 in the work comes up and so um and so now if we can um we do want to start the story right and so so who wants to start and who's been impacted by second story and who wants to say what it's been for them and if there's people who identify as providers think of questions that have been okay my name's Michelle and I was around the second story it was started and I went through like three different levels around second story I began with second story as part of the process of putting it all together and picking a house and furniture and all that good stuff and then I went through I was also a data person for the second story and I really enjoyed doing that and I was a client a second story more than once and I think I also actually had gotten an extended stay once and the thing is is that I I'd never had been in the mental health system ever with my life and I was robbed of gunpoint at my work and everything changed from that day on and I spent a lot of time in the site war here the older one and I saw the effects of the you know reoccurring door showing into the site boards and I observed I'm a good observer I'm pretty intelligent person so and then the third phase was I became a volunteer there and I did a lot of art stuff or watercolor or things like that and I really enjoyed it some days you know we was there and some days everybody was there and then sometimes you know a staff member had a few minutes they would sit down and do some part with me I'd also encourage that as far as what it's done for me second story first of all it has given me a community that I can relate to I guess that I'd never been in the system so I didn't know but after being evaluated by several doctors I was diagnosed with more than one personality disorder which was a result of being a child in a very abusive family and as I worked through staying a second story I became I trusted everybody I start trusting I think that was the most important thing because when I was in the psych ward I couldn't trust anybody I'd be not I almost got beat up in my room in bed one night you know so second story is that kind of place where you go you walk in and you feel like you're at home if you've never been there it's a regular house there's no doctor who's running around there's no you know there's nothing like that and the great part about me was two things one I could manage my own medications and nobody was telling me when I had to take them and all that and it also allowed me to have the freedom to continue on with while I was there there was times when I was in the psych ward where I was frantically going crazy how to get people to come to my house and take care of my animals and pay my bills and nine times out of ten when I walked out of that psych ward I felt like a deer in the head freeze at the front door okay now what do I do whereas with second story I was able to go to my house second story had some tricks walking trips and things like that so the bottom line is that if I had a choice as here I would never go back to the psych ward again I would never have a call second story before I would do anything else because I have a community of friends now that I trust you know and growing up in an untrustling family this makes it's like my family and I feel like I'm anybody else like to say something or some things or some words in major depression and I believe that I have saved my life at least a couple times by staying at second story second story has been wonderful for me not always easy as I've had to wanted to navigate some very difficult states of mind at times second story really provided the mutual support for me to learn about grow and more thoroughly and move through my own process which was a wonderful experience I have been involved since the beginning I was among the first 20 houseguests I resumed involvement a couple of years ago as a house guest visitor and volunteer I feel that this has been it is a very positive impact on my life and a positive impact on my family and friends practicing intentional peer support and having had the opportunity to receive the IPS training which was a wonderful experience in itself and putting it into practice to the best of my ability at any given time this has greatly improved my quality of life in all my relationships whether it be in and around respite house to friends and family into peers also adding very valuable skills to the hospice care I have enjoyed doing anything in my future will be greatly impacted and of course my practice of pure counseling was both to come to me I look forward to receiving a living doing this as well I think it's extremely beneficial to have peer support if you do go into the house for some people probably for a lot of people the house is very exciting and cutting-edge we keep learning I experience it as a vital and living organism thanks again for being here today and for receiving my sharing my nation also so I just I just wanted to read something it's a quote from take no home all the wonderful things that you are looking for happiness peace and joy can be found inside of you you do not need to look anywhere else and I love second story I have been participating and a very thankful resident of the second story home I came in feeling disconnected scattered and while there I have gained hope focus direction most importantly second story is giving me a loving safe environment to call home even for a moment in time volunteering at second story gives me a purpose and an opportunity to do service and make our community beautiful I have a stroke last year so slow they've helped me so much as I can story also I mean given me a lot of support during the time that I really needed it and didn't have anywhere else to get that that kind of support you know right there with me every day you know just really really great place anyway I'd like to also express my deepest heartfelt gratitude for the second story home the county supervisors also that have helped me become a very important part of community and for the people who keep it growing the second story is a safe warm inspiring home where those of us who are the fringes of society or are in a crisis situation we can have a warm bed nutrition nurturing in order to gain stability to be grounded and have a place to focus in order to get strength to to become to be to be able to stand strong again you know to stand strong again but see I