A total of 69 departed public child welfare workers responded to a telephone interview asking why they left their positions and what might have made them stay. Their open-ended responses were then coded into domains and subcategories and also converted into quantitative data for descriptive analysis. The model developed describes the effect of child welfare work (mentioned by 26.1% of respondents) and working conditions (supervision, 28.9%, agency climate, 31.8%, agency behavior, 57.9%, workload, 47.8%) having an impact on the self (noted by 72.4% of respondents) which then resulted in departure. Factors that workers said would have made them stay included changes in the child welfare work, 17.4%, supervision, 24.6%, agency climate, 26.1%, agency behavior, 43.5%, manageable workload, 52.1%, and impact on the self, 24.6%.