SPEAKER_01 0:00

September is the month where we recognize recovery and it is also National Suicide Awareness Month. My guest today sits at the intersection of both of those issues. Lisa Dominisi is the CEO of Centerstone, Indiana. She and her team meet and deal with people sometimes when they're at their very lowest. I was very excited to have this conversation with Lisa, and I cannot wait to share it with you. This is We Plural. I'm going to introduce you to this beautiful lady on my left in just a second. I'm going to read her resume to you. Lisa Dominici is a seasoned and strategic executive with a distinguished, seriously, track record of guiding organizations through complex transformations and achieving operational excellence. I can attest to that. She brings expertise in leveraging deep experience in executive management within the behavioral health and healthcare sectors to craft vision, facilitate organizational turnarounds, and ensure regulatory compliance. That is a mighty job, my lady. Wow. So without further ado, you guys have to meet the CEO of Center Stone, Indiana, Lisa Dominisi. And thank you so much for being here.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

Oh yeah, thank you, Lisa. I appreciate that.

SPEAKER_01 2:02

How do you find time as you're doing all these strategic things to Well, you said I'm seasoned, which weeks to my age. Did I say that? I uh it's probably a word I referred to myself. It's all good. Yeah. So you you, as in Centerstone, just came through some pretty big acquisitions.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

Yeah. So we are in the middle of in Indiana, a merger inside of a merger. So we've got the the big, big merger is Centerstone of America with Brightly. And those have come together in November of last year. And then within our state, we have Adult and Child, a community mental health center. Familiar with that CCBHC and Centerstone coming together within the state, all happening at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 2:52

Was that planned or was that on purpose?

SPEAKER_00 2:55

Yeah, definitely on purpose. The um the Brightley group had already affiliated with Adult and Child, and so it was just natural then to bring those all together together.

SPEAKER_01 3:07

So you are in leadership in a in a magnanimous way. How do you stay in touch with the community aspect of your services? How how I know you have a brilliant team because we get to enjoy many of them here in Brown County. But how how do you stay with your pulse, your thumb on the pulse of community being here?

SPEAKER_00 3:36

Yeah. So I think a couple of different ways, Lisa. One is I I still like to be in the office. And by in the office, that can be at any of our any of our locations. Um that way I can interact with clients as they're coming in and out, and those patients can give me instant feedback on things that are happening. Um, I'm also I'm a former economic developer, and so I have a natural affinity for just community in general and quality of life. And how do we live our best lives in our community? And then how do I translate that on behalf of our patients to make sure that our patients can live their best lives in community? And so just um, I think an there's been sort of a natural evolution in my career of that. And I think that's that's helped me significantly in staying connected.

SPEAKER_01 4:28

I'm really fascinated by that because it would be so easy for you to stay in a an ivory tower, if you will, you know, just managing all the things that we just said that you do. So the fact that you get out to the various facilities and all, I think that's really incredible. It's your lab, really. Yeah, it is the lab. Right. Uh so you get to see firsthand the kinds of customers you're serving. You know, uh Center Stone was such a big part of the Addicts Wake. We so appreciated Linda Grove Paul uh sharing her expertise with me in that documentary. And you've just been such a great partner. And by the way, you guys, today's broadcast is brought to you by Center Stone, and that's uh what a great partnership we have. And I'm I'm very, very uh thankful for that.

SPEAKER_00 5:16

Yeah, thanks for saying that. Um, you know, we see ourselves not just as a mental health provider, but as a member of the community. And so it's important that we are committed to those communities beyond just um the workforce that are that's there and the people that we're treating.

SPEAKER_01 5:33

Well, you know, this is National Recovery Month and National Suicide Awareness Month. Yes. And I had so many hurdles, Lisa, with that film, in the way that even from what it was called, the Addicts Wake, because as hard as we are trying to change the language of addiction in the industry, the interviews with hundreds of people that I had still they referred to themselves as addicts. And so one of the many goals of that film series was to try to break down the walls of shame and stigma. And do you feel hopeful that we'll have an opportunity at some point to do that? And what do you think keeps us in that stigma mode at times where we just can't really cross the barrier yet?

