Sustain the lawyer. Sustain the system.

“There’s no point walking around full of bravado if you’re actually struggling”

In conversation with Maria Henty.

Family practitioners routinely work alongside people experiencing some of the most difficult periods of their lives. They absorb highly personal accounts of conflict, trauma and loss while being expected to remain objective, provide clear legal advice and advance client’s cases effectively.

For Maria Henty, a family barrister a Pump Court Chambers, one of the challenges is recognising that lawyers are not immune from the emotional consequences of such work.

Called to the Bar in 2012, Maria practises in family law (finances and private children) and has seen a significant shift in the profession’s willingness to acknowledge mental health and wellbeing. Where struggling might once have been something to conceal, conversations about difficult cases, seeking help such as therapy, and the need for support more generally are becoming increasingly normal.

But greater openness has coincided with growing pressures elsewhere. Increased communication, unrealistic expectations of availability, administrative problems within the courts and the continuing pressures on legal aid all contribute to the strain experienced by practitioners.

As part of Young Legal Aid Lawyers’ Mental Health Pledge, co-chair Priya Pandya spoke to Maria about vicarious trauma, burnout, the particular pressures facing junior practitioners, how she protects her own wellbeing and why resilience should not mean simply carrying on regardless of the personal cost.

How did you find your way into law?

I studied Social and Political Sciences at Cambridge as an undergraduate, then did the law conversion and Bar course.

There was also a family connection to the law. My grandfather was a solicitor with Sussex Police, before the CPS existed and my mum was a CPS solicitor before taking her higher rights and then becoming a barrister with the CPS, she then moved to chambers.  I spent a lot of time going to court with my mum, so in some ways going into law felt quite natural.

I started with a mixed common law practice and did a lot of legal aid work in crime and family. Over time my diary naturally became more focused on family work, and I ultimately made an active decision to stop doing crime and stop family legal work aid too.

I do love family law. Complex private children work and finance cases are intellectually challenging, which I really enjoy.

How does practising in family law affect a barrister’s mental health?

In family law, one of the major issues is vicarious trauma.

You are dealing with people’s emotions at court and sitting alongside somebody on what can be an incredibly emotionally charged day.

As a barrister, you have to find the balance between being empathetic and giving solid, objective legal advice. You sit with quite a lot of emotion, and there can be a lot that you take home with you afterwards.

We are not necessarily trained to listen to trauma and then understand how to process what we have heard before going into court, moving on to the next case or simply going home at the end of the day.

Those areas are interlinked. We can absorb and take on a great deal, which is why we need to talk about it.

Has the profession’s approach to mental health changed since you started at the Bar?

Definitely.

I was called in 2012 and joined chambers in 2014. Over that period, I have seen a significant increase in awareness around wellbeing and in people’s willingness to talk about mental health and the difficulties that can come with the work.

People are better at saying, “I’m struggling”, “I need a break” or “I’ve had a really hard day”.

People are also more open about going to therapy or acknowledging that a particular case has triggered something for them.

There has been a move towards destigmatising the fact that people sometimes find this work difficult.

It is not perfect by any stretch of the imagination and we have a long way to go. But it makes me happy that chambers are increasingly offering mental health support and that there are therapists who specialise in supporting people working within the legal profession.

They are baby steps, but they are important ones.

Is burnout becoming more common in family law?

I don’t think I am in a position to say whether burnout itself is more or less common, but there are certainly increasing strains on family practitioners, whether they are doing private or publicly funded work.

The level of input required from practitioners has increased.

Communication is one example. We now have emails, WhatsApp and other ways of contacting people constantly, and everything can start to feel urgent.

That creates an additional burden.

Too much correspondence, too many telephone calls and too many conferences can become overwhelming.

There are then the wider stresses and strains on the family justice system.

Hearings may not be given enough time. Listings may not be issued when they should be. There is a sense that the court system itself is struggling to provide the service it should.

When the system does not function properly, that pressure falls on judges who care deeply about the cases they are dealing with. It then falls on barristers, solicitors and paralegals, and ultimately it affects clients.

When I started, court offices were much more accessible. If you had an issue, there was often somebody you could speak to. Clerks could pick up the telephone and get through to somebody.

A lot of that has gone.

Things feel broken in a way that adds another layer of stress to work that was already stressful.

And the state of legal aid is appalling.

Are those pressures particularly difficult for junior barristers?

They can be.

Obviously, experiences vary depending on the chambers you are in, but junior barristers are right at the coalface.

There is the sheer volume of documentation you have to get through. There is the stress and strain of travelling. Papers may arrive the day before a hearing.

Court practices have changed as well. There may be an expectation that position statements and other documents are filed by 11am the day before a hearing, for example. That can be incredibly difficult when you are a very junior barrister dealing with a busy diary and papers arriving late.

Then there is the nature of family work itself.

Family cases are unpredictable and the content can be difficult. When you are new to the work, that can be particularly hard to manage.

You are also suddenly in the spotlight. You are responsible for your client and you are standing in front of a judge.

It does get easier with time. You become better at dealing with things and more confident in yourself and in the work.