also think the supervisors also for helping us to create a place for the children to play in the part in the cover bridge part and that's an important place for my child in the house so I thank you very much for coming and second story is just a really wonderful home and I love it so much I'm seeing fingers and pointing in different directions did somebody want to speak is it Jamie hello everybody my name is Jamie and I work at second story as a peer counselor I'm trying to say I'm so much when I talk about collaboration I think that's a really really big thing I was reminded and collaboration came right here the day that my mother said hey I saw you on the internet I saw I saw you and there was there was a show and it was second story and the whole probation apartment saw it and I'm thinking to myself whoa how did you see it you know that was my question and then I thought to myself that means that the county side that means that a lot of people that are trying to it seems that we all have the same objective I know that I would not have known that if I did not explain the second story I think of second story as the liaison organization of a county-wide thing we have we have things like such as the housing such as going in and in into the hospital and what the effect is on people that are trying to to provide services as well as people that are receiving those services and that's across the board in the county and I think that on a really basic level it's really magical and it's really really cool to be a part of that and it's really really cool to see my peers come up here and know that I'm a peer and I'm a part of something and I'm also a part of a bigger community of peers and so I just wanted to thank everybody for showing up here because that's what we need. Second story respite my twice born story what I was hired to work with my beloved peer group story respite in 2014 it was a new birth into the mind-scape of attentional peer support I had been present at the planning group for the creation of a peer operated respite house while I was attending the Mariposa Wellness Center in Watsonville, California during the early years of 2000 it wasn't until 2014 when Molly at the Rose Acres Board and Care suggested that I apply for the peer counselor position open at the second story respite house in Santa Cruz, California. I had been working for Molly at my traveling barber service as a hair helper. I did apply and was very happy to be hired. I began to learn the practice of the principles of intentional peer support and there began my birth into the knowledge of the very greatly comprehensive method of peer counseling. After working a few months I set way into their new management team and before long was enrolled in the required IPS training. This classroom experience is the greatest and most fun I've had in school. Now I am a permanent part-time employee working one night shift a week and as an on-call counselor I'm expected to work two additional shifts a week of called on. One of the very special components of our respite house is that it has a two-story building. Its name second story is found throughout the how-to manual workbook created by the author Sherry Mead. In it we are taught how to write our second story. As an alternative to traditional mental health methods peer support has the intention of discovering the story obscured by talking about what is wrong with me rather than what happened to me and instead of moving away from the problem or its symptom it's moving towards what it is we want to choose to create for ourselves and those in the world around us. Peer support is about creating mental health but mental health isn't the opposite of mental illness. Trauma in form peer support start with the question what happened to you rather than what's wrong with you. We are looking at the root cause rather than trying to treat the resulting symptom with archaic methods like lobotomies, insulin shock or heavy medications with devastating side and after effects. So now we have peer support. When we learn how to hear not only how to listen the untold account important to the peer appears and we hear what's happened and by empathetically validating the speaker repeating back the so what happened moving towards where the person wanted to go in life a personal focus plan can start to grow into an improved way of being. IPS teaches a wide range view of looking at many factors looking at what they are present in the whole person. When someone is having a hard time functioning well in the world we share. Not everyone shares the same world view of how things are. Holding multiple truths is another one of the four basic tasks of IPS. What is true for me may not be true for someone else. After many years of study of language, religion and philosophy that is in the childhood bedtime lullaby row row row your boat gently down the stream. Merrily merrily merrily merrily life is but a dream for me is true and as in the fairy tales of the old and happily in rapture is also an archetype of the true. Someone else might believe differently that life is real. Life is hard and that when our bodies die that is their final end. The first task of IPS is to connect with create a relationship and reconnect with the peer. We are in relationship when there is a lack of understanding or an opposing view. It is a skill we practice so to go on to a discovery of how our lives can come to an improved state of understanding and fulfill goals we may only dream of. A wise man once told me if you don't have a dream can't come true. Please do what you the hearer are able to to further our retelling our story frame in a new way by keeping our second story working for the betterment of all of us here and far. I hope this twice-born story that second story will continue as my born again story has for me I found new life in the religious sense of our main perspective 35 years ago as in church history worships have in turn consecrated more bishops. So have peer counselors educated peers to become peer counselors and have thereby created jobs for many of us as a system of care play second story and now for the campus supported housing I've come to appreciate how the peers can work together through communication compassion and common experience in order to get through some tough times or simply to take a break and reflect on things there is a unique and powerful dynamic