SPEAKER_00 6:23

Yeah. I think what one of the things about stigma and when you start pursuing stigma reduction is it takes time. It's it's really it's really no different. Do you remember when 911 was originally born and it took a lot, like it took a decade or so for it to be adopted, and now we're in the 988 for the ment for mental health, right? And we have to expect that it's gonna take some time. The same thing with when we're trying to change um societal perceptions of something, there is an element of time to that, right? And so the more we talk about it, the more we um have films like like your film, I think the better that that's gonna get. I think also it's how we talk about ourselves a little bit. And um I uh you know, the it this month is important to me because my my sister-in-law died by suicide just a few years ago and was um utilizing all types of um drugs to self-medicate uh her mental illness. And the the one thing that I know that um that she really struggled with was how did how did she identify, right? In terms of was she, I mean, she had a diagnosis of bipolar, she had a diagnosis of schizophrenia, but how did she personally identify, right, in terms of of her illness? And then how did all of us around her, you know, react to that? And and how were we either contributing to or reducing that sense of self as you interact with? Exactly. It was it and so you know, there's there's just so many layers to it, and it takes a really long time to have it become more normal. I do think while the pandemic was a really difficult time, I do think it's kind of accelerated some of our um opportunities around stigma in terms of the ability to sort of uh bring stuff out into the light, and that's helpful.

SPEAKER_01 8:30

We're certainly talking more about mental health than we ever have before. And I think there's that uh dual diagnosis when we look at addiction. That's what I learned in the five years of making the film and meeting so many different people from the medical side of things, from the psychological side of things to the actual, you know, person like your sister-in-law. And I'm so sorry about your loss. Yeah, thank you. That's um, it's just so hard on families when, you know, we want to say we loved you, we wanted to help you, and you know, we just don't know what they battle. Um well, coming out of the pandemic, we we have been discussing mental health like never before. And I'm so grateful for that because I think mental health has been one of those things that has been tucked away for so long. I mean, you you look at our parents' generation and they didn't talk about anything, anything that was interpersonal or uh struggle at all. You know, it was just all swept under the rug, and you went on like, you know, everything was good in your home. And so for that, I I'm with you. I did I did see that as a silver lining coming out of the pandemic. And the other thing it it did for the film, because we had to stop filming for four months, five months, was it brought substance use then back to the top. But what I I learned through all that is you can't really sub uh separate substance use and mental health. They they go hand in hand. Right. And so from a behavioral health care provision side of things, how do you know what to treat first and how or how do you treat them together? And is there convincing you have to do for the individual to look at both of them?

SPEAKER_00 10:21

Those are that's a great question. I am not a clinician, and so I'm not qualified to to give you anything other than way smarter people than me are evaluating these individuals and determining, you know, what is their primary diagnosis? And is it a mental health diagnosis that's utilizing substance use as a secondary in order to just medicate that other that other feeling or or difficulty? Or is it really um something that was really substance use presenting first and primary and and then and then the mental um illness aspects?

SPEAKER_01 11:00

So by the time someone gets to a center stone facility, they're probably ready to address it. That is the hope. That is the hope, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:10

I mean, because readiness for change is a thing, right? It is for all of us, right? If you want, if you you tell yourself, oh, Monday I'm gonna get up and I'm gonna go to the gym and I'm gonna do all the things, but if you're really not ready for whatever change it is that you're trying to make in your life, it's super difficult. And so layer on top of that a substance use disorder or a mental illness and your ability to even get to that point can sometimes be really difficult. Be really challenging. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:38

What is the greatest challenge you see in healthcare at this time? And what are some of the hurdles we still just have not mastered?

SPEAKER_00 11:48

Oh, wow, that's a giant question. Um I I really see sort of two things happening. There's there's the payer and sort of regulatory environment because healthcare has become so incredibly expensive. Right. And I recognize that the financial resource is limited, right? And and in terms of what our population can afford, what we can as taxpayers afford to provide for people also is limited because those dollars are finite. Um, and then we have a a workforce challenge as well in terms of how fast can we get people into the healthcare environment for all healthcare roles that um in in all these shortage areas. And if you don't have people to treat the people, that's pretty that's pretty tough.

SPEAKER_01 12:41

Are you feeling there's a shortage of professionals at this point in time?

SPEAKER_00 12:45

You know, I grew up in a rural community and have lived most of my life in rural areas, and there is there is, was, and probably will continue to always be a lack of resources in rural areas. So that that's a the really important for me in terms of a focus. So yeah, I do think it's gonna continue.

