For Barbara, the Serenity Clubhouse in Everett was a place where she could recover from her mental illness, gain job skills and confidence, and rebuild her life.
But on July 1, that safe place shut its doors to Barbara and 200 nearly other people in our community who struggle with mental illness.
Barbara (a pseudonym) has struggled for most of her life with schizophrenia, a brain disorder that causes her to become delusional. Basic self-care, social and work activities that most of us take for granted were challenging if not impossible for Barbara.
Serenity Clubhouse was one of many effective, innovative social service and health-care programs that fell victim to this year’s state budget cuts. I worked there in support of the clubhouse’s members.
The Serenity Clubhouse program allowed our neighbors with chronic mental illness to become contributing members of society, by teaching work and life skills, and by building confidence in one’s abilities.
Ironically, we taxpayers will probably pay more in the long run as a result of this short-sighted cost cutting. Without the clubhouse, many of the people we served there will cycle into crisis and end up in our emergency rooms and jails.
The Serenity Clubhouse was built on a proven national model of innovative treatment for people like Barbara. Some 60 years ago, the “clubhouse” model emerged in New York. Today there are hundreds of clubhouses around the world. Clubhouses are open to anyone living with mental illness. Clubhouses provide a holistic, structured environment that involves consumers — the members — every step of the way. Members lead the clubhouse, the work units, and the recreation. By operating and working together in the clubhouse, members — supported by a professional and caring staff — regain skills and self-confidence, and are able to resume their lives and relations with family and loved ones.
When Barbara first started coming to Serenity House a couple of years ago, she didn’t have much confidence in herself. Through her regular participation in the club kitchen team she became a steady worker there. She was starting to learn how to get on the Internet and build keyboarding skills. She started taking better care of herself, and began to smile and laugh more. Now the club is not there for her to continue her recovery goals.
Serenity Clubhouse provided a work environment for members to participate and build structure into their own lives. As part of their vocational education, professional trained staff like me assisted members to become successfully employed and become more a part of the greater community again. Members got better by being with people who have already gotten better. This was immeasurable for clubhouse members, as the diseases they struggle from left them feeling invisible, unworthy and outcast.
The accomplishments were entirely theirs, and the savings belong to all of us.
When our members were actively engaged in the clubhouse program, they were not as likely to use emergency services. If were homeless they’d have a community to help them find and keep housing; they were not involved in fights; they were less likely to use drugs and if they did use, they’d have strong incentives to seek treatment; and they were not calling 911 for emergency treatment.
Time and time again, I’ve seen mental health clients struggle with run-ins with the law. But when they become members of a clubhouse program, they have something more important to do. They’re building programs and their own lives.
Unfortunately, this past session state legislators chose to close several of the state’s clubhouses and other innovative programs. It’s hard to accept penny-wise-but-pound-foolish cuts to programs that actually save us money. It costs the state on average $2,200 a year to treat a person with mental illness in community programs. It costs the state more than $30,000 a year to incarcerate the same individual. It costs the state $200,000 a year to treat the same person in a state hospital.
I know that some of the clients I served at Serenity House will, unfortunately, cycle into crisis and end up in our jails and hospitals. That is a shame — not just from an economic perspective, but from a human one as well.
Moving forward, I hope that our state’s political leaders show more vision and creativity in addressing the needs of people like Barbara and our most vulnerable citizens.
Nancy Clark is a clinician at Compass Health and a member of SEIU Healthcare 1199NW.
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