 Growing up, I had a lot of anxiety and a lot of dissociative tendencies. When I was six years old and had anxiety, I didn't understand it because it's hard to explain to a six-year-old that you have this kind of debilitating illness within your brain. I was diagnosed with having a traumatic brain injury. I also became severely depressed. When a young person is experiencing mental health challenges or substance use challenges, it impacts their family, their relationships with their peers. It really impacts their ability to learn and develop. It affected my schoolwork immensely. I felt sick all the time from a really young age. I hated going to school. I would not eat. I would not sleep. I would basically just lie in my bed and feel numb. Every moment was like that moment when you step into really, really cold water and your whole lung sees up. I didn't know any other type of feeling other than that. Well, we know from talking to young people that they're not getting the care they need early enough, that they're having to navigate a system and go from door to door asking for help and getting turned away and having to wait too long for services. I grew up in a really small town that didn't really see a lot of mental health resources. I felt like I was on my own in my own journey to find mental health help. Having to tell your story to one person is hard enough. But if you are constantly sent around to this professional and then that professional and then this professional having to share the same story, it's traumatising. It got to a point where things weren't getting better and they just seemed to be getting worse and these new things were being expected of me as I was getting older and I didn't know what the rest of my life was going to look like if I didn't get help. We have a big job to do and we know what we need to do and we have a moral imperative to act and to transform the system of care so people are getting the help they need when they need it closer to home. Integrated child and youth teams are part of the overall vision of a pathway to hope where people have access to the care they need for improved health and wellness. Integrated child and youth teams include a number of core positions led by a program lead who facilitates the integrated care planning within the team. ICY is about integrating services, especially services offered by Ministry of Education, Ministry of Child and Youth and Family Development and Ministry of Health. What is the definition of cultural safety? I mean included abilities and Sam is going to follow up on keeping us accountable when it comes to that piece. It's also about shared knowledge amongst professionals, clinically and operationally enhancing our capacity to serve children and youth in BC. Child and youth teams will be really the glue within the community, the connective tissue to ensure that young people are connected to the care they need. So if a young person in a school is exhibiting signs and symptoms of mental health challenges, they will be connected to the team proactively. If a young person shows up in their family physician's office experiencing depression and anxiety, their family physician will connect them to an integrated child and youth team. So the burden will no longer be on families and children and youth to find the services they need. Not only will we be able to integrate services in Maple Ridge, but we'll also be able to offer added services. So I'm so excited that we'll be able to have peer support workers. Young people with lived experiences of having gone through mental health and substance use challenges, ages 18 to 27, that are at a really good place in their lives and in their recovery and in their wellness. They're at a place where they can help other people. With depression and anxiety, you kind of feel like you're at rock bottom and you don't see a way out. So peer supports and people who have lived that life, they're inspiring because you see them change, you see them grow and you see them become people who overcome those challenges and perhaps you recognize that, hey, maybe I can too. One of the barriers to accessing mental health and substance use care is the cultural safety, humility and inclusivity of the services and supports. So there's also a commitment to ensure that the services are culturally safe, culturally appropriate, free of racism and discrimination. I'm trans, I'm indigenous, I'm disabled. People were trying to help me but they didn't know who I was. Knowing that I see why teams is going to be bringing cultural supports and have a whole team built around the individual youth and the family is very important in making sure that the youth as the individual is getting the specific help they need for who they are. I feel particularly passionate about this work. To make sure that young people can grow and develop and achieve their potential, there's nothing more important. When a young person gets the support they need, they have hope for the future. The integrated child and youth teams will be incredibly beneficial to children and youth right now because it's a circle instead of a really confusing and complex web of things to deal with. Youth are going to feel a lot more listened to and it's going to bridge that communication gap between youth and service providers. When I was younger, this is something I really could have used and benefited from and I think would have made my life a lot easier. But I'm also very grateful to see that there are children like myself that now have access to resources like this and can get help in our intervention earlier.