that takes place at the rest of house it is not one of power and preaching rather staff and guests live or work a second story sharing chores participating in groups talking or just hanging out the common room or out the beautiful backyard. Sometimes people are surprised when they are told that staff does not direct their activities particularly when they have recently been in locked care or other facilities it is my hope to see second story stay and move forward in wonderful ways in my experience in the mental health care system I found it to be the most helpful avenue to maintain my well-being and have observed firsthand the positive impact on the lives of many of the guests I've seen come and go and it has made a big difference in money so we have about seven minutes or less before we start closing ceremony so what would anybody like to step forward and speak maybe from the provider community or family. Hi everyone my name is Jess and I have a complicated relationship to second story because on the one hand I have an employee of the campus also I work for our supported housing program as a counselor and on the other hand I am a neighbor of second story and I want to speak to the neighbor piece first because I feel like it's a really important one because there is such a huge stigma against mental health housing in your neighborhoods you know you're not part of the mental health system or even if you are you know oftentimes there's this idea that a mental health house of whatever sort pure respite or you know pure clinical is going to somehow harm the neighborhood and I'm here to tell you that that's not been true for you know my experience with second story and if anything they're kind of the best neighbors in the neighborhood on the street and I'm a little biased I'm also co-workers with the cures that run the house but I can that you know any one of us that live on the street can go to them at any time of the day or night and and be greeted with a smile and with you know how it reached arms and they're always willing to communicate they've also held community meetings and they've done like movie showings and stuff like that I feel have gone I think a long way to showing that they're you know a positive part of any community and I think that that's going to be a really scary and exciting thing going forward as the as the peer support network grows and more houses like this pop up so again very exciting because we're going to start breaking down those walls of stigma and also really scary because the backlashes is really really scary and so part of this soapbox I'd like to ask that people if you can and if you feel it start having conversations with people about breaking down that stigma and really re-humanizing each other in any way that we possibly can and then also as a another service provider so as a housing support counselor I also have seen that some of my my clients go to second-story and go in and such a locked down shut down hopeless state and come back with renewed life and that's been amazing I also I worked in in locked care for about five years and walking into that work was really in itself humanizing to me as a staff member so I can't even I won't presume to speak for the clients themselves but I can imagine I don't even know how people get better in locked care whereas I don't know how they couldn't get better at places like second-story and so just that visceral feeling it's it's so great to walk in a second story it's people smile at you they look at you like you're going to be a friend they know you are it's just great to feel that hope and don't forget to sign in everybody and make sure we sign in for see so we so we have a sign-out form sign out and evaluation form at the back you can on the way out it helps helps kind of give the county understanding about how the training was how the program so you know we can we have time for one more person and and they will start to close if there's one more person that wants to step forward I'm fortunate enough to be one of second-story staff I came to second story by accident and because of that I was convinced I was having sent I landed in the middle of a social experiment full of love and kindness towards all others traveling the journey of life while I second-story a co-worker asked me to take a survey for her daughter of course I said yes she asked a series of questions and one of them was how do you feel about being mentally ill my response was I never thought of myself as mentally ill I felt like I was experiencing an emotional crisis one that I sought support for and started a healing journey to make me the compassionate person I am today I had a really good support system and that made all the difference perception is very important at second story we hold the space and allow each individual to let unfold their healing journey second story is a respite a place of love and kindness through peer support I am one of the newest staff members at second story even though I arrived quite by accident or by divine intervention I feel fortunate and honored to be a part of this cutting-edge approach to healing emotional crisis and trauma the guest at second story will tell you if I didn't come to second story I'd be in the hospital it's an amazing transformation that can happen in a two-week period not their guests are magically cured what we do is start to set a foundation of love and kindness to open communication peer support participation in house activities chores groups meaningful connection with peer counselors and other peers our guests find their balance and start the process of regaining their self-esteem here guests come to believe that they can start anew and build a second story one with a view of their innermost dreams and aspirations which may be a permanent job a place to live starting school or just taking one class while staying at second story individuals have a nice warm clean cozy environment kept with food and drinks music TV and community activities it's a place to heal a place to catch your breath feel safe and get validated for who you are a child of the universe it's been shown that isolation is the true killer of the soul would support care and concern people thrive the research results and the second stories of those individuals that you've heard today show that people are touched and healed by their experiences with second story our