Empathy roleplay event asks residents to step into the shoes of those battling mental illness
Navigating the process to receive help for mental health or substance abuse issues can be a daunting and exhausting journey – for the patient and their loved ones.
People often face a maze of barriers, including long wait times, endless paperwork, confusing eligibility requirements and a lack of clear communication from service providers. Each step forward can feel like two steps back, as they encounter miscommunications, conflicting advice, and a system that often seems indifferent to their urgent needs.
A group of community partners seeking to improve the process will offer Georgetown County residents a unique opportunity this month. Empathy in Action, an exercise featuring 35 real life scenarios experienced in South Carolina will allow individuals to step into the shoes of people struggling with mental health and/or substance abuse issues, to see first-hand the frustrations and hurdles involved in getting treatment.
It’s an exercise in understanding, said Georgetown County Probate Judge Leigh Powers Boan, who is one of the organizers.
“We’re looking for people who know that we need to do something and making a positive impact on these issues matters to them,” Boan said. “Maybe it’s something they’ve experienced with someone in their own family or a close friend or neighbor. If we haven’t experienced it ourselves, we all have someone connected to us who has or will. This event is about awareness, but it’s also more. It’s to open eyes to things you haven’t seen before or understood before – not just from the perspective of the person experiencing the addiction or mental health issues, but also the problems experienced from a service standpoint.”
She recommends the event for anyone. “There is no wrong person for this.” But she’d especially like to see area policymakers attend, whether from the government or private sector. By understanding, we can all work together to effect change.
“It matters to have our decision makers at the table with both our public and frontline workers who live the experiences,” Boan said. She asks that participants come prepared to not only immerse themselves into the simulation, but be open and intentional about gaining a greater understanding of the problems, possibilities and places where each of us can make a positive impact on these issues in our community.
How to participate
The event will take place from 2-4:30 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 19, at the Howard Center Gym, located at 1610 Hawkins St. in Georgetown. There is no cost to participate and there is room for up to 100 people to take part, representing different segments of the population. Volunteers will play the roles of various service providers. An emcee will facilitate the activities and schedule, with the first 2 hours dedicated to the exercise and the last 30 minutes reserved for discussion.
The more people who are at the table with an understanding of the problem and a desire to find solutions, the more likely problems in the system are to be resolved, Boan said.
The event is cosponsored by Georgetown County including the Probate office and the Sherriff’s Office, in addition to the Waccamaw Center for Mental Health, Georgetown County Board of Disabilities and Special Needs, Tidelands Health, AccessFavor, Georgetown County Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission and its Open a Door campaign, the Palmetto Project, and VA Ralph H. Johnson Health Care System.
Anyone interested in participating can do so by calling Aimee Bowen at 803-454-3850, sending an email to abowen@scorh.net or visiting https://shorturl.at/kfsiV.
The Behavioral Health Coalition
A volunteer group of community partners, the Georgetown County Behavioral Health Coalition, has been meeting since the end of 2017 with the goal of breaking down barriers to receiving help for mental health and substance abuse issues. Their first objective was to identify those barriers through learning about all the agencies involved and the problems they encounter as they perform their service. With a professional facilitator and a gaps analysis, they identified two primary drivers of “pain points:” A lack of community awareness and a lack of inter-agency coordination.
“The good news is those are issues we can solve,” Boan said. “The hard news is that it really does take all of us.
The Empathy in Action event is just one step in working toward a solution, but Boan said she hopes it will be an important one.
For those seeking help, every call that goes unanswered, every appointment that’s delayed, and every piece of conflicting information adds to a sense of hopelessness and frustration. It’s a battle that leaves many feeling lost, overwhelmed, and disheartened — like they are constantly fighting uphill with no clear path to the support they desperately need.
Family members and loved ones, too, often find themselves entangled in the struggle, trying to advocate and support, only to be met with the same roadblocks and dead ends. This experience can leave everyone involved feeling isolated, unheard, and discouraged, compounding the challenges already faced by those in crisis.
The Empathy in Action event will help participants to understand those struggles, and hopefully help find ways to ease them in the future.