, and you open your eyes and now physically embody the boundary. Extend your arms straight out from your sides, palms facing outward, creating a clear circle of space around your body. Y'all. This is your space. Everything inside this circle is yours. Everything outside belongs to someone else. Walk around your space while maintaining your arms extended and feel the clear nation inside equals mine outside, equals theirs. I also. Like to use a hula hoop for this. So if you're having a hard time visualizing that space, grab yourself a hula hoop, paint it gold, and step inside that and let that be your golden boundary. Now you can bring your hands back to your heart and say, I return what is not mine. I reclaim what is. And you take a beautiful deep breath and imagine releasing any energy you picked up from clients today. And see it flowing out of your heart space and back to the universe to be transformed. And then imagine calling back any of your energy that got lost in client sessions. See your own life force returning. To your heart chakra, re feeling your well, you're no longer the empty cup. Immediately after this practice, grab your journal and answer these three questions. Whose pain am I carrying that isn't mine? What boundary did I lose today? Maybe you said yes when you meant no. What does my heart chakra need from me tomorrow? One specific action and that action is to restore heart energy, not depleted. So this isn't an optional self-reflection, y'all. This is how you interrupt the pattern of vicarious traumatization. And this practice works because it addresses all three levels of compassion fatigue simultaneously. Neurologically, the humming stim stimulates your vagus nerve, shifting you out of sympathetic activation into ventral vagal research shows. This reduces cortisol and inflammation markers within minutes, and then energetically. The visualization and vocalization is gonna restore the protective boundary in your heart chakra. That compassion work destroys you're literally rebuilding the energetic structure that allows compassion, compassionate differentiation, and somatically this boundary, this physical boundary embodiment. That arm extended walking your space or your hula hoop gives you a big bonus. Your nervous system is getting a felt sense of this is mine, that is theirs, and your body learns what a boundary feels like, making it easier to maintain one in sessions. So let's anchor this in. Uh, let's anchor the science. You learned the mere neuron truth. Using MRI imaging prove that when you listen to trauma narratives, your brain creates neurological activity and it's indistinguishable from personal trauma exposure. Those mirror neurons of yours, they fire as if you. Experience that trauma yourself and that creates structural brain tra changes, elevated cortisol and symptoms of PTSD, not from your own trauma. From occupational exposure to others trauma and the heart chakra collapse. Compassion work depletes the chakra. Your energy center of love and boundaries and research on biofield measurements show we helpers with compassion fatigue, have energetic boundary dissolution in the heart center, and this leaves you unable to distinguish their pain from yours. Unable to receive care. And carrying accumulated suffering in your chest and the compassion boundary reset, you learned an integrated practice combine. Combining vagal nerve stimulation through humming golden boundary visualization around your heart chakra and physical boundary embodiment. Followed by the compassion ledger to identify who's pain you're carrying and what boundaries you lost, y'all, I promised you three truths at the beginning that would shift everything, and here they are. Your compassion is not the problem. Your lack of protection is. You are good at what you do. You're endlessly empathic, always available, self-sacrificing, and that's a lie. Designed to extend maximum labor while blaming you. When you break, your mere neurons will keep firing. Your heart will keep opening. You need energetic boundaries, not less compassion. Number two, you cannot think your way out of vicarious trauma. You have to embody your way out. Your trauma isn't stored in your thoughts. It's embedded in your nervous system. Your heart chakra, your cellular, cellular memory. Cognitive insight won't fix dysregulation. You need somatic practices that speak the language. Your body understands sensation, vibration, boundary release, and number three, the system won't save you but you can save yourself. No workplace policy, no supervision model, no administrator is coming to protect your nervous system. The benefit from your, the system benefits from your depletion, but you have agency. You can hum between sessions. You can visualize boundaries. You can walk your energetic space. I invite you to keep a hula hoop in your office as a reminder. Paint it gold. Put some feathers on it. Make people wonder. Make it pretty. Oh, you can write in your compassion ledger. Whenever you need, you can choose one practice that restores instead of depletes. The biology is real. The damage is real, but so is your capacity to heal. Oh, y'all. So is your capacity to heal. If you're ready to stop hemorrhaging, grab my book, click in the show notes. I've got it linked there as well. And if you happen to be of some kind of crisis mirror neurons are so activated, you're having nightmares. Book a call with me. Let's work through that. We rise together. Your empathy is your superpower, but only when it's protected by boundaries. Your heart is meant to be open and sovereign. Your nervous system deserves regulation, not constant activation. If this episode hit home, don't just nod and move on. Give yourself what you actually need. Tap the show notes right now, and girl, if you know another woman healer who's running on empty, please share this episode, y'all. We rise together.