HELP Mental Health Center

In 2021 reports, there were 57.2 million visits to physician offices with mental disorders as the primary diagnosis, 5.8 million visits to emergency departments with mental disorders, behavioral, and neurodevelopmental as the primary diagnosis, and 48,183 suicide deaths, which averages about 132 per day. Of those who have died by suicide, 80% are men and 76% are White. Around 40% of transgender people have attempted suicide and around 80% of transgender people have considered suicide.

https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/mental-health.htm

https://www.cdc.gov/suicide/suicide-data-statistics.html

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1388565/us-trans-suicide-rate/

"48% of employees believe that respect is the most essential factor for a culture of inclusion...yet, 54% feel they don’t regularly get respect from their leaders; 61% of employees believe diversity and inclusion strategies are beneficial and essential...yet, a whopping 75% of employees in underrepresented groups don’t feel they’ve personally benefited from their company’s programs; cognitive diversity can enhance team innovation by up to 20%."

https://www.quantumworkplace.com/future-of-work/diversity-and-inclusion-statistics

The world is not designed with all needs in mind. Redesigning to be more inclusive can help people feel less broken and in need of fixing and instead embraced for their identities and authentic selves as well as supported the way that each person would like to be supported.

The solution started with a website called My Choice for Hope that consolidates resources to support the holistic needs of community members in the Northern Virginia area. A chatbot was then created with Watson Assistant to help navigate the website to locate information more efficiently. A Trello board was created to capture the business plan, interactive exhibits, facilities, resources, and such in preparation to implement a museum-like site that is free and open to the public. People do not need to have any particular mental health needs to visit. They may simply be curious to learn. Guests may range from no mental health knowledge to experts who would like to collaborate in networks to address pressing issues.

Imagine walking into Hope Education Love Peace (HELP) Mental Health Center. A virtual tour guide warmly greets you by asking how you would like to be supported. After finding out that you are visiting with an autistic South Asian grandchild and a spouse who had served in the military, the tour guide presents a map recommending interactive exhibits on neurodiversity, Asian culture, and service members, veterans, and families (SMVF). The map also points to a sensory space for the grandchild to play followed by quiet time to decompress in the healing garden. A list of resources is also provided to try out various services offered by local nonprofits and through the government along with contact information for additional services from those organizations.

Through interactive exhibits, visitors learn how to support various identities from terminology and history to local organizations and resources focused on serving each population. Identities supported include people with disabilities/diverse abilities, ages/stages in life, first responder/law enforcement/military, athletes/gamers, interfaith/spirituality, LGBTQ+/gender/sexuality, and culture/race. There are also exhibits that educate on the history of mental health including healthcare disparities, types of abuse, mental health conditions, neuroscience/brain/statistics, behaviors/emotions, legal considerations, treatment, well-being/wellness, humans services/needs, and workshops like humane technology/responsible artificial intelligence (AI), cybersecurity for mental health professionals, etc.

The interactive exhibits are created by the community for the community to model nothing about us without us and to spread awareness of the diversity within each identity group to dispel monolithic myths. Picture guests walking into the LGBTQ+ exhibit surrounded by dangling hearts painted by LGBTQ+ student groups, each with a different LGBTQ+ flag and an explanation of the identity that each one represents. The members of the student groups can bring their families and friends to visit and see what they had collectively created.

The two colleagues whom I have listed in this submission are innovative leaders and advocates. One has led our trauma informed community network (TICN) through Stop Child Abuse Now (SCAN). We educate people on how to support various identities, hosted roundtables to better support survivors of abuse, and developed rights to guard boundaries on how one would like to be supported. The other colleague is a former NFL athlete who founded Battle Sports Academy (https://battlesportsacademy.com/) with former NFL and WNBA athletes to support young athletes through the development of various life skills like mental fitness, financial literacy, branding, and outreach while playing in tournaments. We had previously co-hosted a popular talk show series called Unfiltered where a panel of everyday people modeled civil discourse regarding topics that many would not touch.

I am a neurodivergent genderfluid Asian person of faith raised by two Black families in a military town and a Black and Latino neighborhood married to an Italian man and we have three children. I became a mental fitness coach, family support group facilitator, lead presenter on signs of suicide and mental health conditions, neurodiversity advocate, speaker, and many other hats in collaboration with multiple health and human services organizations because I know what it feels like to fit in everywhere and nowhere all at once because of intersectional identities. I also live with complex post traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) with 8 of 10 adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and supported a sister who has recovered from major depressive disorder and substance use disorder. My website has a small subset of the vast library of resources on our Trello board and the press releases provide more information on my charitable contributions.

