| July 2010 | www.namiohio.org |
Tracy Plouck
State Medicaid Director and Volunteer
|
“Medication
and counseling can change someone’s life.
I have seen firsthand employees and friends get well after
struggling with a mental health disorder and marvel that they were
hesitant to seek treatment. Depression,
anxiety, and bipolar disorder are so common in our society.
It is frustrating that there continues to be so much stigma
surrounding these conditions.”
Reflecting
on her work at the HelpLine, Tracy shared, “Volunteering serves as a
reality check for me both personally and professionally.
I had a call from a young woman with a mental health disorder who
was living in the state forest and had no support network.
It is disturbing to know that there are people out there who may
not have families to support them, or the resources to get to services
that are available to them. It
really reinforces the need for continuity of services across agencies.
We have to find better ways to serve the whole person and to make
sure that services that are available are within reach of those who need
them. This is a big
problem.”
Volunteering
for the HelpLine has also helped Tracy in her
relationships with others, “I can more easily see
issues for what they are and understand that they
are not about me, they’re not personal.
Once I learned to do this, I became much
better at listening and helping to address the issue
without becoming defensive.”
Tracy’s
parting advice was to look at volunteerism as
benefiting not only the organization and its
clients, but the individual who does the
volunteering.
“Volunteering has been very rewarding
to me personally and professionally and has given me
a more balanced perspective on life.
I think that everyone has skills that can be
put to use in a volunteer capacity.
More than ever, we need to look at solutions
that don’t involve more state dollars, and I
believe that volunteerism is one of those
solutions.”
NAMI
Ohio Applauds the Center for Community Solutions for
Telling it Like it Is
Dear
Readers,
Last
week, the public policy think tank, Center for
Community Solutions, issued a white paper entitled
“Ohio’s Community Mental Health System at a
Crossroads.” The
paper does an excellent job of outlining the
problems plaguing Ohio’s mental health system and
offers several thought provoking solutions to some
of those problems.
The only drawback to the report is that
you have to read through nine pages to find the most
important observation of all, which is: “Around
the country, care for people with severe mental
illness is reverting to something that resembles the
system that existed when Dorothea Dix began her
raids on jails and almshouses in the 1840s.”
NAMI
Ohio could not agree more.
We receive calls in our office every day from
individuals with mental illness and their families
who are in crisis and cannot access services.
Certainly, a large part of the problem is due
to lack of adequate funding, but it is not the
entire problem.
Read this report and you will get a good
sense of the many structural problems inherent in
Ohio’s mental health system that interfere and
actually prevent those in greatest need from getting
help.
The
time for major restructuring of our mental health
system is now. NAMI
Ohio plans to be at the forefront of this effort and
we hope we can count on you to be there with us.
To
read the report, go to:
http://www.communitysolutions.com/assets/1/AssetManager/sbm%20v6.3_Ackerman_MH%20071810.pdf
Sincerely,
Terry
Russell
Interim
Executive Director
Stigma Busting Challenge: Talk to that person, friend or relative that has been hesitant to seek treatment. Offer to set up an appointment and go with him or her.