Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Poverty is a key indicator for one’s mental health. This episode, we speak to David Chowne, Elsie Lobo, and Eric Krepstekies to explore the complexities of managing your mental health while living in poverty.
Do Local Good is a podcast created by United Way of the Alberta Capital Region and the team of volunteers on the GenNEXT Cabinet. We feature stories and people from the Edmonton region to inform, inspire, and invite others to join us in building resilient and thriving communities. Listen in to learn about some of the local good already happening, and how you can be a part of the force for good!
Peace Out Poverty S01E02 – Accessible Mental Health Care
CONTENT WARNING
[Rebecca] Hey, it’s Rebecca with GenNEXT. Just a heads up, we’re going to be discussing topics like depression and suicide in today’s episode. Please take care while listening, and if you need support, we have some mental health resources in the show notes.
[INTRO MUSIC]
INTRODUCTION
[Tokunbo] Hi. My name Tokunbo Adegbuyi, and I’m a member of the GenNEXT Team. And this is Peace Out Poverty, the podcast that gives you a local perspective on social issues, and shows you how you can get involved.
United Way’s GenNEXT Team started this show to explore the intricate ways poverty can impact the lives of folks in the Alberta Capital Region. And this episode, we’ve got our work cut out for us. Because today, we’re exploring the relationship between poverty and mental health. That is, how poverty can impact your mental health, how poor mental health keeps folks in poverty, and hopefully, how we can work towards breaking the cycle.
[BEAT]
[Tokunbo] You don't need to look for very long to see that there’s a strong connection between mental health and poverty. The tricky part is untangling the two. It's a cyclical issue without a clear starting point. And we know it’s hard to address a problem without understanding the root cause - so let’s break it down!
First, let’s talk mental health. According to the Centre for Addiction & Mental Health, in any given year, 1 in 5 Canadians experience a mental illness or problem with addiction. And by the time Canadians hit 40 years old, 1 in 2 will have had a mental illness.
We also know that your mental health and physical health are connected. For example, people living with a mood disorder are at much higher risk of developing a long-term medical condition. Also, mental illness is a leading cause of disability in Canada.
Now, let’s talk about poverty. Alberta Health Services found that folks with lower socioeconomic status are more likely to be hospitalized for a mental health-related illness. Statistics Canada says Canadians in the lowest income group are 3 to 4 times more likely to report fair or poor mental health than Canadians in the highest income group. And lastly, the Edmonton Social Planning Council says that factors inherent to poverty, like the stress of living paycheque to paycheque, can also drive down your mental health.
So to recap: Mental illness is a common problem in Canada. Your mental health can leave you in a condition that makes it difficult to work or go to school. Without steady work or an education, you’ll have difficulty earning a living wage. And if you do find work, the constant push to just get by eats away at your mental health even further. And so on, and so on.
And this is just one of the trends we can see between mental health and poverty. Poverty also impedes your access to steady housing, healthy food, and social connections, all of which are vitally important to your mental health.
All that talk, and we’ve just gone around in a circle again. If we want to learn how to break the pattern, we’re definitely going to need to talk to some folks in the field. Folks like Dave Chowne.
INTERVIEW 1
[Dave] So my name is Dave Chowne, pronouns are he/him, and I'm the portfolio manager of mental health at United Way. I worked on our community investment team and I worked mostly with our mental health organizations.
[Tokunbo] Dave acts like a bridge between United Way and community-serving organizations. He connects organizations to funding, government resources, and to one another! We sat down with him to discuss the state of mental health support in the Alberta Capital Region.
[Dave] One thing I love about working for United Way, it's just, there's so many people doing some great work in our community.
We fund some impressive and important programs that are providing Distress Line support. They are providing, walk-in counseling as well as counselling programs as well. So there's a lot of really great work happening in the community. That said, you know, dating back even before the pandemic, one in five people in Canada are experiencing a mental health problem or illness.
