Hi all! I am a relatively new nurse in general, with my first experience starting in acute inpatient psych last year. I am wondering what are some methods for stress relief y’all practice after days with high acuity teams?

For example, I had a team of 4 today and though 2 of my patients were relatively okay, the other 2 were very high acuity. One is so much so that she has an entire “flex area” to herself. (The flex area consists of 3 independent rooms with a day area separate from the other parts of the unit, usually used for high acuity or sexually inappropriate patients) I ended up having to toggle between medicating her IM as soon as it was available again, and putting another patient I had into locked seclusion for 3.5hrs.

It was very stressful on me in the end, and I feel dead to the world right now. What are some ways you guys cope with hard days and what methods do y’all use to help with stress relief? TIA! 😮‍💨