SPEAKER_01 13:05

We were also excited in this community when Centerstone opened up. Uh I was in the thick of the film and realized the need, and to the to the point where now some of our Center Stone professionals are in the schools, correct? Right.

SPEAKER_00 13:19

Yeah, the school-based staff.

SPEAKER_01 13:21

Was that something you could foresee would would happen, or was that just kind of a natural evolution of of caring for folks?

SPEAKER_00 13:29

Yeah, you know, um the the truth is in and the science bears out that the younger you can get people into services, the closer to traumas, the the better their outcomes are. And so it was important to identify that if we can get to these youth, they're not gonna have the complicated adulthoods that maybe a parent had had suffered or something like that. So getting in the schools has been a key component of our strategy and a growing aspect of that because we really want youth to have the best possible chance, right? To become um productive, fully realized adults. And uh it's hard. It's hard to be a kid, right? Yeah. Um, and so we want to make sure that we're giving them all the tools.

SPEAKER_01 14:16

It's hard to be a kid, it's even harder to be a responsible adult. Oh my goodness, right? You know, adulting is hard, and I think that surprises everyone once they get there, like, yeah, what I'm responsible for all of this now. So yeah, but I love that because as I looked at again when I was in the thick of things, we were looking at opioid dollars and settlements coming into the state and how those were being allocated. And there was just not in my very limited and humble opinion from the information I was privy to, there was a limited amount going to prevention. And and I want to say, yes, it's great, we need to treat people here, but let's get smart and let's let's get them while they're here so that we don't have to provide for them here later. So I love that school-based component of your healthcare plans because I think you're you're absolutely right. And it helps to know that's in place where prevention dollars aren't necessarily allocated.

SPEAKER_00 15:16

Yeah, and I'm really interested to see uh what happens with the meta settlement uh now that that's gonna be rolling down to states, to see how we will be able to um as as the Hoosier state really leverage that investment that's gonna be coming to us from that settlement to to really um impact and improve the overall well-being of our of our citizens, and especially our kids.

SPEAKER_01 15:41

Are you do you sit on any boards or in any positions where you get an opportunity to speak into that as a leader of mental health?

SPEAKER_00 15:49

Um that right now is a little early. I do sit on the um board of directors for the uh National Council for Mental Wellbeing. Oh, good. Um, so hopefully we'll have some um interesting conversations about that.

SPEAKER_01 16:02

I'm sure those will be very interesting with lots of opinions. Yes, but Hoosier seem to figure it out when we need to. So so my thought about engaging with you today, Lisa, I mean, I can't imagine. Um, you know, you are you have the big picture that you have to keep in mind. You know, your providers are tending to folks that need the services, but then you also have to tend to your staff. So, how do you manage a company in keeping the staff healthy as they're outpouring to others? What and and how much time do you personally spend in that arena?

SPEAKER_00 16:41

Yeah, that's a great question. I um so I have a people first leadership philosophy that I've had for a very long time because the people that work for our organization, um, they have to be well in order for them to uh fully help our clients, right? Right. Because the best, you can't bring your best self if you're not if you're not well. And so um I do a few things. Like I really I try to send out a Monday message that is more inspirational and less, you know, updaty every week to try to set the stage. Um this last month, I try to focus it on certain things. Last month was National Wellbeing Month, and so how to self-care was sort of the focus of that and encouraging that. Um, I pour a lot into my uh into my leaders over time. Now, granted, I've been there five, six months, so I haven't had yet the time to be able to pour in the way that that I do, but I think that's really important.

SPEAKER_01 17:44

And over time you'll have that opportunity. Over time I'll have that opportunity. So, right now, are you just spending that time getting to know some of your leaders and their positions and how they're functioning?

SPEAKER_00 17:54

Yeah, so I've I've been to 37 of our primary sites across the state and tried to spend time in those offices, and that includes here in Brown County. I've been here and got to spend time with the staff here. It's it's a really good for me to hear directly from them about what is going on here that's specific to you because every every area is a little bit unique, right? We all have our own little flavor. I mean, it might be it's like the fries are the same, but the dipping sauce is definitely different. And so it's important for me to understand where the what those nuances are across the state so that I can be mindful of that as I'm making decisions.