And, you know, with some of the COVID stats, that number may even be one in four right now. So statistic Canada just released a report. And so that just means there are hundreds of thousands of Albertans accessing mental health services and supports. And there are hundreds of thousands of Albertans who aren't getting the mental health supports they need.
About 70% of Canadians living with a mental health problem, illness, say those started childhood. And even when we look at working population alone, I mean, a lot of the working population experiences, mental health problems. One-third of disability claims are related to mental illness and that's affecting people in their prime and early welcome years as well.
Mental health is huge. We've made some great strides in recent years, addressing stigma and results and supports, but I mean, there's just so much more work to do.
[Tokunbo] At this point, we have a pretty good picture of mental health across the country. But how do things look for someone trying to access the system here in Alberta, right now?
[Dave] Canadian Mental Health Association puts it best. And so we currently have a patchwork of hospitals, public health services, and community organizations doing their best to support mental health needs. But there's still far too many people that just don't have the capacity or they can't pay out of pocket to access some of these services. And so to access some of the community-based services, the subsidized services, or the community sponsored supports, you know, sometimes they're on wait lists for months and months. And some of these people can't really afford to wait. It's not really that uncommon to hear someone who goes to a hospital emergency room with thoughts of suicide, and then they're sent home without a plan or without proper alignment towards resources or supports that they might need. We're seeing greater need for addiction and substance use disorder. And again, some of the people can't afford the programs or supports or recovery programs that they need. And so there's, there's a lot of people doing some great work, but I feel there's a lot more we can do to help. Make sure that we can provide the sport, especially in the midst of this pandemic.
There's been increases in suicidal ideation,opioid and substance use, feelings of anxiety. The pandemic has touched us all. And if you were struggling beforehand odds are it's been really tough.
[Tokunbo] At the best of times, trying to access the mental health support you need can feel like wandering a maze. And as Dave mentioned, we are not at the best of times. But Dave and his colleagues are working hard to streamline the process and raise awareness of the issue. One product of this work has been the Community Mental Health Action Plan.
[Dave] So the Community Mental Health Action Plan is really a group of members from government, nonprofit organizations, and individuals that came together just to help raise awareness for mental health, promote mental wellbeing, and start looking for solutions to the challenges in the mental health system, including access and prevention.
And so it's a team of service providers that are really trying to look at systems as well as supports and compiling reliable lists of training that's available to make sure agencies have the info they need to provide meaningful supports, help reduce duplication in services, and you can get involved in projects like when 211 Alberta was launched, a number of members from the community mental health action plan worked with a Community Mental Health Association in Greater Edmonton.
The distress line in Calgary as well. So there's been some great systemic, things that this group has worked with as well as some great successes and just making sure organizations had access to training and supports that could change the way they do business.
[Tokunbo] The financial cost of taking care of your mental health is a prevailing issue in Canada; it’s why we wanted to make this episode! The cost of therapy sessions can get fairly high, not to mention medications or continuing care. Dave, of course, recognizes this, but he doesn’t want a price tag to deter people from seeking care.
[Dave] So mental health is a health issues, so the cost varies a lot. It depends on your diagnosis, the types of supports you have available your personal circumstances. If you have access to a employee family assistance program that might help cover the cost of some sessions or subsidize access. I mean, I wouldn't get too worried about cost of supports and stuff. Of course, if you have the resources to pay for it yourself, it's going to be a bit easier, but there's programs and supports. There's free or subsidized community-based programs as well. We have peer navigators that can help you navigate mental health system if you need it.
So it might take a little extra time and connections, but I wouldn't get too set on costs. I mean, once mental illness is recognized, it can make a difference in about 80% of the people who are affected. So don't let fears of costs or a treatment plan get in the way of taking that first step.
[Tokunbo] And despite the shortcomings of our current system, Dave had a very clear message for us. If you think you should speak to someone about your mental health, do it. And if you’ve been trying to get the help you need, keep trying.
