May is Mental Health Awareness Month, and to increase awareness of mental health in Darke, Miami and Shelby Counties, the Tri-County Board of Recovery and Mental Health Services is offering Mental Health First Aid classes to the public at no cost.

Mental Health First Aid Teaches:

• Risk factors and warning signs of mental health concerns.
• Information on depression, anxiety, trauma, psychosis, and substance abuse.
• A 5-step action plan to help someone developing a mental health concern or in crisis.
• Available evidence-based professional, peer, and self-help resources.

Adult Mental Health First Aid is appropriate for anyone who wants to learn how to help an individual who may be experiencing a mental health crisis or concern.

Youth Mental Health First Aid reviews the unique risk factors and warning signs of mental health problems in adolescents ages 12-18. It emphasizes the importance of early intervention and covers how to help an adolescent in crisis or experiencing a mental health challenge. The youth course is intended for anyone 16 years or older to learn how to help young people.

The Tri-County Board has training more than 500 individuals in Mental Health First Aid or Youth Mental Health First Aid since 2014.

Normally a $25 per person class, the 8-hour training is being offered at no cost in May. No special code is required, For more information and for links to register, go to www.tcbmds.org/mhfa. May dates and locations scheduled are:

Mental Health First Aid

• ​Monday May 7, Troy
• Thursday May 24, Sidney

Youth Mental Health First Aid

• Wednesday May 2, Sidney
• Thursday May 17, Sidney
• Tuesday May 29, Troy

To arrange Mental Health First Aid training for groups or organizations, contact Ian Ridgeway, Prevention and Wellness Coordinator, RidgewayI@tcbmds.org, or call (937) 335-7727 ext 216.

Mental Health First Aid classes in October, November and December are now available for registration. The classes are offered by the Tri-County Board of Recovery and Mental Health Services.

The general Mental Health First Aid courses are: October 13 in Troy; November 8 in Greenville; and December 5 in Sidney. A Youth Mental Health First Aid course which is designed for adults who work with young people ages 12-18, will be offered November 2 in Sidney.

Mental Health First Aid teaches a 5-step action plan to offer initial help to people with the signs and symptoms of a mental illness or in a crisis, and connect them with the appropriate professional, peer, social, or self-help care.

Anyone can take the 8-hour Mental Health First Aid course — first responders, students, teachers, leaders of faith communities, human resources professionals, and caring citizens.

Pre-registration is required. Cost of each class is $25 which includes the required manual. For details and to register online, go to the Tri-County Board’s website at www.tcbmds.org/mhfa, or call 937-335-7727, ext 216.

Shelby County Counseling Center will be starting a new session of the Incredible Years on September 1, 2015, for youth between the ages of 4 to 9 years. Parents will be required to attend with their child.

There will be a portion of the group where the family is together and a portion when parents are able to discuss concerns and work on helping their child and the children will have a group to gain skills in the following areas.

• Improved parent-child interactions, building positive relationships and attachment, improved parental functioning, less harsh and more nurturing parenting, and increased parental social support and problem solving
• Improved teacher-student relationships, proactive classroom management skills and strengthened teacher-parent partnerships
• Prevention, reduction and treatment of early onset conduct behaviors and emotional problems
• Promotion of child social competence, emotional regulation, positive attributions, academic readiness and problem solving

Groups operate from 5:00 p.m. until 7:00 p.m. at the Shelby County Counseling Center offices at 1101 North Vandemark Road in Sidney, Ohio. A meal is provided to the families during the group time. Additional services including working with a counselor and a family coach can be offered to families who are interested. 

Shelby County Counseling Center is accepting referrals until August 26 2015 for the upcoming session. Please contact Gail Dafler or at 937-492-8080, extension 406.  If you are interested in learning more about the Incredible Years, please see their web site at  http://incredibleyears.com/

Williams was a superstar on television, film and stage. And as such, his death will dominate the news cycle for a day or two. But the conversations about suicide and mental illness and drug and alcohol addictions cannot go away. There will be celebrations and remembrances of Robin Williams the actor, the Hollywood persona so much bigger than life. But what about Robin Williams, the man? The person who, despite having every material resource at hand, could not defeat his demons, his addictions to alcohol and drugs, and the disorders of the mind that led him to his final act?