SPEAKER_01 18:34

That's a big salad you're mixing together. I had the CEO of the IDDC on, okay, which um is you know, tourism, visit Indiana is their campaign, and she was talking just about the differences of the counties throughout the state and no two alike. I mean, and everybody has either this long-standing restaurant or uh, you know, they're known for their tenderloin or it whatever the nuancing is. But so I'm just sitting here going, oh my gosh, how do you take the needs of you know that many facilities and try to manage a consistent outcome? That's really challenging.

SPEAKER_00 19:11

Yeah, it is. We are really lucky. One of the best things that I've found inside the Centerstone system is just there's a lot of talent. And there's a lot of frontline management talent that is very good at rallying their people, supporting their people, supporting their communities. They're very involved in their communities, which I love because I think that's super important. And so um we're I think we're in good hands.

SPEAKER_01 19:39

I think that's the grit part of how Hoosiers live.

SPEAKER_00 19:42

Yeah. Oh, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 19:45

For sure. I really do. Who do you turn to when you need to be poured in as a as a leader of a state? Do you have a good team above you? And and what's that messaging to their state captains?

SPEAKER_00 20:00

Yeah, I do. So how the how the the center stone system is is built out post-merger is that each of the states have their own market CEO. And so I have peers in the other states that I can contact and be like, I'm having this problem, can you give me an assist on this? And then there's also this larger um system support over us. So if I need um guidance on something, or if I'm just having a frustration and I need to vent to some course, vent to a trusted adult. Yes. If you feel like I need some adulting, yes, um, yeah, I can't. Yeah, I can do that. And it uh I I feel incredibly supported. I feel like Indiana is in really good hands. I feel like the team really wants Hoosier success, and that feels amazing.

SPEAKER_01 20:56

Yeah, that it that doesn't surprise me, but I love hearing that. And you know, I made the film, Lisa. Uh, again, I had a certain consistent goals in mind, but one of them is there was so much misunderstanding about addiction, and then, you know, to breed compassion for our neighbors who are struggling. What is the one or two things you think the general public doesn't understand about what you all do that is so very, very important?

SPEAKER_00 21:30

Yeah, I think the probably the things that would surprise people are the breadth and depth of the organization. I think the things that are sexy, right, are we do substance use treatment, we do treatment for individuals who have severe and persistent mental illness, but we we also do um my kids driving me crazy treatment. We do I'm in menopause and losing my mind treatment. Oh my gosh. We do, but and I'm I'm being kind of kind of silly about that, but no, but there's a need. And and we run um clubhouses for individuals who are really working hard to live independently with their mental illness. We run um, we have homelessness outreach. We have significant workforce initiatives for the individuals who are in our care who maybe struggle to keep and maintain employment. Um there's like, I think it's like 46 different service lines. Um some of the things that um folks would be surprised about is like nationally as an organization, Centerstone has um a very large military services presence. And we have a service line that really just serves those individuals and their families. And I believe there's like 1,500 providers in that system serving those in 50 states and 11 countries. And so when you when you think about scope and span, those are the things that I think folks wouldn't necessarily know. Yes, that is important. I did not know that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:08

And I probably have more intimate knowledge than the the average person at the center. Because you've been deep in it. But I I did not know that. And um I love the the outreach and the heart for the vets as you know, my youngest son came out of the Marine Corps. So you were saying mental health was, you know, not great at that time. And um, you know, he's figuring it out, and I'm so proud of him for doing that. But uh gosh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:35

And I I think too, like the organization overall, we're really working to um as part of the whole certified community behavioral health clinic transformation in the United States, you know, that in Indiana, we are one of the eight pilot sites to be complete uh moving through that transformation in Indiana. And this focus on whole health also, I think sometimes people think, well, I go to the doctor for this, I go to my mental health care provider for this. But the truth is if those two things aren't working together, there's no mental health without physical health, and there's no physical health without mental health because they're just too intimately linked together.

SPEAKER_01 24:12

You you can't separate them.

SPEAKER_00 24:14

No?

SPEAKER_01 24:15

Wow. Um, when you hear, well, I can't afford that, or you know, I'd love to go to center zone, but I can't afford it. How do you guys work with folks who are marginalized and don't think they can afford the services?

SPEAKER_00 24:32

Yeah, well, we encourage everyone to come because we can always find a way. Um we treat individuals without regard to ability to pay. We have sliding fee scales, we have charity care that they can apply for. Amazing. There's a there's a lot of um ability for people to get care. So cost should not be your barrier.

