27/05/2026
Burnout and moral injury get mixed up a lot. They're not the same thing. And honestly, I think the term burnout is over-used to describe something far more impactful.
Burnout is exhaustion. Moral injury is what happens when you're required - repeatedly - to act against your own values. When the system asks of you to be the social worker you never expected. When you feel complicit in harm you didn't choose.
It hits differently. It needs different support. I write and teach about moral injury, and I work with it in supervision regularly. Far too regularly. And, I've been there too.
It's workable- but it needs to be named first.
If this is something you're sitting with, feel free to reach out.