1st Annual Mental Health Recovery Conference @ UNC-Greensboro

 

This conference was sponsored by the Mental Health Association of Greensboro and we were welcomed by Susan Ball the Executive Director and Mary Seymour, the Director of Recovery Initiatives of the Mental Health Association of Greensboro.

This was a day-long conference that brought counselors, social workers, therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, peer support specialists, educators, students from across NC. The topics they covered included:

• Defining Mental Health Recovery
• Strength-Based Perspective to Assessment & Care
• The Ethics of Self-Disclosure 
• A Holistic Approach to Recovery-Oriented Mental Health Care

The  first presenter was Cherene Allen-Caraco, QMHP, QDDP, CPSS, CESP as the Executive Director and Founder of Promise Resource Network. She offered an engaging presentation on:

• The history of mental health treatment,
• The history of the recovery movement
• Defined what is mental health recovery
• Practical ways to bring recovery-oriented care into your own practice

From a peer perspective, Cherene challenged me to raise my level of  conciousness about my mindset, language and overall approach to supporting others.  Some other important insights she reminded me were: the dignity of risk; employment as a path to recovery; combating societal and self-stigma and the all important lesson of (learning as a peer) how to give up power and control.  

The second speaker was Dr. Jan Laughinghouse, Social Work Program Coordinator and Assistant Professor at Bennett College. She shared some important insights on a Strengths-based perspective:

• Strengths-based assessment
• Ways to empower clients
• How to create and maintain a supportive, therapeutic and hopeful environment

She shared some helpful distinctions between pity (feeling for someone),  sympathy (feeling with someone); and empathy (feeling as someone). She touched on the important work of Albert Bandura and the assessment work of Epstein and Graybeard. She brought an informative, passionate and affirming approach to ways to gain insight into the motivations, aspirations and strengths of those we support.

There was a panel discussion offered by Dr. Joseph Jordan, Clinical Director, NC Physicians Health Program ; Dr. A. Keith Mobley, Clinical Associate Professor and Clinic Director, UNCG;  Shannon Englehorn, MSW, LCSW Counselor at Cone Health Behavioral Health Hospital; Myla Erwin, CPSS, Director of Programs for Mental Health Association of Greensboro and Amber Pope PhD, LPC, NCC Therapist at Tree of Life Counseling.

Some of the helpful insights I gained from this panel discussion were to be aware of:

• How to share your lived experiences
• When and why you should share
• When you should not share and the importance of intuition

Dr. Sharon Young, director of CooperRiis Institute, CooperRiis Healing Community. She was joined by Becky Singer, their Residential Activities Director at their Asheville Campus  as she shared her own insights and life experiences as a participant and now as a staff person at Cooper Riis.  She offered A Holistic 7 Domains Approach she based her research and recovery work upon at Cooper Riisng shared how her research in the seven domains was rooted in grounded theory analysis. From her extensive research and interviews from many people sharing their recovery stories she was able to glean and establish the seven domains. She along with others have been able to develop a holistic approach of care at Cooper Riis on these domains.

The 7 Domains Are As Follows:

1. Social/Community/Connectedness-our ability to connect to others in a healthy way
2. Spirituality-our sense of inner peace and harmony; our hopefulness and passion for life
3. Purpose/Productivity/Fulfillment-accomplishment, fulfillment, achievement & meaning
4. Empowerment/Independence-increased sense of control of over one's life and recovery
5. Emotional and Psychological Health-one's well-being and emotional stability
6. Physical Wellness-one's ability to take care of their basic physical needs
7. Intellectual/Learning/Creativity-a desire to learn and to challenge yourself mentally/creatively

Cooper Riis offer a holistic approach to healing and wellness on their healing farm community in Mill Springs, NC and that extends to their urban Asheville campus as they seek to support others with relationship-centered care and experience-based living.

This was a wonderful conference and an important one for peers to get a chance to see the exciting things that are happening  across the state of North Carolina as we  seek to move our state towards Recovery-Oriented Systems of Care. 

Comments

[ID McCollum]

Thanks Bryan, amazing recap of the conference. I felt as if I was there with you. Were you able to get a power point for the panel discussion? I would like to learn more about sharing your story, when and how? Once again thanks for giving us the view.

Iden