hope is that this model of healing emotional crisis and trauma through loving kindness will take hold across the United States and beyond the old model of stigmatizing and shaming people for having a mental health diagnosis is no longer valid approaching clients with dignity and respect goes a long way towards their healing and their opinion of themselves and if we are accepted and treated with respect it is easier for us to respect and love ourselves it's contagious love is all there is to quote a famous guitar player our hope for the future is that more people find out about our program and what we are offering our other hope of course is continuing funding which I guess we got which is wonderful I am hoping that the research will be a strong indicator of the success we are experiencing people's lives are being rebuilt and there's not hospitalization involved we would like to see a kinder less clinical more pure phone service interactions that's what second story is all about and with wonderful leaders like like Adrian and involved who have given us so much support and believe in our mission they've helped us to move forward with this wonderful great thank you all for being here okay thank you everybody and so and so we'll now the final percent is after a couple we are going to wait in 10 minutes and I'll come to our day so I just wanted to say you know every every story starts with kind of a start to dream but it also starts seed quite but like a grain of sand so every story starts with kind of a great sand and it was Sylvia Karris that kind of brought it to light in the community and and she's up here activist leader and Sanquish and been long run and it took a family member as well like a little burners just grabbed the grab the piece of sand and just flutter along and looking for a place to take us in and that was Jenny Gomez and she so that will bring us in talked into young Jacob's office sees a computer young is on lunch break or something see the computer just drops out of green center right into the that it's not a cartridge it's now a typewriter that that not a typewriter it's a keyboard keyboard goes this little green has no choice but actually just start typing until that keep until that grain of sand starts to break up into little particles gets into the rest of the keyboard and gets into the computer and then starts getting into the consciousness of each and every one of us so we've kind of from seed from sand to bird keyboard to young actually bringing this program to two this is it was it's a community community baby and now is a four-year-old toddler and so I wanted to just offer you honor to be able to say the final words thank you really really we've all been here together working toward it together but I just looking around the room just seeing all the people in the bathroom but what this what this dream is becoming and growing into and it's only going to get better it's going to be I mean South County okay we can start moving to South County let's start eating so but we've got a just and just to say that you know without the team to everybody that has worked and I just love to for people to stand up for just a moment if you work at second story and our part of it because it's so important and that means everybody everybody and thank you thank you a dream that was a funny introduction yeah so my name's yana Jacobs and I had the honor of the seed that fell with so yeah another person at the state level who asked if I would write a grant for SAMHSA to bring in a transformation grant for a pure respite that we needed one in Santa Cruz so I did a lot of research on what pure respites were about and it really fit with my belief system at the time I've been the chief of adult outpatient services but always really a believer that the people who were the experts on wellness were the people we were serving and so having a place where people could be supporting each other rather than going to places where other providers were telling people what was best for them just never really made a lot of sense to me because we were forgetting the expert in the room that was usually sitting with us so peer support just seemed like it made sense and we needed more peer support we needed more of an active community of people speaking up and so it felt like if we had a center in a place where people could really model peer support that we could grow that and build it in Santa Cruz and you know I literally have been crying listening to them and give the presentation because it was the first time I heard sort of the outcome of what the vision was and you know there's a video of me opening with the grant in the community we had a whole meeting at MH Cannes when we got the grant and I mean I sat there believing that this was all going to be possible but the reality is I didn't really know and I wasn't sure but I had a lot of faith and belief that this really could work if the people rose to the occasion and it's been probably the most interesting work I'd ever been involved with in my 30 plus years in the county and it's just so incredibly heartwarming to see that it really did happen just like just like we wrote about in the grant just exactly what my vision was going to happen is really the results that Bevan was talking about the things that people say when they go through this program are what we want people in the word recovery has been out there and so overused that I don't like it anymore but what you're hearing from people's stories is this is what true recovery is about I mean people are just living their lives and taking away the labels and kind of medical model that's been telling people forever that they're sick and they have an illness and a disability you can't work with that as a provider because it's working against the grain of being a human being and so when you get to work in a place like second story and people get to go to a place like second story it starts to remove one of the biggest barriers that I think we all struggle with as providers which is how do you sit there with somebody and help them when they're already in a one down position and they've been told they have a serious illness and they have to live with it the rest of their life it's such a hopeless kind of introduction to mental health and it's really hard for the people at second story to undo that for people who have been in the system a long time