We are told that one in four people will suffer from some diagnosable mental illness. We are told that 90 percent of persons who complete suicide have some form of mental illness. We are told that those with serious mental illness have life expectancy 10 years less than average. The tide is turning on conversations and stigma about mental illness, but too slowly. Fear and denial keep too many from seeking help. There are still ignorant haters with popular soapboxes, perpetuating myths about mental illness and suicide.

Celebrity deaths, whether from mental illness, addictions, or recklessness, are always a double-edged sword with young people. On the one hand, there is a fear that young people will be more likely to follow their tragic idols. On the other, it opens a door to conversations. If there could be such a thing as a best-case scenario with a celebrity suicide, Robin Williams' may be it. He is famous enough, has been around long enough, and has appealed to generations of kids enough that anyone older than 7 is going to recognize his face, voice or characters. On the other hand, he is not the kind of celebrity whom young people will like likely emulate or idolize. Robin Williams is not Kurt Cobain.

Just as with so-called "physical" illnesses, not all mental illnesses are deadly, but some are. Mental health counselors identify three mental illnesses that are potentially deadly: addiction, eating disorders and depression. However, people are generally more comfortable talking about diabetes, heart disease, even cancer, than about mental illnesses. Any opportunity to make mental illnesses less dark, less mysterious, to shed light on these all-too-common afflictions, is an opportunity for teaching and, in some cases, early identification and intervention.

So, what's a parent to do when a child says "Mrs. Doubtfire is dead" or "Peter Pan killed himself"? There's no one, best answer. Understand that children are by nature both curious and resilient. Answering the question to the best of your ability is OK; deflecting or ignoring it drives the subject further into the darkness, where it can take on all sorts of misunderstanding.  This Mom wrote about how she talked with her kids, relating to his characters and other family experience. The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention offers a few tips for talking to kids about suicide. SAVE.org offers more help. The Jason Foundation website has information for teens, parents and schools.

Many families find comfort in speaking to pastors or other faith-based counselors. Your school may have a counselor you can speak to. The mental health agencies in the Tri-County network of care employ counselors who specialize in youth and family. NAMI of Darke, Miami and Shelby Counties has upcoming classes you may find useful. For someone in crisis, the Tri-County Hotline is open 24 hours a day at 800-351-7347, or the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 800-273-TALK (8255).

Every suicide is a tragedy. Celebrity amplifies the tragedy, and when the celebrity is someone with the multi-generational reach and appeal of Robin Williams, someone whose voice will continue to be heard through the timeless characters of his films, the loss is proportionally deep. If his illness and death create opportunities for a deeper understanding of mental disorders, then that is the solace we can take from it.

WHIO-TV's Northern Bureau Chief Steve Baker reports on a summer program for kids in Darke County, "Hooked on Fishing, Not on Drugs."

Watch the video...

Piqua City Schools and project partners were notified of a $35,000 grant awarded April 1 by the Office of Ohio First Lady Karen W. Kasich, in partnership with the Governor’s Office of Faith-Based Initiatives and the Departments of Aging, Job and Family Services, and Mental Health and Addiction Services.

Piqua school officials and other grant partners recorded a video roundtable April 4 to discuss the program, titled "Building Resilient Youth in Piqua City Schools." The video will air on Piqua TV5 and will be available through the Piqua school website.

The grant was written by the Tri-County Board of Recovery and Mental Health Services on behalf of the school district. The school will contract with Miami County Recovery Council to provide a prevention specialist to deliver Botvin LifeSkills curriculum to all fifth and sixth grade students in the Piqua schools during the 2014-15 school year.

Also supporting the grant is the Piqua Juvenile Education Fund, and the Piqua Police Department. Piqua Police Chief Bruce Jamison is the uncompensated Executive Director of the PJEF.

Resiliency is a term used in behavioral health and prevention to describe a broad set of skills, behaviors, attitudes and information that enables individuals to make healthy choices even when faced with pressures from media, marketers, peers and others to use harmful substances such as tobacco, alcohol and illicit drugs.

"Resiliency goes beyond 'just say no' kinds of programming," said Brad Reed, the Tri-County Board's Director of Community Resource Development and lead author of the grant. "Resiliency explores why to say no, and how to say no, and how to be confident and assertive about saying no. Developing resiliency also develops positive behaviors and attitudes for social interaction. It's a skill set that can be used for a lifetime."

