KELLY WESSELMAN: NAMI raises awareness, celebrates hope despite mental health crisis

A mental health crisis is looming in these unprecedented times. Do a basic Google search on mental health and COVID-19 and the information, taken with a healthy dose of skepticism, is staggering.

The relapse and overdose rate has increased by 30 percent since March 2020. Mental health issues related to the lockdown and the pandemic are especially hard for people with depression, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), a not-for-profit association based in the nation’s capital.

Another national public health group, Well Being Trust, reported that as many as 75,000 Americans could die from drug or alcohol “misuse” and suicide as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. Its May 2020 report stated the economic downturn, stress caused by isolation and a lack of a definitive end date for the pandemic could significantly increase so-called “deaths of despair.”

For more than 40 years, the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) has provided hope for people whose lives have been touched by mental illness. This nonprofit organization provides education, support and advocacy at no charge to participants.

Angela Michele Patterson embodies its principles of peer support and advocacy. A certified peer specialist, she wears a lot of hats for NAMI Albany.

“I am the evidence today that recovery is possible. Today, during COVID-19, I am an essential worker,” she said.

Angela works full-time “helping others discover their goals, dreams, and needs. … Supporting others during this time would not have been possible without the training and foundation that NAMI helped me to build.”

This year NAMI has had to tailor its annual fundraiser to the realities of COVID-19. So the Albany chapter is organizing activities this month to raise essential funds and awareness needed to help stomp out the stigma of mental illness.

On Saturday, Oct. 10 — the National Day of Hope — NAMI Albany will host its walk to celebrate recovery. The walk starts at 10 a.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 212 N. Jefferson Street, and circles to the Ray Charles Plaza on the Riverfront Trail. Other planned events include:

♦ Saturday, 8-10 a.m., NAMI members will hand out mental health information and “hope rocks” at Albany Area Primary Health Care’s drive-thru health fair at the Exchange Club Fairgrounds.

♦ Saturday, 10 a.m.-1 p.m. at St. John and St. Mark Episcopal Church, 2425 Cherry Laurel Lane, NAMI will sponsor a walk of an outdoor labyrinth to inspire private meditation. Participants also can design prayer beads in nearby Primo Hall. These beads were popular at last year’s walk in Moultrie. The church will collect donations of food and hygiene products for Neighbors in Need.

Pre-registration is not required to participate in any of these events.

Our mental health system remains overburdened and underfunded. Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities Commissioner Judy Fitzgerald said, “We are not considering when this will end, but rather planning about what COVID-19 co-existence should look like for a state agency. Hope remains our greatest asset.”

NAMI Albany is the strongest “boots on the ground” mental health advocacy group in the Good Life City. These fundraising events Oct. 3 and Oct. 10 are a way for our community to do something. When we support NAMI — by walking or donating to the 2020 NAMIWalks Your Way — we support each other and a lifesaving cause.

For information on how to join a team or to donate, email the local NAMI chapter at [email protected] or call (229) 329-1444.