Little By Little: Witness To Witness

In 2020, the world grappled with unprecedented challenges. Across the globe, the Coronavirus pandemic, worldwide economic losses, and political unrest all contributed to mounting alarm about the long-term consequences to public health. Professionals warned of a developing mental health epidemic for frontline clinicians who faced an increasingly stressful state of conflict across numerous intersections of the personal, professional, and economic, including cultural, emotional, physical, political, and social health echelons.

One such clinician is Willow, a registered nurse who has worked with burn victims in a public hospital for five years. As COVID-19 cases began to spike in her hospital, Willow found herself experiencing heightened anxiety about her job, particularly after she learned administrators were considering moving COVID-19 patients to her floor. Despite the presence of a sterile environment, necessary to protect burn victims who are susceptible to infection, the virulence and ease of COVID-19's contagion scared her, especially as she realized that the burn unit staff would have to absorb the care of the COVID-19 patients. "For the first time ever," she confided, "I was truly worried that just by showing up to my job, I could kill someone.”

At the same time, Willow, whose spouse is an essential worker, felt overwhelmed when people close to her expressed doubt about the seriousness of the pandemic. “Our daily lives changed very little, but all of a sudden, the stress jumped for both of us, and we didn’t have many other outlets to vent and work things out, besides with each other,” she explained. Her frustration reached a fever pitch when challenged to use her professional credentials to prove the seriousness of the virus working its way through her community. "I had to tell people that being a nurse didn't mean I had some insider access to information that someone else couldn't review for themselves." She reached out to Witness to Witness a short time later, seeking validation "from someone outside my circle, an impartial third-party." It was a move that helped her understand the stress facing her, and work through it.

Willow is just one of hundreds of clients who have benefitted from Witness to Witness since the onset of COVID-19. During this most recent quarter, Witness to Witness volunteers have remained responsive to the development of subsequent events that have promoted stress within vulnerable communities. Six webinars have been produced and hosted for audiences up to several hundred participants at a time in the last 90 days. In addition to their peer-to-peer services, Witness to Witness clients have benefitted from a multitude of services, including topical social media posts, newsletters, and event-specific email blasts promoting resilience, understanding, and emotional growth, values that will continue to shape future work.

Links:

• For more information, click here.

• Witness to Witness Webinar Material (PDF)