Like any organization, from the largest corporation to the smallest grassroots advocacy group, our nation’s lead agency for behavioral health, SAMHSA, has a strategic plan to guide it. After more than 1,400 public comments and months of refinement, the latest version of that plan, Leading Change 2.0: Advancing the Behavioral Health of the Nation 2015-2018 […]
A Focus on SAMHSA’s New Strategic Plan Read More »
People with behavioral health needs can and do participate in the labor force. With the right supports, they can succeed in the workplace, and enjoy both the economic and the social benefits of employment. The key to helping people with lived experience to move into the workforce is Supported Employment, a system that empowers consumers
A Focus on Supported Employment Read More »
Trauma survivor and fearless advocate Tonier “Neen” Cain, subject of the award winning film “Healing Neen,” delivered a keynote address at The 16th Annual Family Cafe on June 6th, 2014. Ms. Cain began her journey to become a survivor, and to live with more hope than fear, when someone finally asked her, “What happened to
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The CAFE TA Center is pleased to present its newest online training, Peers as Professionals: Workplace Success. There are many challenges for people with lived experience when it comes to engaging with the behavioral health workforce. Peer professionals want to remain true to the principles of recovery, help those they work with build on their strengths
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On campuses across the country there is a growing consensus that the mental health of the student body must be a topic of open conversation. Many colleges and universities offer free, confidential counseling services, and the stigma associated with behavioral health is being challenged by student activists. While the atmosphere surrounding campus mental health is
Focus: A Policy Model for Campus Mental Health Read More »
It’s no secret that we live in an extraordinarily dynamic moment for behavioral health, and the healthcare system in general. Major changes to healthcare laws, including the Affordable Care Act and mental health parity legislation, have opened up access to behavioral health care. At the same time, the value of lived experience as a professional
Focus: Peers at the Center of New Approaches to Coordinated Care Read More »
The CAFE TA Center is pleased to release the seventh and final video in its Recovery Stories series. In this segment, people with lived experience speak out about what they think the world needs to know about recovery. While recovery is a familiar concept for people in the peer support movement, those outside the behavioral
Recovery Stories – Episode 7: A Message to the Outside World Read More »
For people with a behavioral health diagnosis, the reality of stigma is all too familiar. They know from first hand experience how people react to finding out that someone they know has a mental health diagnosis. Individuals forget that they are dealing with a person, and begin to think in terms of negative stereotypes that
Recovery Stories – Episode 6: The Stigma of Mental Illness Read More »
One of the goals of the mental health consumer movement is to change the system. People with lived experience want a more compassionate system of care, that sees people with mental health challenges as experts in their own lives, relies on recovery principles, and considers the strengths of an individual as a whole person, instead
Make Your Voice Heard through Boards, Committees and Councils Read More »
In the fifth installment of Recovery Stories, people with lived experience respond to the question “What would it take for the recovery model to truly take hold?” Before the concept of recovery evolved, many individuals’ experience of treatment left them feeling that they were fundamentally broken, and that their only recourse would be a lifetime
Recovery Stories – Episode 5: The Medical Model & Resistance to Recovery Read More »
