WELCOME!
Hello and welcome to A New Spirit Behavioral Health Services Foundation! We are excited to inform the public about our new non-profit organization designed to provide behavioral health services to our fellow citizens, uninsured and underinsured, as we all make our way through the most consequential crises of our era. These are, indeed, challenging emotional times. These truly are the worst of times and yet they are the best of times. We invite you to take a few minutes to review our first NSB Newsletter!
At New Spirit our goal is to provide trauma informed mental health services to children and their grandparents/caregivers. It is our aim to help them manage the distress of family member opioid abuse and/or overdose, which in many ways, have been exacerbated by the onset of COVID-19 and its ensuing stressors. NSB further resolves to support families through other distressing, life impacting challenges, to help them problem solve when they are facing difficult times. We admit, it is not the kind of service people are generally excited about like the opening of a new restaurant or shopping center, but New Spirit can offer hope to families in need of regaining a sense of peace and normalcy.
The NSB Genesis
The vision for this project was created in 2018 with serious concern for children and their grandparents/caretakers who are living in the midst of a continuing opioid crisis. Jim Kenney, Mayor of the City of Philadelphia, called upon all citizens to use their talents to help in the fight against one of the “worst epidemics” to hit the Philadelphia area and across the globe. Understandably, the city initially focused much attention on adults with opioid dependency with the aim of doing all it could to prevent overdose and drug related deaths. Too little attention was given to children and extended family members experiencing the daily trauma of opioid addiction and overdose of a loved one.
The opioid crisis remains with us. It lives in the shadows of COVID-19, but remains very much a threat to the wellbeing of our communities and families. A December 2020 press release by the Centers for Disease Control has revealed that while overdose deaths were escalating preceding the onset of the pandemic, latest numbers suggest an acceleration of overdose deaths during the pandemic.
A Bit of Epidemic History
Nationwide, these comparative statistics reveal just how unique the latest wave of opioid addiction is. In 1970, at the height of the heroin crisis, there were less than 3,000 deaths in the United States and fewer than 5,000 at the height of the crack epidemic in 1988 (Stobbe, 2017). Between 2002 to 2013, heroin related deaths increased by 286% (Lui, et al., n.d.). One account of the latest number of opioid deaths for 2017 in the United States was at or above 72,000 (CDC, n.d.; Sanger-Katz, 2018). The numbers are staggering. One must presuppose that the impact on children, families, and communities is also exponentially greater.
Research regarding the emotional needs of children and their grandparents were going unnoticed, concomitantly. In recognizing the gap in care of children amid the epidemic, a national figure in the defense of the little ones signaled that the time is now to take care of the children. They are society’s youngest and most precious victims who are in desperate need for professionals to act with urgency to meet their physical, emotional, and social needs (Wright Edelman, 2017).
There is additional research that points to the specific needs of grandparents/caretakers of the children in these situations. Grandparents who were thrust into the caretaker role for the children faced their own set of stressors. There are numerous reports, stories, and statistics on children living with grandparents, in kinship care, or in foster care. More attention is now being given to the difficult task of grandparents, citing their own levels of trauma, grief, and other challenges resulting from the opioid epidemic (CBS News, 2018; Enos, 2018; Stanik, 2018). An account provided by R. Lamb of the Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbility Services in Philadelphia revealed that in year 2012 65,000 children in Philadelphia had been placed with grandparents because of the opioid crisis. Prior to year 2012 the number of children in foster care had been on a decline nationally. By 2015 nearly half a million children were living in foster care nationwide (Wright-Edelman, 2017). Fast forward 6 years to 2018 and 1 million children were reportedly living with grandparents because of their parents’ addiction, primarily, to opioids, (CBS News, 2018).
The COVID-19 Pandemic Factor
COVID-19 has become an added stressor for children and families as it has halted degrees of normal socialization and the way children are educated, tremendous departures from what they have learned as normal. New Spirit addresses stress and anxiety of individuals and families related to relatives infected with COVID-19. Children are suffering tremendously because of quarantining, and social isolation. The closing of schools presents significant challenges for children and parents. More than 20 million students were receiving at least one meal at school. Some are hungrier than normal because of this development. Parents who are essential workers have to find childcare with little economic support. The secondary impacts of parental job loss and economic insecurity also present difficult challenges. People need help. Opioid and COVID-19 might be better addressed specific to the resulting trauma. This is one of the major goals of the foundation, to promote healing for specific traumatization in children.
At New Spirit, biological parents are valued. We believe a generational approach has promise. A “3-Generations” component is part of New Spirit’s effort to provide treatment to impacted family members. Its focus is on bringing recovering parents/recovering adult children into the treatment process when appropriate, with hopes of the reunification of children and natural parents.
We envision behavioral health support that helps children resume their emotionally healthy lives, to help children learn to cope with family disruption, to manage their traumatic symptoms, and enjoy their friends at school again. We envision grandparents/caretakers learning to manage the distress of life interruption, grief, and the need to return to parenting roles. We imagine for them a look to the future with hope of returning to the exciting things life offers in their own life cycle, from planning family gatherings to socializing with their own friends again. We are excited about the impact A New Spirit Behavioral Health Services Foundation will make on the lives of children and their families under these difficult circumstances. These are the worst of times, yet these are the best of times.
Please join us in helping to improve the lives of so many children and their grandparents/caretakers in Philadelphia. Donate now to support a family against the stressors of our time!
Denise Ray-Shields, PhD