[Dave] I'm not, again, not a mental health professional. I'm not an expert by any means. But the earlier you can address mental health problems or challenges, like, the more success you're going to see. So people often worry about asking for help because there can be stigma around mental health problems. They believe that asking for help or is admitting something that's wrong with them. Some people worry about how they're going to be perceived or that they should just be able to pick themselves up by their bootstraps, so to speak. So, asking for help means that you want to make changes or take steps to new health goals, and it should be a celebrated feeling when you reach that point, we should celebrate it. We should encourage it. We should encourage people to get help. The first steps are often the toughest. So one of the first things you can do is if you have a support network, you can count on, reach out to them, share how you're feeling.
If you have a family doctor, they are a great resource that can help link you to other professionals if needed for assessment, they might be able to do assessments themselves, connecting with the medications to try many employers have employee family assistance programs that provide assessment and counseling and help can help start you building those recovery plans as well. But again, it's not just for people that have access to these resources, there are community supports available. So if you don't know where to go, like one of the best resources you can call right now is call 211. If you're ready to talk to someone about mental health if you are ready to start seeing if he can access short-term counseling or conventional health services 211 can help connect those to you. We have a great drop in single session counselling that's available, which provides great free drop-in counselling services.
They have therapists they'll help you focus on your strengths and connect you to other services available as well. And these, these drop-in counselling sessions are free. You can access them remotely if that's what you're more comfortable doing in the pandemic. There's about five or six maybe, more locations where these drop-in supports are available as well.
If you need someone to talk to right away, again, 211 can help connect you to the distress line. So if we're talking Edmonton, the distress line provides immediate support for people in a crisis. And it can provide emotional support or they can help the caregivers who have someone in their lives that are immediate as well.
So again, recognizing mental illness, taking those first steps to improvement are so important. There's a lot of ways to get into the mental health system. But the first step is admitting that maybe it's time to talk to someone.
It's easy for mental health to spiral out of control. Like the impact of an undiagnosed mental illness can be devastating. Both inside and outside of our homes, like your relationships suffer, it can be overwhelmingly difficult to work or go to school. Your household finances can become precarious as well. If you don't seek those mental health supports or services you need maybe it's due to stigma or whatever, it can really, really hurt you. If you can avoid a crisis or letting things spiral out of control and take more proactive steps, it can make a really big difference.
[Tokunbo] Dave also has recommendations for folks who might not be dealing with a mental health issue themselves, but want to be better prepared to support the people around them.
[Dave] When I shared some of the stats, when I say, like, one in four people in Canada are having challenge having a mental health problem or experiencing mental illness. So this is our friends and our neighbors. I think one thing we can really do to help address stigma is learn about mental health and learn about mental illness. And so if you have the resources the mental health commission has a program called Mental Health First Aid, which is a great resource to make you so you can help people and learn a little bit about mental illnesses, how to refer people to programs successfully.
And there's all sorts of really great community resources as well. So you can learn a little bit about the impact of trauma and how trauma impacts people's lives, how it can affect a child's brain. Again, the more we can learn about mental health and how we can support each other and how everyone works a little bit different. I think it's really important to just, if you have the opportunity and the time to learn there's programs available, that you can pay for it, that you can attend for free as well.
[Tokunbo] There are links to all the resources Dave recommended in the show notes, including 211 and the Community Mental Health Action Plan.
[BEAT]
INTERLUDE 1
[Tokunbo] Dave mentioned many different kinds of supports someone could access to help their mental health. But perhaps the first kind of support that comes to mind is speaking to someone in 1-on-1 therapy. So, the next voice you’re going to hear is from a mental health therapist. Her name is Dr. Elsie Lobo and she works at The Family Centre. Here she is with Rebecca.
