Local organizations partner to educate the community
By Meliqueica Meadows
Of the St. Louis American
With Medicare budget constraints, the local faith-based community hopes to pool services and resources to help educate the community, particularly African Americans, about mental illness. On Thursday, Abraham’s Children, an Interfaith Partnership program, hosted Dispelling Mental Health Myths at the Salad Bowl restaurant. The two-part program included a panel discussion and training workshop for mental health advocates and professionals.
“Because of budget cuts, it is more important than ever for churches to get involved in their counseling of individuals that need some help,” Steve Estopari of the Mental Health Association of Greater St. Louis (MHA) said.
“MHA started an initiative a few months ago to get out into the African-American community. We wanted to outreach to churches of all faiths so that we could help educate individuals, the church and the clergy about mental illness.”
Estopari said mental illness has a stigma attached to it in the minority community and that education is the key to dispelling myths about mental illness.
The Reverend Rosalind Denson was a member of the panel. The associate pastor at Westside Missionary Baptist Church also works as a counselor for the congregation. She said many African Americans view mental illness as a sign of weakness.
“People don’t want to be perceived as weak,” Denson said.
“We’re often the last one hired and first one fired, so we don’t like to show what we consider to be a flaw. It’s important to re-educate people about the fact that its not a character flaw, a weakness or a sign of spiritual displeasure of God.”
“I’ve had situations where clients were told that if they continued to take their medication and see therapists it was a sign that their faith was not strong enough,” Dr. Vetta Sanders-Thompson, SLU associate professor, said.
“Clients who get those messages don’t necessarily want to separate from their faith or their faith community.”
Denson said Christian African Americans run the risk of becoming alienated from their faith communities or try to battle the illness alone.
“One of the things that’s a myth is that they can do it alone,” Denson said. “God gives us help through people, and learning how to ask for what we need is something that we have to learn
She said another myth is “that all counseling is of the devil.” This viewpoint, which can be disastous for someone in need of mental health care, is rooted in the secular approach taken by many therapists.
“If they are working from a bias that says that you don’t have a personal relationship with God and you’re not hearing anything by His spirit or through His word, then that’s in opposition to what we teach and many pastors will reject that,” Denson said.
The church, she insisted, should be a haven for healing.
“In our churches, I would hope that a person can feel comfortable coming no matter what their condition might be,” Denson said.
“Technically, we are a hospital and not a museum for perfected people. We are a hospital to address the brokenness of humanity and that includes anyone and everyone.”
Denson said that more African Americans might seek help for mental ilnness if there were more African-American professionals in the field.
Mary Barfield became a mental illness advocate nearly 30 years ago when she became a foster parent. Many of the children she took into her home were suffering from various mental illnesses, including depression, mild retardation and manic depression. Now Barfield and her grown daughters, Crystal Barfield and Ann Barfield-Campbell, work to bring mental health services to North St. Louis.
“We are a non-profit organization, and we need to raise funds to do certain things,” Mary Barfield said. “We want to have some things in our neighborhood where we can begin to support some of the young people to come and talk about how they feel.”
Through the non-profit organization Molding to Create Change, the Barfields have established three group homes on St. Louis Avenue. Ann Barfield-Campbell recently purchased a building where she plans to offer 24-hour respite care for children and young adults with behavioral issues and mental illnesses.
“The community needs to be educated on mental health issues, because it is a community issue,” Barfield-Campbell said.
“When children have behavioral concerns, it’s hard for us to find respite care in North St. Louis. We’re working on doing that now because it’s not here.”
Barfield-Campbell plans to call the home “Creating Change” and hopes to offer youth a creative environment where they can learn to cope with their illnesses by exploring the arts. She said they have exhausted funds trying to complete the renovation of the respite house located at 4124 North 22nd Street and are currently seeking volunteers and companies who would be willing to help them make repairs. The Creating Change respite house is scheduled to open in June 2006.
For more information about mental health services, contact the Mental Health Association of Greater St. Louis at (314) 773-1399. For more information about Creating Change, call Ann Barfield-Campbell at (314) 534-1645.
