This May marks the 66th annual Mental Health Month. As a society, the way we understand and approach mental health has come a long way since then. Back in 1949 when Mental Health Month was first established, advocates pushed for asylums to ban the practice of shackling patients suffering from mental illnesses, many of whom had been written off by society as permanently diseased.
Today, mental wellness is widely recognized as being more than an absence of disease. It involves complete mental and social well-being and Greenwich House’s Senior Health and Consultation Center is at the frontline of this holistic discourse on mental health.
Getting older is not easy; as we age there are many adjustments to make including the changes in lifestyle that retirement, loss of a partner or close friends, isolation or physical impairments can bring.
Greenwich House recognizes that these adjustments don’t have to be paralyzing; since 1974 the Senior Health and Consultation Center at Greenwich House has offered a team of psychiatrists, psychiatric social workers, medical doctors and home health aides who work in tandem to provide comprehensive wellness care to aging adults in order to address diseases like depression and dementia.
Judy Jones, the Center’s director for over twenty-five years, recalled a former client, Mary, when asked about the importance of Greenwich House and its role in managing mental health challenges of aging adults.
Mary was depressed, facing eviction and living on a small Social Security stipend. After a fairly successful career as a writer, she began to decline in health after her second novel was panned by the critics. Living alone, Mary had little support during this difficult time, and began to isolate herself from others.
At the Senior Health and Consultation Center, Mary was enrolled in weekly therapy sessions and began receiving primary medical care in her home. The Center’s social workers then helped to negotiate with her landlord to set up a schedule for past-due payments.
Her Greenwich House social worker also helped secure a private foundation stipend designed to help senior women who worked as artists or writers augment their monthly income in order to pay rent. Mary not only emerged from her depression but began to reemerge as a fixture in the neighborhood.
Jones emphasizes that a combination of therapy, medical treatment and the knowledge that she could remain safe in her home allowed Mary to reach a comfortable state of mental wellness.
For too long, mental health issues have not been framed as preventable and treatable. However, organizations like Greenwich House’s Senior Health and Consultation Center have worked hard to change the conversation and demonstrate that wellness is contingent on neither the mind nor body being ignored.
For more information visit http://greenwichhouse.org/shcc or call 212- 242-4140 ext. 251.
