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Towards the end of last year, Sharonview leadership and I focused on building a strategic plan for 2024 and beyond. The discussion naturally turned to the pillars of our community: ending homelessness, alleviating hunger, and promoting financial literacy. These are the causes we as an organization strive to support and advance. As we look back, improving financial literacy, while helpful, seemed redundant. This is what we do every day to help our members achieve their financial goals. This allowed me to showcase something near and dear to my heart: mental health advocacy and awareness.
This new pillar is consistent with the other two pillars. This is because individuals and families affected by mental health concerns can overlap while facing food and housing insecurity. All three of his community-focused pillars are supported by our organization’s desire to improve financial literacy in the communities we serve.
The team responded enthusiastically. This is why this pillar is important to me.
my son my hero
I’m proud of my father, but my son amazes me. At age 17, he replaced his car’s entire brake system just by watching his YouTube videos.
My wife and I are extremely proud of everything he has accomplished. At 25 years old, he has a home, food on the table, and his own transportation. He saved his money and bought the pickup truck he had always wanted.
He defied adversity and graduated from high school. He hopes to continue his education at a trade school rather than a four-year university.
His education gave him a great deal of stability. This result may sound unexpected. To be honest, there were some things that bothered me. My son has deep learning and mental health issues. He is severely dyslexic, has short-term memory problems, has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and has trouble processing and finding the “right” words. Any of these can make it difficult to perform daily tasks.
When he was young, his mother and I realized that reading books was difficult for him, but by watching videos he could quickly learn new skills.He was able to learn without relying on reading. to learn.this is how he learns Are doing.
I didn’t even know he had the brake system replaced until he announced he was replacing the brake system finished. The next day I secretly took his car to the mechanic and asked him to check behind his son. He assured me that his son did a great job.
He has enough common sense. He is also very intelligent, athletic, and mechanical. Intellectually, my son has no problems. He learns differently.
Early intervention is key
At an early age, our son started exhibiting behavior that worried us. By the time he was 8 years old, we began to understand the extent of his challenges and consulted a doctor.
Without early intervention, I don’t think he would be able to get a job or live on his own today. Many parents of children with mental illness care for their children throughout their lives.
According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), “at least 8.4 million people in the United States provide care for adults with mental or emotional health problems.” “Carers of adults with mental or emotional health problems spend an average of 32 hours a week providing unpaid care.”
It took years of trial and error to get a diagnosis and treatment. Once a diagnosis and treatment plan is established, it is not static. When a child reaches puberty, hormonal changes affect the effectiveness of the drug. Keeping track of medications and dosages is an ongoing puzzle.
Education is also a puzzle. There are private schools that specialize in one, maybe two, mental health disorders, but none that specialize in the combination of disorders he has. As far as we know, there is no program for bipolar students with dyslexia.
When he was in high school, we hired a lawyer to urge the school to adapt instruction to students with dyslexia, not just for his benefit. The first year the school offered this program, our son was one of his 13 students enrolled.The program is still Approximately 30 students participate each year.
Advocating for mental health in the workplace
My son’s dyslexia led me to reevaluate the way we teach financial literacy, the programs we offer year-round.
When we go to schools and community centers to teach the basics of budgeting, we don’t want even one person to be confused. Gamification is incorporated as a teaching tool to make these lessons inclusive for people with learning differences. It’s activity-based and very fun. Particularly helpful for children and adults with dyslexia, ADHD, and other reading comprehension problems. We have helped level the playing field.
We also plan to start a dialogue about mental health internally and eventually involve the community.simple and innovative talk About mental health in the workplace. Talking about it openly can ultimately minimize the stigma of shame and fear.
Our benefits team is promoting Mental Health Awareness Month by providing helpful tips, reminders about employee assistance programs, and links to other resources. Our goal is to normalize the discussion around mental health. Sharon View employees can talk about their mental health with their leaders and have the luxury of doing what they need to do to take care of themselves and their families. That grace was given to me repeatedly over the years.
When my son was little, I often left work early for doctor and counselor appointments. I was open about it. It’s not embarrassing and I didn’t want my teammates to worry about why I was going to the doctor every other week.
When my son entered middle school, my wife quit her job and became a full-time caregiver. Thanks to her work with me, she was able to be a stay-at-home mom and we were able to earn money for treatment. we are lucky. Not every family has such a luxury.
Medical care is expensive, but mental health care is especially expensive. My insurance barely covered it, so I paid for my medications, weekly counseling sessions, and psychiatrist visits out of pocket. Again, we felt lucky to have the resources to get help.
family illness
Mental illness affects the entire family. We turned to psychologists to learn how best to parent children with special needs.
We even educated extended family members about our son’s illness. It took years for them to fully understand the challenges we face. There were many times when my wife and I felt alone and isolated.
We found support through doctors and counselors who put us in touch with other parents facing similar issues. It’s so valuable to talk to people who are walking the same path.
I don’t want to give the impression that our family life is always a struggle. wrong. And thanks to the help we’ve reached out to over the years, the support we’ve received and the transparency we’ve expressed to family and friends, we’ve been able to balance some difficult times. You can live a fulfilling life full of joy and laughter while doing so. Our son brings us great joy and we cherish the time we spend together.
erase the stigma
If you live with a mental illness or have a family member with a mental illness, please know: You are not alone.
According to NAMI, 57.8 million adults in the United States, or 1 in 5, experienced a mental illness in 2021. However, not all families are open about this. Exposing it to sunlight is the first step to normalizing it.
I look forward to it. Help is more available now than when we started this journey. All we need now is to tell our stories and provide information about where help is available in our communities.
herbal white
Herb White is president and CEO of the $1.6 billion Sharon View Federal Credit Union, based in Indian Land, South Carolina.
