How do I cope when other people's trauma changes how I see the world?

You carry what the people you serve have been through, and it is starting to color everything, even the parts of life that used to feel safe. This is not you being fragile. It is what happens to caring people who stand close to suffering for long enough. The mind takes on some of what it witnesses. But noticing it, as you are now, is the beginning of protecting yourself. The suffering you see is real, and so is the good you do. What you must guard against is letting the darkness become the only lens, quietly convincing you the whole world is only its worst parts. It is not, even though your work shows you those parts up close. Start by deliberately taking in some evidence of the other side. Each day, mark one ordinary kindness or small good thing you saw, and let yourself actually register it. This is not denial. It is keeping the picture honest, so the weight you carry does not get to rewrite what you believe about people.