it's a lot easier for the young people who have come in and are allowed to stay a lot longer because they don't they aren't ingrained with that message so there's less undoing that has to take place but I can't tell you how thrilled I am with everyone that the money came through because it's been more nerve wracking than a lot of you need to realize that you know it's an expensive program to run and because it's a different model and they don't bring in half their revenue with Medi-Cal dollars like all the other programs it makes it very expensive and you know using Medi-Cal dollars will be a challenge because again that's the medical model and people are going to have to do that dance when that day comes forward but I have faith that people will be able to be as creative with that as they've been with you know doing the work at second story but it's really a reason I can't I'm just so relieved because we were all wondering are they going to get the funding to be able to move forward because this is the culmination of the grant we are in June and the federal dollars go away on June 30th and the county have to step up and take over the entire budget and that's a huge budget to take over and I'm so grateful that Eric the leader of the Malham Substance Abuse Department really saw the vision and really believes in peer support and was here to support that because you don't know how fortunate you are to have a leader who got behind it a hundred percent and was really trying to make sure that happened so you've got mental service act dollars now that are going to carry you forward and you know who knows what the future is going to bring with the peer certification process that's going through the state now that's going to allow people with lived experience to have a their own certification and their own classification for billing Medi-Cal that should change how they're able to do the billing so that it will support their you know who they are and their integrity to do so without making them into more of what you know we used to do but bringing something new forward so I'm kind of rambling but I'm just really happy that we made it through the grant and the program really really lived up to what I wrote in the grant it was just a vision at the time we were the first peer-rest put in the state of California we've had you know the honor of hosting people from all over the state who've come to find out how we did it and they've wanted to replicate it in other counties wouldn't you say there's three more now that have opened up I know there's numerous more that are in their planning process today and will be opening up so you also pat yourselves on the back you were the cutting-edge county that was able to demonstrate a peer-rest put in our state or a pretty big state and we are joined with all the other peer-response nationwide Adrian and other people communicate and they share what's working and what their struggles are and one more thing I want to share Laysha who was the evaluator at the beginning and she wrote the evaluation section when I was writing the program piece shared with me a story just last night that came in on it was a Forbes story and it was about open networks versus closed networks and I was thinking about that today because we were referred to as a hybrid and that meant you know the pure peer-rest put was one that was a closed network it was one that was only peers and they had no county involvement they had nobody that was touching it or doing anything to the program unless they have lived experience and honestly I didn't really agree with that because I felt like if we were going to change the system I've always worked from within trying to change things and being part of it and I felt like if we could have a program that could affect all of us and have an open system we would learn a lot more and we were all going to change together if you have a little closed system of people with lived experience then that magic that they're doing a second story you wouldn't get the benefit of even knowing that about it and so we have these two systems working parallel but they both be closed and it would be kind of more of the same us and them and so it's been very challenging I know for a lot of providers they'd say to me I don't feel welcome when I go to second story you know and I feel like now you know how the clients feel they don't feel welcome either and so there's been a challenge to try to work that out you know how to how do the staff make the providers who really share the same common goal everybody is working in this field because we care about people and we want to help people and I know that everyone who works in County Mental Health has that desire and I think you know there's it's always been a odd thing to think that you can learn from the person who's been diagnosed and labeled but I hope that a lot of the providers who have had the the opportunity to go to second story have really had their eyes opened and their minds opened and realize there's a lot for them to learn and that we can all teach each other that there's a sharing and back to me it's the beauty of the broader open network that's been created through the collaboration of having County and Compass as a contract provider and the peers all working together and all having to solve this problem together and it's been hard but it's been really creative and you know it takes all these minds together to kind of solve the problems and I don't think you would have had this much success and be able to penetrate the system and continue to make changes as you go I'm hoping that the staff and the therapists who are sitting here are learning from what really works because if your goal is to help people recover and get out of the system and not be permanent you know clients of the system there's something you need to learn at second story because it works and Kevin was telling you about that so you might want to get some of the you know the electronic version of what she shared and really read it over again and share it with others because you know you go to trainings and you take classes and you read books and I think there's a lot of the answers are right here in your own community and I really encourage people to go and sit and spend some time there and if you really listen you might really learn what it's all about so thank you and thanks for making it happen.