SPEAKER_01 24:53

And so many times it's in their mind because they've talked to someone else on the street who, well, I can't afford treatment or I can't afford this or that. So I love that you have all that variety available for funding.

SPEAKER_00 25:07

I think that's part of the whole medical care narrative or the health care narrative that you're talking about before. I can't afford to go to the dentist. I can't afford to go without um exploring those resources. You know, you can, if you need to go to the doctor, go to your closest um federally qualified health center. They have excellent primary care physicians in them. They many of them have dentists inside. So, and just keeping those linkages is really important.

SPEAKER_01 25:32

You know, and you and I, and Travis and his wife and our families, we can advocate for ourselves. But so many times when you've been on the streets or you're beaten down or you're, you know, uh still in active addiction, you can't properly advocate for yourself. And I I saw that so much. Um, you know, which again is why I'm so glad that you're in the schools, because you could hear about a parent struggling or through a child, and and so, you know, more direct lines to those those problems.

SPEAKER_00 26:08

Yeah, I think that's really uh that's really important. You know, you were talking about I was telling you earlier about my uh sister-in-law, and uh her her illness, her mental illness was severe.

SPEAKER_01 26:18

And had she always dealt with that, Lisa, or did that come on later?

SPEAKER_00 26:22

My understanding was she had always had challenges, but I think in adulthood it just got exacerbated over time, um, and after having children and things like that. But um, you know, we as part of the whole certified community behavioral health clinic transformation and build out one of the key components of that is that crisis continuum. And I know you're familiar with that with some of your um some of your work, previous work. And um I really believe that if she had had access to a crisis center and a team to do exactly what you're talking about, help navigate, help coordinate, help to provide that that soft landing for someone instead of looking at it as how in the world am I ever gonna overcome this? Right. Everything looks like a barrier when you're in the throes of addiction. Everything looks like a barrier when you are mentally ill and not on your medications and can't think through your executive functioning doesn't work right. Right. And so I I really think that that I'm so happy that we are in that space. And it's an honor to be able to hear the stories and and walk through that. I had a in a in a previous um role that I was in, one of our leaders did something that just astounded me. Uh, she was running our crisis teams and our our mobile crisis goes out. And, you know, they oftentimes are intervening when someone has means and intent um for to die by suicide. And so for all those lives where that intervention was successful and that and that person was then thriving, she bought um a rose and she brought this giant bouquet to this meeting and said, in this 12 months, this is how many people that we have we've saved their lives, right? And so that was such a it was a powerful, powerful visual to see that. And I really, I really see that as like that's why we get up in the morning, right? Is is just for that. And so I'm I'm just I'm honored to be in this with this team of people that's willing to go out and do that because that's hard.

SPEAKER_01 28:38

They're doing the hard work every day. And that's what I I asked the question about, you know, how do they care for themselves? Because my daughter-in-law is in social work and she's a fabulous social worker, and she has capacity in her heart to care for the entire nation. Yeah. And and that's how she's been wired and called. And so, uh, but I I did see it at times, you know, where it was hard for her to um let that go and come home and you know, keep that work life separate. I mean, yeah, because these are such human issues, yeah. You know, it's humanity.

SPEAKER_00 29:15

Yeah, making sure that our teams are having proper debriefings after difficult calls and and difficult situations is super important. And then surrounding them with um with resources, both both the type of human resources, so um EAP programs and things like that where they can access their own mental health care um services is really important. Very important.

SPEAKER_01 29:36

Um, how important it maybe is it gonna become, or maybe it is now and it never has been, but you know, collaboration in in my opinion is the secret sauce to healthy communities. Very much. And it's key, you know. And when I first started kind of getting indoctrinated to the whole recovery community and all the components and what it looked like as we were filming, I realized how siloed in 2019 certain communities were. And that is changing. I see the coalitions that have been formed, and I see you know the right hands and the left hands coming in now working together. And that's been such a fantastic change. But how key is collaboration for you with the communities where your centers are located, and what kinds of things do you advocate to those centers in terms of collaboration?