Health and Human Services Resources https://mychoiceforhope.wordpress.com

Close Up Television (CUTV) Radio Interview https://www.einpresswire.com/article/696182744/neurodiversity-advocate-claudia-matteo-to-be-featured-on-close-up-radio

Marquis Who's Who https://www.24-7pressrelease.com/press-release/508467

Marquis Top Healthcare Professionals Spotlight https://marquistophealthcareproviders.com/2024/03/claudia-matteo/

I have pulled together a huge network of collaborators over the years to design this. All of us are in our communities engaging directly with the people. If someone calls the Loudoun Cares hotline to ask for help in paying a bill, the representative will assess their holistic needs to lift the person back on their feet. Perhaps the person could not pay the bill because of a job loss and that the job loss was due to a mental health condition. Loudoun Cares may contact Loudoun Workforce Center, Crossroad Jobs, Inova Behavioral Health, and National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Northern Virginia. It truly takes a village. The HELP Mental Health Center will consolidate that village under one roof to make our services more accessible to all.

My website is regularly referenced from our family support groups to the LinkedIn profile in the press release. I have built a chatbot to help locate information from the website more efficiently, but have not yet embedded it. The design of the HELP mental health center is documented in a Trello board through contributions from various collaborators.

The next step is to identify a location along with funding and to curate all the content from the Trello board to finalize each exhibit and facility of the HELP mental health center. Technology would also be needed for a compelling interactive presentation. While it would be helpful to have support in other areas, such resources are available like a museum curator on our team, worldwide volunteer talent, guidance on data usage, promotion, and replication of the solution in other locations.

Our solution shifts focus from prioritizing profitability to prioritizing people first in order to drive greater profitability down the road.

Our partner Loudoun Cares is a virtual version of the HELP mental health center in that organizations register to be part of their Volunteer Center to promote services and recruit support. Organizations who would like their services to be promoted through the HELP mental health center would first register through Loudoun Cares. People would try the services for free at the HELP mental health center and pay for additional services directly with the organizations.

Giveback is an often overlooked form of self-care while caring for others. The HELP mental health center would help to drive adoption of the Volunteer Center that already exists through Loudoun Cares for an even stronger community bond than what we already have. People would have free access to services to determine what mix of solutions works best. It's a win for everyone.

Testimonials to me offer more valuable feedback than metrics because data can be manipulated to present what someone wants people to hear, but focusing on impact and quality over intent and quantity can help us to do better to support. There needs to be a shift from traditional volunteer approaches of setting performative goals that are achievable, yet offer little value to the community, and then rewarding volunteers to confirming the most pressing needs and taking intentional action to close such gaps, so that community members in need are the ones who are lifted simply for the reward of living in coliberation where everyone can thrive. This would help to improve heath, lower poverty, drive economic growth, etc. The scales would better balance out between those in a position to receive and those in a position to give. There would be a better balance between the needs of self, others, and the world.

The Loudoun Cares Volunteer Center runs on a Volunteer Management Software called Get Connected through a vendor named Galaxy Digital. The My Choice for Hope website runs on Wordpress. The chatbot runs on Watson Assistant.

Dozens of part-time volunteers

I have been working on this solution for about seven years.

We have volunteers across various affinity groups like Black, Pan-Asian, Hispanic/Latino, Native/Indigenous, LGBTQ+, Neurodiversity/People with Diverse Abilities, Veterans, Women, and Interfaith. I am a member of all of them because I identify as part of most of them and am an ally in the others. We have a vast network because of affiliations and collaborations with Inova Action Committee, Loudoun Chamber of Commerce, Loudoun Human Services Network (LHSN), National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Northern Virginia, Trauma-Informed Community Network (TICN), and Virginia Mental Health Access Program (VMAP). Many of us also serve on communities within these networks like DEIA, disabilities, etc.

Our Mission

The mission of the HELP Center is to give and receive help that inspires hope, education, love, and peace.

• Hope is important for mental and physical health.

• Education is lifelong.

• Love is a universal need.

• Peace is possible even if the world around us may not always be so.

Our Vision

We envision a safe space where all people belong and are supported with dignity and respect.

Our CARE Values

Practicing the following values can enable people to accept help when needed.

• Connect through curiosity, cultural exposure, and compassion to shift the burden of care from the individual to the community.

• Accept by embracing identities and unique lived experiences that shape individuals without stigma.

• Respect how one would like to be supported and understand that such boundaries may change over time.

• Empathize by setting aside personal stances and bridge gaps by reflecting on the feelings of others through non-judgmental listening.

Financials

The decision was made not to start yet another nonprofit because HELP mental health center is giveback to promote the vast range of support that is already available within our community. Nonprofits have offered to apply for grants to apply towards the development of the HELP mental health center. Our county also has community foundations. Mental heath touches all, so through individual donors and large donors, this will be built grassroots starting simple through manual labor and virtual environment piece by piece and enhanced as additional funding is received.

Grants through organizations served, donations from visitors who benefit from the resources, government funding, foundations, etc. We are within an hour of the museums in DC and our county also has a Children's Science Center that started as a small space in the mall and is now developing a big museum-like facility, so there are similar models around us that have been sustainable. I have met with people who have contributed to the development of these facilities who are interested in a possible partnership with the HELP mental health center.