INTERVIEW 2
[Elsie] So my name is Elsie Lobo. I am the manager of therapy and mental health services at The Family Centre. And so in my role, I oversee all of the different therapy programs and all of the work that we do out of the community with our therapy programs.
Through the different programs it really helps me see the impact of the work that we do in the community, the importance of, of supporting people and their mental wellbeing in the community, and then I also get to see, I think in my role too where some of the challenges are right where we have difficulty providing enough services or adequate services where some of those gaps are in how we serve people and how we serve communities.
[Tokunbo] We’ve already discussed the difficulties of finding the right care for you. But once you’ve found it, even the logistics of booking appointments, commuting, and arranging for childcare can be a challenge. This is why Elsie and The Family Centre work to promote a more community-based approach.
[Elsie] So we have therapists and like I said, in different community settings. So one of the programs that we are at this United Way program, All in for Youth. And so part of that funding helps us to put mental health therapists as well as success coaches and social workers in schools.
[Tokunbo] The All In For Youth program works with Edmonton Public and Catholic schools to provide social supports to students and their families. Since it began in 2016, All in for Youth has provided folks with therapy, social workers, lunch programs, afterschool programs, and more. All free of charge, and all based out of the school itself!
[Elsie] That's been a really big piece I think of expanding accessibility, right? When we can put people right in community. Which helps already take away financial barriers, transportation barriers, childcare barriers. There's so many different barriers, even scheduling, you know, our therapists are right there and easy to be connected to families. That in and of itself, right when we can be there in communities, really supporting, really being available to people. I think that's when really big way. We also have a drop-in counselling programs. We have therapists here at The Family Centre in our downtown office.
So if principals or teachers see the need for either a student or a family where they're having a lot of difficulty accessing services, or maybe there is some sort of ongoing trauma or past trauma, or just barriers overall for them, or they're struggling overall, even with attending school. They can connect them to our therapists who can then meet with that student and then meet with the families as well.
And they also can help when there are crises. Right? So if students are, let's say having suicidal ideation or self-harming, or you know, maybe even conflict with other people or conflict in their families, that there's someone like a safe person at the school who they can talk to and who's trained in helping to support these things. And they're right there.
[Rebecca] So do you find that, you know, youth are more willing to talk to counsellors because they're onsite?
[Elsie] I think so. I think it's scary sometimes for youth to come into a strange office building downtown. You know, you don't really know who you're meeting or what to expect, but when you've got someone in your school there they're part of the school community, right. They're connected to the teachers there, you see them walking through the hallways. I know a lot of our therapists talk about like high-fiving students when they're coming in or just seeing them in the hallway. Right? And so even if a student isn't a formal client of theirs, really getting therapy services, they still will cross paths with a therapist. And so that becomes someone who's familiar with. And I think it also helps reduce the stigma because they may see other students going into that office or coming out or, or that this person is like an okay person to be with before they actually have to face something like being in session.
So I think it helps take away some of that stigma. It takes away the unknown. It feels a lot safer, I think for adolescents. When it's someone they're familiar with.
[Tokunbo] Of course, the All In For Youth program is just one of the community-based programs The Family Centre offers. There are also options for those of us not connected to a K-12 school.
[Elsie] But then we also have people placed at different places. Like for example, the pride center or family futures we connect with on the south side or when the libraries are open, we've got them in different libraries and places like that that are out in the community.
And those are really nice because it's free for people to come for a single session counselling. And then we can connect them too to subsidize counselling program if they need something longer term. Being where people are, again, I think there's so many barriers involved in people coming downtown to an office, building scheduling appointments ahead of time. And so by trying to make ourselves accessible and available. It's helpful because especially once we kind of meet with them and if they find it helpful, then we can help connect them to a therapist who can see them for a number of more sessions and maybe do some more intense work, but getting in, I think is a big barrier and that's being out there helps people to get in.
[Tokunbo] The Family Centre conducts well over 200 free sessions of therapy per month, just through their drop-in programs. But we know that the actual need for mental health support is still much higher. We asked Elsie to share some recommendations on how we could make mental health more accessible in the Alberta Capital Region.
