At The Lighthouse we are working on a partnership with Saskatoon Mental Health & Addictions to have 8 long-term suites available to them for their hard to house clients with 1 room being a respite room for shorter stays. Currently we are renovating them and by May they should be ready.
It is my job to work with SMHA to decide criteria for the clients we are going to serve, staffing levels, and general protocol. The best thing about this is that we, as staff, have much more access to mental health nurses who we can bounce ideas off of and share client issues with them.
SMHA also wants to know more about who the people are who live at the Lighthouse, and the past week I have gone through everyone’s files to figure out if they have a diagnosis and who their supports are. (We have our clients permission to share this information to health care professionals.)
Some of the files are very slim at the Lighthouse. We only know what clients disclose to us, and when they first fill out their application form many are very reluctant to share much. Because they are in a desperate housing situation, they think what they disclose may cause us not to house them. (The vacancy rate in Saskatoon in less than 3% and Mental Health group homes are completely full.)
I am not trained in Mental Health. I write down what is in their files. Some I add too. The ones who I list as ‘undiagnosed’ are probably our toughest cases. I don’t know what to write about a client now my age who was locked in the basement till they was 8, or one client who just stares catatonically out the window for hours at a time.
In March I am going to get some more Mental Health training, starting with ASIST which stands for something like Applied Suicide Intervention Training (I forget what the second S is for). This job is stretching me in such different ways that I never could have predicted but I get to use all sorts of talents and skills and acquire new ones.
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