But when you are a baby barrister, you are learning both simultaneously: you are getting to know the work while also getting to know yourself.

How do you personally manage the emotional impact of difficult cases?

I try very hard to look after my wellbeing, although it isn’t something that necessarily comes naturally and I often do not get it right but again, all one step at a time.

I journal. I exercise. I go to therapy. I try as hard as I can to go to bed on time.

With experience, age and therapy, I think I have developed greater capacity to recognise what is going on internally.

Self-awareness is key.

If something is affecting you and you do not recognise it or give yourself space to process it, it is likely to come out in some other way that you did not intend.

Having no break is no good to anyone.

How can chambers better support the mental wellbeing of their members?

I feel very lucky at Pump Court Chambers.

We have a wellbeing policy and a chambers health scheme which offers ten therapy sessions. It is a warm, friendly and collegiate set, and there is always somebody at the end of the phone, at every level of seniority.

Sometimes you need to speak to somebody who actually does the job and understands the particular pressures that come with it.

There is a real family atmosphere in chambers.

For me, an important part of that is fostering an open culture where people can talk about difficult things.

There is no point walking around full of bravado if you’re actually struggling.

We should be actively thinking about wellbeing. Bring in external speakers to talk about it. Encourage more people within chambers to talk about their own experiences.

There can be this perception in the profession that you simply have to keep going.

Of course resilience is needed to do this job but at what personal cost?

You can still do excellent work while having the right support and looking after yourself.

We need to become more accepting of that and more willing to talk.

Mentoring also matters. At Pump Court, everyone under ten years’ call has a mentor.

And some of the support does not have to be formal. It can be social: going to an non work related event together, having a coffee or simply knowing there are people around in chambers.

Those relationships matter.

What advice would you give junior lawyers about protecting their mental health?

Be yourself.

Trying to be somebody else or feeling that you have to present a particular version of yourself can generate a lot of strain.

Talk to people. Talk to your clerks. Don’t be embarrassed.

Everybody has something going on.

Someone may look completely self-assured from the outside, but that does not mean there isn’t something happening underneath.

Do not feel like you are the only person finding it difficult.

The job is hard.

And the fact that the work matters is part of what makes it special but it is also why you need to look after yourself while doing it.

What role should the Bar play in improving mental health support for practitioners?

Better signposting would help.

People are increasingly alive to the fact that support exists, but one of the ironies is that when you are stressed and extremely busy, that is often precisely when you struggle to acknowledge that you need help let alone find out where that help is.

Support therefore needs to be easy to find and easy to access.

It should be right in front of people rather than something they have to search for when they are already overwhelmed.

We also need to recognise that different practice areas involve different professional relationships and different pressures.

The relationship between counsel and judges, for example, can vary depending on the type and length of case. Family practice has its own dynamics.

Mental health support needs to recognise those differences rather than assuming that every barrister experiences the profession in exactly the same way.

If you could make one change to improve lawyers’ wellbeing, what would it be?

Another 24 hours in the day!

And finally, how do you switch off outside work?

Watching Peep Show for the millionth time after a long day in court works wonders for me.

Making space to acknowledge that the job is hard

One of the clearest themes running through Maria Henty’s reflections is the value of simply acknowledging the reality of the work.

Family practitioners are expected to sit alongside people experiencing intense emotions, absorb accounts of trauma, provide objective advice and then move on — often immediately to the next client or hearing.

Doing that without being affected should not be the measure of whether somebody is resilient.

As Maria puts it, lawyers are not trained therapists. Yet the profession can sometimes expect practitioners to absorb traumatic material without giving them the tools or space to process it.

That is why conversations about mental health matter.

So do practical measures: access to therapy, mentoring, supportive clerks and colleagues, realistic expectations around availability and somewhere to turn when a case has affected you more than expected.

But Maria’s reflections also highlight pressures that individual wellbeing strategies cannot solve.

Journalling cannot fix a dysfunctional court listing system. Exercise cannot make late papers arrive earlier. Therapy cannot restore the court offices and administrative support that practitioners once relied upon.

And telling somebody to become more resilient does little if the system continually increases what it expects them to absorb.

Sustaining the lawyer, sustaining the system

The shift Maria has witnessed since joining the Bar is therefore significant.

A profession in which somebody can say, “I’m struggling”, “I need a break” or “that case affected me” without embarrassment is healthier than one in which difficulty has to be concealed behind professional confidence.

But openness is only the beginning.

As part of Young Legal Aid Lawyers’ Mental Health Pledge, we want to encourage a culture in which conversations about wellbeing lead to practical change: where support is visible and accessible, where junior practitioners know they are not alone, and where organisations recognise their responsibility for creating healthy working environments.

There will always be a need for resilience in legal practice. The work is difficult precisely because it matters so much.

But resilience should not require false bravado.

Nor should looking after yourself be treated as somehow incompatible with being an excellent lawyer.

As Maria’s reflections make clear, sometimes the most important thing a practitioner can do is recognise that the job is hard, talk to somebody about it — and give themselves permission to take a break.

Because, as she puts it:

“Having no break is no good to anyone.”