[Elsie] We're doing a lot and we're doing the best we can. Right now I see our therapists in schools. They're being utilized a lot, right? Their case loads are very full and it's only still the first half of the school year. And so there are a lot of children and students and youth and families who do need services and so when our people are full, they may have no place to go still as much as we do our best to still connect with them and get them served. And so I think we do need more people out in the community. We need more people, not only just in schools, but also just in community, easy places to refer people to where they can access services at an affordable rate or at a subsidized rate. People even in community centres.
I was going to say too, with poverty too, there's such a reciprocal relationship with mental health and poverty, right? Of course, if you're struggling with your mental health, it's harder to maintain employment and all of those things. But then on the other hand, too, when you're in poverty, that's going to increase your stress levels. It's going to lead to a lot more mental health symptoms. So it becomes quite a cycle. And so I think it's so important too with mental health that we're not only serving mental health, right. That our mental health services maybe come in connection with other supports. Like, I mean, of course ensuring people have housing or food. You know, their basic needs are also being met. Because it's really hard to just isolate mental health as something when people are also struggling in so many other areas, because all those other areas are going to impact their mental health.
[Tokunbo] Links to learn more about The Family Centre’s programs, including their online therapy offerings, are in the show notes.
[BEAT]
INTERLUDE 2
[Tokunbo] So far, we’ve talked about access to mental health support largely in terms of affordability. And while being able to afford care is certainly important, it’s not the only factor that goes into ‘accessibility.’ We also need to ensure that mental health support is appropriate. The Mental Health Commission of Canada points to a number studies that say clients have better outcomes when they receive culturally competent treatment. That is, when the therapist has a strong understanding of the client’s cultural background, ethnicity, or faith.
Your background can say a lot about where your mental health issues stem from, and how they might be best addressed. Colonialism, racism, gender identity, living as a refugee; these are very personal experiences that not just anyone can understand and address clinically.
Eric Krepstekies is someone who specializes in this area. He is, among other things, a registered psychologist working with The Family Centre.
INTERVIEW 3
[Eric] My name is Eric Krepstekies and I am the, well, I work as a few different positions here at The Family Centre. So I am a mental health therapist, so I serve clients that come in, in our drop-in and our ongoing programs. And then I also am an intern mentor here, so I will help the new interns when they're coming in. They're finishing their last year of their masters program in counselling psychology, helping them out with any kind of ethical issues that come up or ethical decision-making. So just getting them ready to be therapists outside into the community themselves. And then I also have a private practice too. So geared kind of a little bit more to people that are using benefits or have maybe third-party funding or something like that to access therapy as well.
[Tokunbo] As a practitioner and a mentor, Eric was able to give us a well-rounded perspective on how clients can find success once they’ve chosen to begin therapy.
[Eric] There's a big portion of therapy and therapeutic success that's involved with the relationship with your therapist. Therapy isn't like a paint by numbers type of thing where if you do this for this specific thing for this problem, then it'll be okay. It doesn't work out that way. So that flux happens and I think you have to be, you have to accommodate that. And I think that's just with, with anybody, but then not only that is you have on the other side of culture, which is going to affect how each one of those different effects will then relate to the individuals. So I think giving that allows for more effective therapy, because it gives you a level of comfort with the person that you're talking with. Comfort means vulnerability. You can be open, you can feel like you can be honest. That that person while they might not share maybe specifically your culture, but they will hopefully be able to show some empathy and care and that what you're experiencing is important and matters. And so I think that's why it means a lot to have that focus and have that ability to connect culturally. We have therapists that speak different languages and therapists that have different cultures. And so hopefully that helps to connect. Not every single time are you able to match up therapists like that and, and everything, but you know, potentially that's an option as well. So think that's helpful.
