President’s Message for June 2023
NAMI Central Middlesex has been a very busy affiliate this year. Thank you for all your support and enthusiasm for our new and seasoned programs. We hope some of you have benefitted from the many support and educational events of the year. Here are a few items that could use your attention and helping hands.
Crisis Cards
Loyal readers of this newsletter certainly know about the new behavioral health crisis options by now, but a whole bunch of other people don’t. Our affiliate is doing our best to spread the word in a targeted fashion. This spring we revamped our pocket-sized Crisis Card to include the new crisis response options. In an effort to connect with those who have a history of accessing behavioral health crisis care, we made cards available within our affiliate area to hospital inpatient units and emergency departments, area police departments, and clinicians who work with police, community social workers, and DMH Clubhouses.
Our outreach was well-received, and in the last two months we distributed 7300 cards to these community partners. We also sent two cards to each Central Middlesex member household. Did you receive them? Hopefully the cards will reach our target population and thousands will be educated about the new crisis response options and NAMI Central Middlesex! We plan to touch base with the community organizations in the fall to inquire about the need for supply replenishment. Thanks to Beth Van Emburgh for helping with the outreach.
Helping Hands
We have some volunteer opportunities available. For over a year now we’ve been trying to add some helping hands to our NAMIWalks and Community Information Table Outreach teams with multiple manageable roles available. We could also use one extra person to assist for just an hour or two per month with our social media outreach, and we need someone to mail a short list of monthly renewal reminder letters to our members. If you admire our efforts, please consider joining our team of volunteers.
Library Brochure Outreach
We are connecting with local libraries by supplying copies of our affiliate brochure. Almost all libraries have community information areas that accommodate brochure display. The effort simply involves stopping by library facilities and asking if it would be okay to leave the brochures. We have one volunteer actively visiting libraries in the west of our affiliate and would like one or two more people to cover the east end: Melrose, North Reading, Reading, Stoneham, Wakefield, Wilmington, Winchester, and Woburn. Please contact us at nami.cmsx@gmail.com if you can help with the library outreach or other volunteer roles.
Happy Summer!
Our newsletter takes a break for a few months in the summer. We offer up wishes for a joyful, restorative, relaxing summer for all. The Bridge will be back in the fall with new information for you.