System of Care Stories

On October 5, 2005, I left Cleveland, Ohio to start a new life with my soon-to-be husband, Dan, in Western New York. Moving from a city to a rural area was a big change, and it took some time to adjust. As you can imagine, life in the country is simpler and a bit slower than city living.  On Friday October 7, 2007, I became a single mother to my 18-month-old daughter, Laken, and a widow. My husband, Dan, had died by suicide. Life as I knew it had changed forever.  Following Dan's death, I was in a fog for approximately 6 months, just going through the motions to survive. I do not have many memories of that time. In November, I reached out to a local agency that specialized in grief counseling. The holidays were coming up, and I had no clue how I would navigate them. I was so nervous driving there. As soon as I walked into the room, I broke down in tears. I spoke to the counselor, I am not sure for how long, but I remember his words before I left: “Well, you are a strong … [Read more...] about Carri’s Story

by Carri Raynor

Do you see me? I'm the haggard-looking, rapidly graying woman in the dairy aisle, calmly repeating "not this time" and “not today” to my belligerent, man-size child, who earnestly believes chocolate milk is vital to his survival. It makes no difference that it makes him sick. He only wants, and "no" makes him feel threatened. He'll start crying any moment. You'll see me wrapping my arms around him, working to convince him that he's safe and loved. I don't care if you smirk or point. I only care that I can re-stabilize my baby. You, bless your heart, may take a hike. Can you hear me? I'm crying in the night watches, not knowing if investing my life in this wounded human will lead to life or death. I'm afraid my most fervent chat with AbbaFather is, "Help! Please don't forget us. We're trying so hard." I'm not eloquent; I'm desperate.   I am every mother and every father of every special needs, traumatized, fragile, at-risk, adopted, fostered, or rejected child. The … [Read more...] about Do You See Me? One Mother’s Plea

by Deborah Deggs Cariker

My name is Imani and I am the single parent of five children from the ages of two to twelve. Steven was my oldest and I had just moved into the projects. He started hanging out with the project youth. One day, I got a call that he had been locked up for breaking into Kmart and he was being held in the Philadelphia Youth Study Center. A few weeks later, he called to tell me he saw a boy being raped. Shortly after that, he had a court hearing, and I made a very hard decision to send him away. He was sent to a residential treatment facility inaccessible to me by public transportation. The lawyer did not want him to go away since he had never been in trouble before. I was concerned about his safety, and I did not want him hanging with his project pals. He spent a year at a residential treatment center and finished the eighth grade. After a year, he was released without my knowledge, and I was dismayed that I was not alerted about him returning home. I met … [Read more...] about Left on My Own

by Imani-MB

I am often in positions where my autonomy is deemed irrelevant, be it in hospitals, schools, my old family home, but the place with the most heightened sense of anxiety for me is with my previous partners. Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence regularly face this very hard question: do I tell people? And if so, who? This is something I chose to disclose after both my safety and the safety of others were put in danger. It was difficult for me, as I was a queer person and what he’d said and done to me had severely disconnected me from that part of myself. I lost track of who I was. Unfortunately, for LGBTQ+ youth, this is not the only challenge they face when it comes to Intimate Partner Violence. If you’re a young queer survivor, I hope you feel validated, seen and heard. If you’re a provider, here are 5 things you should know and radically accept in your work: Survivors don’t come in one model. I may not be in the perfect mold for what you considered to be a survivor, but I am still … [Read more...] about “5 Things about Queer Intimate Partner Violence You Should Know”

by Sawyer Keegan

Young people who have been touched by the juvenile justice system occupy many different levels within the behavioral health workplace. They are being hired for opportunities to serve in roles as peer support, family support, youth coordinators, specialists, managers, and other leadership staff. A critical goal of hiring individuals with lived experience in the juvenile justice system should be to enhance the work, the workplace, and the systems of care, and ultimately to enhance outcomes for youth and their families. But what happens when critical conversations and hard truths are avoided or prohibited? What happens when young people experience tokenism from systems and burnout from sharing and reliving their trauma over and over again?   In my role as a Youth Certified Peer Counselor, I have experienced and witnessed countless young people experience tokenism. In my experience developing youth committees and councils, I see youth voices in action but I rarely see real … [Read more...] about “We Need More Than Youth Voice . . . We Need Action!”

by Evelyn Clark, Change Consultant & Racial Equity Trainer