We do have translation services here. So we can have a translator come in, sit in sessions and not only that even providing other services, we can do translations for documents and things like that. But for therapy actually just having someone in the room that can relay what the therapist is saying, and then get that chance to kind of have that face-to-face. So that's one thing that we can do, and we can offer that for most most people. In terms of Indigineous specific we have a knowledge holder that actually works with us at our downtown location. So she offers a lot, like, I mean, just a wealth of information in terms of what would be the best way to go about aspects in therapy. Because as therapists, I think we get a sense of working with different cultures, cultures that are not our own, and how to go about therapy with them, but it is nice to have that extra little bit of information too, to know, you know, how do I navigate this specific thing? And so she will, she will let us allow us to be involved in a lot of different things. So like doing some sweats and herb pickings, and then we have now virtual smudging that we do every day here, if you want to join in or not. But we also, we used to do that in person.
Some of those things, we can also incorporate into therapies. So a couple of different therapists have their, their kits that they'll use to smudge with. And they'll actually do that sometimes with clients before sessions or at the end of the sessions. So that offers just that extra little piece that can kind of help a little bit the process and comfort and connect in the way I think that client connects rather than just trying to fit something the way that therapy says it needs to be this way. We can kind of fit that more towards that specific person and what they practice and what's important to them.
[Tokunbo] Eric is among the few Black men working in the mental health field and he's noticed how your identity, specifically race and gender can influence your ability and likelihood to seek care. He shared some of the work he’s done to address this gap.
[Eric] So I am connected to the Black Therapist Network. So is essentially just, it's a nonprofit organization that is its goal is to support access really. Kind of twofold goal, I think, one is the place for black therapists to connect with each other, to have discussion about, you know, race and implication and how that connects to therapy, how that manifests, and then that second goal of accessing the community and then helping provide, you know, that support allowing people to feel that, that sense of comfort, I guess they're connecting with someone that understands a little bit what it's like to be a minority. So the network will actually connect with other organizations and provide like consultations as to how they would maybe integrate certain aspects into their organizations. They also have some psychoeducation that they'll do in schools to other aspects of the community. Just talking about race and talking about mental health. And then there's also a directory. And so the directory is there so if you are interested in therapy and you are looking to have a black therapist, you can look there and you can connect and see there's a little bio for each therapist there and there's about, I think, close to about 40 therapists on there now. And so a little background on kind of, you know, what their journey has been and what, how they practice therapy, and then you can connect with them.
A lot of people in the black community tend to withdraw much more often than do other cultures, other races. So that's an interesting thing is to how to connect them more to therapy.
One thing to highlight is the field tends to be largely female and largely white. I think to the point of it's about 80, in the 80% range of therapists are going to be typically white women. Right? And so there's a misrepresentation there for colour, for males actually. And I think that side of things creates another aspect and other barrier where what does that say about a man's access, as well? What does that say about, can a man be a healer, can a man be viewed as someone that's showing compassion or being empathetic? Is that something that can be shown? And I think there's that systemic aspect that I think comes in play there where men aren't usually seen as having those skills or being able to offer those things and increasing that ability for men to maybe become therapists for men to be a little bit more open to having to going to therapy, to having a male therapist, I think all starts to shift that stigma.
[Tokunbo] Eric highlights how having someone who can relate to your experience can increase your chances of seeking care, but it goes deeper than that. Representation isn’t just something that’s nice to have to get someone through the door. It can also have a profound effect on what sort of treatment works best for you.
[Eric] I think even just going from that North American or Eurocentric viewpoint, I think that's the viewpoint that therapy was, the therapy that we provide tends to have originated from. And when we start to look at other cultures, they start to not fit that mold a lot of the time. It doesn't necessarily encompass all the different aspects of culture and the drastically different way that even mental illness will present. When you look at like an individualistic culture versus a collectivist culture, they present very differently.
