As we wrap up May and Mental Health Awareness Month, one organization in Greene County provides several resources for individuals who may need help.

Central Iowa Community Services (CICS) Planning and Development Officer Patti Treibel Leeds says people can be affected by any forms of mental health issues, even for short periods of time to a more serious outlook. She tells Raccoon Valley Radio there are lots of signs that people can be watchful of and even internally, to determine if help and support is needed. Those signs include the feeling of sadness for longer than two weeks, confused thinking or a reduced ability to concentrate, extreme highs and lows, withdrawing from friends and activities, problems sleeping, problems with alcohol and drug use, among others.

Treibel Leeds points out CICS has lots of services that help their 15 county region, including Greene County. CICS contracts with outpatient providers for therapy, counseling and monitoring medications, calling Your Life Iowa number at 988 and can dispatch mobile crisis response, if needed. She reassures people who may need some of these initial services, to not worry about paying for them.

“Those services, like the mobile crisis response (and) the Your Life Iowa, they never ask for your income, they never take your insurance card. That is a service that’s provided by the region. So you don’t have to worry about, ‘How much is this going to cost me?’ We don’t want people to live under that financial burden if they’re in a crisis.”   

Treibel Leeds describes why it’s tough to talk to adults about mental health.

“Adults, for some reason, we’ve thought that anybody that has a mental health issue that they’re screwed up in the head. I don’t believe that. We are all wired differently. It’s having that tough conversation and keeping it in the forefront. The message has to be, ‘It’s okay to not be okay.’ Let’s get you help for that and you can live with that.”       

Treibel Leeds says CICS has a Greene County Service Coordinator with Kim Shoemaker who is in the Greene County Courthouse on a weekly basis to help get the services someone may need.