SPEAKER_00 30:35

Yeah, no, we can't do our work in a silo. We have to have community collaboration with law enforcement, with our schools, with community leaders, with neighborhoods. Because if you have, if you're putting up a home that's a sober living home, it's very easy if you're a neighbor of that to be like, ooh, I don't know, you know, the NIMBY, the knot in my backyard. Um, but honestly, there the teams have done such a good job of being able to build relationships, tell the story, um, explain the purpose and the intention that we haven't had um probably as much pushback as maybe I would have anticipated, or at least it's pushback that's in the past far enough now. But that collaboration is it's huge. You can't you can't do without it. And you have to be willing to have really open, honest conversations about what is and isn't working because sometimes we fail. We are not perfect, right? We're gonna blow it. Yeah. And if we blow it, we need someone to hold us accountable and say, hey, I respect you, but I respect you enough to tell you that wow, you really blew it with this situation.

SPEAKER_01 31:39

And so now how do we we rethink it, re-look at it, reinvest in it? Yeah, and fix it. So, what gives you hope, Lisa, about the future of behavioral health with all the things we've talked about, rising healthcare costs and some of the hurdles you know, you have to overcome with clients, some of their hurdles they have to overcome to receive assistance. But what gives you hope?

SPEAKER_00 32:02

So uh recently I was uh my office happens to be just right across the street from a Casey store, like gas station, right? And I was desperate for coffee at that particular morning. And so I walked over to grab coffee and Lord knows what kind of processed snack. And I but tasty, right? Yeah, and I and I had it. I had my I had my badge on my jacket, and this guy walks up to me. He's like, Do you work at Centerstone? I go, Yeah, I do. He goes, he goes, I just want you to know, Centerstone is awesome. It has absolutely saved my life. I would not be able to be here today if it wasn't for, and then he, you know, talked about kind of all the things that he had been through. And he he had been a client for like 20 years.

SPEAKER_01 32:54

Oh my gosh. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:55

So he was a lifelong essentially client. He was obviously an adult, middle-aged adult. And we just had a really beautiful conversation. And and while that is a single moment in time, yeah, that gives me hope because it's like it it shows you that mental health is not, it's not like having a knee surgery that you recover from and then you go on and you climb the mountain and do the thing, right? It is a lifelong decades and decades journey for all of us, right? Yeah. To to maintain it, to um, to improve it, to be more resilient, like all of those things. Preserve it. Yes, preserve it. Yeah. And um, I was like, that is a great example. I mean, that for me is hope. This person had a great life. They were happy, they were healthy because they had received what they needed at the time that they needed it and had been able to maintain that for a couple of years.

SPEAKER_01 34:03

So there's no limitation on you, you can only be with Center Stone for no because 20 years is a long And again, that's usually someone who's had probably a pretty significant diagnosis, right?

SPEAKER_00 34:14

Right. Um, many people can come in and they may need eight to twelve sessions and they're good to go, and they may never need to talk to anybody ever again. Or you may have folks that have situational depression, right? They just went through a divorce, or they had a long illness. Um, I know that in my own family, our son had he's a um acute lymphoblastic leukemia survivor, and he was a young adult when he was diagnosed. So it was sort of like a young adulthood interrupted, and it really kind of messed with his his his mental health. And I remember one of his doctors coming and talking to him and saying, Look, you you don't need to be proud. Like it's normal to to feel this way, right? You know, what with what you're going through. And it's okay to take medication if you need it. And that, I mean, it was a short-lived thing in terms of it was just for a few years, but still just I think getting those are the things that help us move past stigma, those are the things that that make me feel hopeful.

SPEAKER_01 35:12

How did that shape him as a young adult? Did did certain things come from that experience in terms of what he does now or how he thinks now?

SPEAKER_00 35:21

Yeah, he definitely um takes really good care of his mental health. Like he knows when he's out of juice, he knows when he needs to pull back from something. He's very attuned to what gives and and takes his energy. So yeah, it's definitely which can only be helpful as you move through your adult life. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 35:44

That's really incredible. I love these stories. Um, I'm challenging all our guests uh to what I've called, and it's probably silly, but it's a we plural promise. And really what it is is a call to action. So let's say we have a listener who's not familiar at all with the behavior healthcare world, uh, hasn't had to have those services yet in their lifetime, but we want them to know as a stakeholder that they can affect their community. From Center Stone's standpoint, what would that challenge or call to action be that you would have for an individual listening today or watching today?