Sometimes we can look at someone and think, oh my goodness, you need to build up your own confidence and you need to be an individual and you need to be, you know, the strong person by yourself. Does that translate to a more collectivist culture? Maybe not so much, right? So if your therapy is based upon that, it might not necessarily translate. So it's kind of like, we need that increased awareness. We need to have those people that are in our network, in our lives, like a knowledge holder, like a different cultural network, that us as therapists, not only that we have these networks, but then we also connect with these networks so that we do gain that sense of understanding because it's therapy, we keep kind of touching on this theme, right? It's so unique to each person and I think our awareness needs to reflect that. And so those little things we can try and do and putting those people in our lives and in our way, you know, can really change and I think improve is that always seeking that ability for awareness and understanding.
[Tokunbo] Like our other guests, we asked Eric about how we could help increase access to mental health support for folks living in poverty. Eric had a similar perspective to Elsie; mental health care is an important thing to provide, but it shouldn’t be the only thing.
[Eric] There are going to be, I think, different beliefs of the idea of Maslow's hierarchy. Not every single, I think person in mental health will take it the same way. So I just preface this in that. But essentially the pyramid looks at kind of that you need to meet your basic needs in order to then reach more of the kind of existential needs.
And so somebody who is looking at, who am I as a father, that's a harder problem to tackle or a harder thing for someone's mind to kind of go through if they cannot feed themselves or they're looking for shelter, it's tough to kind of look at that higher level way of thinking if you kind of aren't meeting basic needs, cause that needs to be your priority.
Therapy is a great tools that accompanies the social supports for people in poverty, but it can't be kind of like the only thing. And one difficult thing is we see a lot of influx from people that are contacting the distress line or people that are contacting from hospital care, or something, where they are looking because something bad has happened and they're looking to improve it. And while we obviously we'll always try and help, therapy isn't going to necessarily be able to fill those needs that are needed right now. You know, that rehab is maybe what you need or a shelter is what you need. You need the food bank right now. Not necessarily sitting here and going through, you know, for the traditional psychological thing, like, we don't need to talk about, you know, how your parents were and how your relationships with your parents are when you need to eat right away.
So therapy can work in conjunction with all of that when you're working with with an aspect of the population that's struggling so much with poverty.
CONCLUSION
[Tokunbo] This isn’t an episode where we can neatly sum up the moral of the story and call it a day. Honestly, we’ve probably raised more questions than we’ve answered. But we have learned some important lessons.
Dave highlighted Alberta's need for a better-connected mental health support system. Elsie stressed that supports should be placed where the need is; in the community, close, affordable, and readily available. And Eric noted how therapy should take an intersectional approach, supporting folks with diverse and complex identities.
Each of these professionals are building towards a more responsive and accessible mental health support system in their own ways. As for the rest of us, we’ve got work to do as well! Everyone we spoke to mentioned how we collectively need to destigmatize getting help. And beyond that, we can all take steps to be more aware of the supports out there. For ourselves and for those around us.
You can also donate to organizations and programs that are offering free or subsidized mental health care, like All In For Youth.
And finally, there is absolutely a role policy makers must play in creating more accessible care for all. Margaret Eaton, the CEO of the Canadian Mental Health Association, had this to say following our last federal election.
“Rather than keep building on a system that responds to crisis, we need to rethink our mental health system so that it can promote mental wellness and prevent mental illnesses from taking hold in the first place... Our work starts today: let the 44th parliament be the parliament that transforms mental health care in Canada once and for all.”
OUTRO
[Tokunbo] This has been Peace Out Poverty, a podcast by GenNEXT. This episode was hosted by me, Tokunbo Adegbuyi. It was written by myself and Andrew Mason. Interviews were done by Rebecca Price. This episode was produced by Castria.
GenNEXT is a volunteer committee of United Way of the Alberta Capital Region. If you’d like to learn more or find out how you can be a part of the plan to end poverty, visit MyUnitedWay.ca.