According to Jodi Long, the Tri-County Board's Director of Clinical Services and Evaluation, the LifeSkills program is an ideal fit. "After talking to Bruce Jamison and Kim Piper from the school district and hearing their ideas about moving toward evidence-based practice in school prevention activities, this came along at exactly the right time," she said. Long was listening to a teleconference about Governor John Kasich's "Start Talking" programs for youth drug prevention, part of which was the grant funding opportunity, when she heard Jamison's voice on the conference call asking a question. Long's follow-up call to Jamison started the conversation with the schools and the decision to pursue the grant.

Chief Jamison envisions a consistent message throughout the students' school, home and online environments. "We need something that incorporates parents - there are a lot of parents that really care and want to deliver the right message to their children and just don't know how," Jamison said during the TV taping. "We recognize there are partners in the prevention programs within the schools. Wouldn't it be cool if there was something that could go right into the curriculum... more of an integrated message that is a lot of places - in the classroom, in the home, in the media, on FaceBook, on Twitter - wherever they are getting their messages, what if we could have the same right message all those places? And all of a sudden this initiative came out of the state called "Start Talking" ... and it was everything that we've been working towards, including a funding mechanism."

Long said that from her meeting with the PJEF, they had all the pieces to "begin putting together what was Bruce's dream - to implement evidence-based practice prevention services in place of D.A.R.E." Long explained that "evidence-based practices" are programs that are supported by research to have proven outcomes, "that they change the choices our youth make around drugs, alcohol, violence and other social issues."

Superintendent Hanes explained that the "D.A.R.E. program was a phenomenal program that was serving students well, but as we continue to move, things change. What [Chief Jamison and I] talked about was how to transition a program. What excites me ... is that this does provide a mechanism for us to be able to shift gears for better meeting the needs of students today. We were working from a curriculum for D.A.R.E. that was quite old, and it was time to revamp and revitalize."

The eight Botvin LifeSkills modules in the middle school curriculum will be embedded into the Piqua schools "Specials" rotation. Kim Piper explained that the Specials are subjects such as Physical Education, Art, Music, "so this will be added into that rotation." She added that school officials "are excited about the parent component and the teacher component." Part of the grant-funded activities is to train teachers and counselors in the LifeSkills curriculum.

Jamison said the grant-funded program "lays some groundwork - to me it's just the basis for a community-wide approach." Jamison said, "We have a bunch of drug abuse in Piqua. It's one of our biggest problems. It's not something we can arrest our way out of. It's probably not even something we can treat ourselves out of. What if we could do some social norming that made the whole community look at some of these issues differently?"

Jamison added that "this lays the groundwork to begin bringing in some faith-based initiatives, to expand to other grade levels, and we could look at any neat ideas anybody might have." He emphasized that a systematic approach is needed so that different groups aren't duplicating efforts.

Hanes said the $35,000 grant provides a "catalyst for all of us to start working together. We've been strong partners with the Police Department. We're looking forward to bringing the Tri-County Board into working more with us and becoming even more of a partner in offering good programming for our students. That's what this is all about."

January 8, 2014, Ohio Governor John Kasich launched a multi-faceted campaign to prevent prescription and opioid drug abuse among Ohio’s children. Adolescents largely credit parents for the decision not to use illegal substances. Teachers, coaches and other authority figures can have a similar influence on youth and their decision-making. The Start Talking! Campaign gives parents, guardians, educators and community leaders the tools to start the conversation with Ohio’s youth about the importance of living healthy, drug-free lives.

The Tri-County Board of Recovery and Mental Health Services will assist with facilitating these conversations. Schools in Darke, Miami and Shelby Counties have been contacted about scheduling Start Talking! meetings.

The Tri-County Board will:

- Facilitate evening meetings with parents of middle school and high school students.
- Provide a panel of local professionals to answer parents’ questions about opiate abuse, prevention and treatment.
- Distribute literature highlighting local resources and additional information.
- Present the short video “Parents360 Rx” with facilitated conversations afterward.
- Discuss ways parents can continue the campaign by hosting their own Parents360 Rx meetings.

Host sites are asked to:

- Schedule a date or dates that you could provide evening meeting space for 90 minutes
- Send through your normal communication methods (email, take-home flier, One Call Now) notice of the meeting, when scheduled
- Provide a screen and internet connection (we can provide laptop and LCD projector, if necessary)

To arrange for a moderated conversation in your school or organization, email or call Brad Reed, Director of Community Resource Development, 937-335-7727, ext. 209.