MHFA Forum 3 - Building Instructor Resilience: Self-care Strategies for Navigating the Emotional Challenges of Teaching MHFA

Sunday, May 4, 2025

11:15 AM – 12:15 PM ET

Location: 204A

This workshop will discuss how MHFA Instructors: 1) manage sensitive topics, 2) create a supportive environment, 3) manage difficult emotions, 4) navigate different perspectives, and 5) identify the impact on themselves. The objectives of the workshop include describing secondary trauma exposure as Instructors, understanding the signs of empathy strain, and identifying the vulnerabilities and strengths we bring as Instructors. This session will conclude with a focus on self-care and how we transform the emotional impact into resilience. We will discuss tools for managing secondary trauma exposure and establishing a renewed mindfulness of the many rewards that come from being a MHFA Instructor.

Learning Objectives:

Learners will be able to explain in their own words the science behind how stress impacts their mental and physical wellbeing.
Learners will collaborate to identify effective self-care strategies to implement before, during and after a training to improve their own mental wellbeing as Instructors.
Learners will walk away with a robust list of easy-to-implement self-care strategies focusing on things that they can control.
Learners will understand the signs and symptoms of empathy strain and identify the vulnerabilities and strengths we bring as instructors.
Learners will describe how we transform the emotional impact of teaching MHFA into resilience

Forum Presenter - MHFA Summit(s)

Michele M. Pilon, BA

Michele Pilon
Washington Wellness with Michele
Covington, Washington
Jill D. Ramsey, M.S., C.P.R.P.

Lead Behavioral Health Training Coordinator
University of Alaska Anchorage
Anchorage, Alaska

Moderator - MHFA Summit(s)

LB

Lisa Basci, LPC

Director Peer Support and Mental Health First Aid
Community Services Group
Sunbury, Pennsylvania