SPEAKER_00 36:29

I think my challenge would be when when you see someone who maybe is acting a little quirky at your local store and or seems like maybe they're they're struggling, or a neighbor that you know has uh is struggling with some sort of a substance abuse uh situation, instead of labeling them as that, um just look at them as your neighbor who's who ha has is struggling with this with this thing, right? Instead of um making their whole person be a part of their alcoholism, or you know, really think about it as this is just this little part of this person. This is not the whole person.

SPEAKER_01 37:20

It's a chapter, it's not the whole book, correct, right? Yeah, so we would have that a lot when we'd have discussions after the films, and people would say, Well, what can I do? I walk alongside of one person, right? Just one person. And if it's just a listening ear, or you ask them how they're doing, you know, and and is there a way that you could serve them in this struggle? And that all of us can do that. Um we're all stakeholders, so it matters.

SPEAKER_00 37:46

Yeah, and and be just be kind.

SPEAKER_01 37:49

Kindness goes a long way, doesn't it?

SPEAKER_00 37:52

Very much.

SPEAKER_01 37:53

Um, as I wrap up today with you, I don't want you leaving here with uh in your heart or mind going, gosh, she didn't ask me this. A man, I would have loved to have had the chance to share. Is there anything that I didn't ask you or we didn't talk about that you're thinking, oh, I would really want general public to know this?

SPEAKER_00 38:13

Probably the the one thing that I would want the general public to know is that you don't have to have a diagnosis of a major um type. You don't have to be diagnosed with bipolar disorder or major depressive disorder or um substance use disorder. You can you can be someone who just had a baby and is struggling to bond with your baby. You can be someone who is is having difficulty navigating a major change in your life. Maybe you've lost a parent. Yeah, maybe you've lost a child, maybe you know, you could be grieving. Um you you can access those same resources as as the person who might have those other diagnoses. And it can give you, it can be really life-giving for you to participate and have just sort of that that observer, that that outside person, that third party to just share and say the things that maybe would be a little ugly for a best friend to hear and and give you the tools to like navigate that a little bit. And there's no shame in that. You know, I I um my after my second son was born, it was a traumatic birth, ended in an emergency C-section, and I struggled mightily after that. And I I did have to see someone and I had to go on some medication for a period of time, but I couldn't have been the mother that I knew I wanted to be if you hadn't if I hadn't taken that step. And so um, I'm not ashamed of that. That was just a a part of that particular time in my life. So for people to just like it's not always that person over there. It's okay if it's you.

SPEAKER_01 40:03

But I had nurses tell me, because I had postpartum with my first son, that postpartum can affect a lady up to two years afterward. You know, and so it's not over at eight months. Yeah, you know, your body is still responding. So the fact that you got help is amazing. I also got help because it scared me to death. Yeah, I was scared to. You know, here's this greatest joy that you know you know you're going to have in your life, but at the same time, you know, it was it was it was hard. Yeah, it was hard.

SPEAKER_00 40:33

So it's not fun to not be able to connect to joy. It doesn't feel good. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 40:38

Yeah, it's not fun to not be able to connect to joy.

SPEAKER_00 40:41

Yeah, we we should all get the opportunity to go to joy.

SPEAKER_01 40:44

That's so powerful. That is so powerful. Well, that's what community does for me. Yeah, community brings me joy. I get joy from being in my community, serving my community, you know, being a part of it in a real way. So I love that. That's gonna be my new phrase. Okay, take it. It's yours. You can have it. You can have it. Well, how can I ever thank you for coming on top? Thank you. I loved it. It was so great. You just shared so many incredible pieces of information. Uh, I can't wait to go back and and watch this myself. So um, yeah, thank you for making the trip down from Indianapolis. Of course. Thank you to Robert Lambert who made this possible. He's such a great guy. He is. I'm so thankful for him. And thank you for your sponsorship. And um, we'll we'll be in touch after this and let you know how we can continue to check in with each other.

SPEAKER_00 41:38

That sounds great. Thanks, Lisa, so much. I appreciate it. Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 41:41

Well, thanks for joining us again today, friends. And if uh you or anyone you know, loved one neighbor is having any kind of a mental health emergency, please direct them to 988. That is a fantastic tool uh for those situations. And if you would like to have more information about Center Stone, their facilities, uh, you will be able to find their contact information in the show notes. This is WePlural Community on Purpose Podcast.