Parents Helping Parents Raise Mentally Ill Kids

Raising a child who is mentally ill is very challenging, and for those with children who were recently diagnosed, the world can feel like a very lonely place.

Practical advice and emotional support from other parents who have raised mentally ill children can be extremely helpful for struggling parents. Unfortunately, there are fewer than 50 support programs in the City, and only a handful of them involve peer-to-peer counseling.

The National Alliance for the Mentally Ill of New York City (NAMI) has been running the Parent Matching Program since 2003, a peer support group for parents of recently diagnosed mentally ill children under the age of 18. Over the past two years, The Trust has helped NAMI formalize this program, adding a written application, an in-person interview, and a half-day training workshop for parent volunteers. The parents are educated about State mandates on abuse reporting and confidentiality; are taught to solve problems with parents who call in a crisis; and trained to improve their listening and counseling skills.

In 2010, NAMI will continue this much-needed program with our $100,000 grant and will add services for parents of youth between the ages of 18 and 21, an age when many serious psychiatric conditions, such as schizophrenia, first occur and when young adults can fall between the cracks of the youth and adult mental health systems. Volunteer parent workshops will cover the mental health services available for this age group and the differences between youth and adult treatment programs; and provide referrals for schools, jobs, and housing to help youth become independent. Volunteers will also encourage parents to refer their newly diagnosed kids to NAMI's peer-support groups.