Aug 25, 2020 By Dean Russell & Jamie Smith Hopkins The Texas Tribune https://www.texastribune.org/2020/08/25/texas-natural-disasters–mental-health/ Barbara Herndon lay in the center of her bed, muscles tensed, eyes on the television. She was waiting for the storm. All morning on that day in late May, the news had covered the cold front slouching south from Central Texas. […]
Angelina Hudson
The coronavirus pandemic is still raging in Texas. Its mental health toll will only get worse.
Posted Aug 20, 2020/Updated Aug 24, 2020 By Sarah Smith Houston Chronicle https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/coronavirus-pandemic-mental-health-toll-tx-covid-15497856.php Maybe if she hadn’t heard the man cough, Paula Parker would still be able to sleep. She’d been at the convenience store next to the Valero one morning in late May, reaching for a Coke when she heard the cough and saw […]
How Early Intervention Impacted My Life
Aug 26, 2020 By Katharine Hartleb NAMI https://www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/August-2020/How-Early-Intervention-Impacted-My-Life I remember the first time I experienced the feeling of not being able to get out of bed. Not because I was too tired, but because I was too sad. It was during a time in my life when I was coping with a lot: My parents […]
U.S. Senate Passes The Commander John Scott Hannon Veterans Mental Health Improvement Act
8/7/2020 NAMI https://www.nami.org/About-NAMI/NAMI-News/2020/U-S-Senate-Passes-the-Commander-John-Scott-Hannon-Veterans-Mental-Health-Improvement-Act On August 5th, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed the Commander John Scott Hannon Veterans Mental Health Care Improvement Act, S. 785, bipartisan legislation focused on efforts to reduce veteran suicide and improve mental health outcomes through improved access to care, better diagnostic tools and increased oversight of VA programs.
Houston police see increase in mental health calls since start of COVID-19 pandemic
July 31, 2020 By Grace White KHOU https://www.khou.com/article/news/health/hpd-sees-increase-in-mental-health-calls-since-start-of-covid-19-pandemic/285-c7fdb1df-78c6-413b-b7ca-4870868891b0 HOUSTON — On the streets of Houston, fighting crime isn’t the only job police officers are doing these days. “We can say we have seen an increase in mental health related calls for service to HPD,” Asst. Chief Wendy Baimbridge, with the Houston Police Department, said. She […]
Experts worry about mental health as COVID-19 continues
August 4, 2020 By Jeff Forward The Houston Chronicle https://www.chron.com/neighborhood/woodlands/news/article/Experts-worry-about-mental-health-as-COVID-19-15458329.php As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to surge across the Houston region and the nation, mental health experts are seeing increased issues related to anxiety and depression resulting from stay-at-home orders and other restrictions on social interactions. Now, therapists and other mental health doctors and providers […]
An Open Letter In Response To The President’s Executive Order On Safe Policing For Safe Communities
7/17/2020 NAMI https://www.nami.org/About-NAMI/NAMI-News/2020/An-Open-Letter-in-Response-to-the-President-s-Executive-Order-on-Safe-Policing-for-Safe-Communities Today, NAMI, in partnership with CIT International and other national organizations working in mental health and policing, released an open letter responding to President Trump’s June 16th executive order, “Safe Policing for Safe Communities.” The order is the Administration’s response to the recent national outcry for police reform, following the killing of George […]
Why We Need More Culturally Competent Therapists
Jul 10, 2020 By Sebastian Martinez NAMI https://www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/July-2020/Why-We-Need-More-Culturally-Competent-Therapists I am a Latinx (a person who is ethnically from a Latin American or Caribbean culture) living with co-occurring mental health conditions. It took quite some time for me to realize that my constant depressive state, trauma responses, insomnia and other symptoms all fall under the title […]
COVID-19’s coming mental health toll is a ‘disease of despair’
Posted June 12, 2020/Updated June 16, 2020 By Todd Ackermann Houston Chronicle https://www.houstonchronicle.com/local/prognosis/article/COVID-19-mental-health-pandemic-epidemic-despair-15334401.php COVID-19 has already claimed the lives of more than 115,000 Americans, but one of the disease’s most serious and lasting effects is just starting to hit: the mental health toll. The coming crisis, created by massive unemployment, social isolation and uncertainty about […]
Why doctors say there’s been an increase in mental health illness linked to COVID-19
May 14, 2020 By Raven Ambers ABC 13 https://abc13.com/mental-illness-linked-to-covid-19-health-coronavirus-social-distancing/6177207/ HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) — Doctors in the Houston area said the unknowns of the coronavirus pandemic and social distancing has led to an increase in mental health patients over the last couple of months. “Depression and anxiety are one of the more common presenting symptoms for […]
Discrimination and Racism in the History of Mental Health Care
July 6, 2020 By Kylie M. Smith, Ph.D. NAMI https://www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/July-2020/Discrimination-and-Racism-in-the-History-of-Mental-Health-Care People with mental illness have always been discriminated against. They have been denied full participation in society and labeled as dangerous and criminal. Many have been locked in institutions that acted more like prisons designed to punish than hospitals designed to treat. In the 1960s, […]