{"id":11444,"date":"2016-04-07T07:30:22","date_gmt":"2016-04-07T13:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=11444"},"modified":"2016-04-07T07:39:37","modified_gmt":"2016-04-07T13:39:37","slug":"children-and-mental-health-care-its-ok-to-ask-for-help","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2016\/04\/children-and-mental-health-care-its-ok-to-ask-for-help\/","title":{"rendered":"Children and mental health care: ‘It’s OK to ask for help’"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Mariah\"<\/a>

Ed Kemmick\/Last Best News<\/p>

Mariah Bryant, seen here in the living room of her group home in the Heights, is looking forward to living on her own someday, and to a career in the medical field.<\/p><\/div>\n

Mariah Bryant has seen a lot of troubles in her 15 years.<\/p>\n

She was mostly neglected by her parents, who were into drugs and alcohol, and when she was 6 her mother dropped her off at Mariah\u2019s grandmother\u2019s house and never came back.<\/p>\n

Mariah has suffered from depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder, and in school she was often subjected to bullying. Even so, she sounds surprisingly optimistic.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hear other people\u2019s stories and I feel pretty lucky,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Her story shows that while it can be very difficult to access mental-health care in Montana, help is available.<\/p>\n

\u201cReach out and do whatever you can,\u201d Mariah said. \u201cIt\u2019s OK to ask for help. You don\u2019t have to suffer through it alone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Over the years, she has received help from the Yellowstone Boys and Girls Ranch and from the Billings Clinic Psychiatric Center, which she called \u201ca really good place to find myself when I was feeling lost.\u201d Most recently, her help has been coming from Youth Dynamics Inc.<\/p>\n

Mariah has been living in a group home in the Heights for about a month now and she is attending Skyview High School. The group home is run by Youth Dynamics, which also provides Mariah with counseling and a case manager.<\/p>\n

Mariah\u2019s grandmother, Nadine Bryant, said the case manager has been invaluable. When Mariah was recently hospitalized for nearly a day for depression and anxiety, Bryant said, her case manager was by her side almost the whole time.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can call them (YDI) in a heartbeat and they are right there,\u201d Bryant said. \u201cThey\u2019ve been lifesavers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bryant also lives with and cares for her own elderly mother. Looking after her mother and granddaughter for many years was a struggle, she said.<\/p>\n

Mariah said she always loved her great-grandmother, but they continually clashed because \u201cwe\u2019re both so much alike that it\u2019s crazy.\u201d One of her counselors told her she and her great-grandmother were basically \u201callergic\u201d to each other.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why, after living with her grandmother since the age of 6, she is now in that group home, living with seven other young people.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s good to have kids who\u2019ve gone through things like you have,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\"CapreAir_Variable\"<\/a><\/div><\/div>Mariah\u2019s mother is still out of the picture, but her father, Wayne Bryant, has been sober for 18 months and he is working. He still has to complete a few more steps before Mariah can live with him again, but he is determined to take her in, and Mariah is more than ready.<\/p>\n

She said she talks to her father two to three times a week and sees him regularly, and despite the trauma of abandonment, \u201che inspires me. He\u2019s my hero.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mariah is one of about 900 youths served in any given month by Youth Dynamics. Teri Jackson, the clinical director for Youth Dynamics, which is based in Billings, said that in terms of providing services to young people with severe emotional disturbances, the organization has \u201cthe largest footprint in Montana.\u201d<\/p>\n

It offers services in Billings, Bozeman, Butte, Great Falls, Missoula and Helena and in 13 smaller communities, including, in Eastern Montana, Colstrip, Glasgow, Glendive, Havre, Malta, Miles City and Wolf Point. Each location also provides direct services to families within 60 miles of its office.<\/p>\n

Jackson said the only real gap in service statewide is in the Lewistown-Judith Gap-Harlowton area. There used to be a YDI office in Lewistown, she said, but for whatever reason there was not enough demand for services to support an office and staff.<\/p>\n

\n
More information<\/h5>\n

You can learn more about Youth Dynamics by clicking here<\/a>. To reach any Youth Dynamics office in the state, call 877-458-7022.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Youth Dynamics provides a wide range of services, including mentoring, counseling, case management, equestrian therapy, in-home support, foster care and group homes.<\/p>\n

Jackson said 99 percent of Youth Dynamic\u2019s budget comes from reimbursements from governmental programs or private insurers, and she acknowledged that youths on Medicaid, like Mariah, have access to the widest variety of services.<\/p>\n

Children who don\u2019t qualify for Medicaid but are covered by Healthy Montana Kids (formerly CHIP, or Children\u2019s Health Insurance Plan) may face some limitations. Families with private insurance are limited to outpatient therapy, medication management and residential treatment facilities.<\/p>\n

Every agency, including Youth Dynamics, offers a sliding fee schedule based on family income, Jackson said, but if a child needs one-on-one help or access to a group home, it can be very expensive.<\/p>\n

Still, she said, families should learn about what programs are available and seek help if they think their children need it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know if parents in general are aware of the services available to them,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Jackson also wishes there were more public support for children with mental-health problems. She said an estimated 30 percent of youths struggle with some kind of emotional or behavioral problems.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think communities in Montana need to recognize it\u2019s a problem,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s not just parents not parenting children or children not behaving.\u201d<\/p>\n

In response to an increase in teen suicides in Montana, the state Office of Public Instruction applied for an was awarded a Project AWARE grant from the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. It is good for $1.7 million a year for five years.<\/p>\n

Youth Dynamics is collaborating with OPI, using the grant to train thousands of people across the state to be able to identify mental illness or substance abuse in children, and how to steer them toward the help they need.<\/p>\n

Nadine Bryant, Mariah\u2019s grandmother, was fortunate enough to be employed at Billings Clinic, where she has worked in the medical records department for 38 years. People at the clinic\u2019s Psychiatric Center helped her get Mariah into Youth Dynamics. A lot of people could used the kind of help she\u2019s been getting, Bryant said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s so many of us grandparents out there raising these kids,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

The people at Youth Dynamics, particularly the people who work at the group home, really get to know each child as a person, Mariah said: \u201cThey don\u2019t treat you like a diagnosis.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m feeling really good,\u201d she added. \u201cI\u2019m a lot different from what I used to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Youth Dynamics is also teaching her skills she\u2019ll need to live on her own someday. She turns 16 this summer and says six months after that she can got to court and seek formal emancipation, which would allow her to live on her own.<\/p>\n

She wants to live with her father, she said, but if things don\u2019t work out she wants to be able to rely on herself.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I will\u201d be ready, she said. \u201cI\u2019ve always been mature for my age.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t change the past for anything,\u201d she added, \u201cbecause I wouldn\u2019t have gotten to the point where I am now.\u201d She has also weaned herself from medication. \u201cI just keep on keeping on,\u201d she said. \u201cI use coping skills.\u201d<\/p>\n

For a while she thought she wanted to be a therapist, but now she\u2019s leaning toward the possibility of working in the emergency department of a hospital, or as an emergency medical technician. Her grandmother says Mariah is well positioned to pursue her dreams.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think with the people she\u2019s got working with her, she\u2019s got a really, really good chance,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mariah Bryant has seen a lot of troubles in her 15 years. She was mostly neglected by her parents, who were into drugs and alcohol, and when she was 6 her mother dropped her off at Mariah\u2019s grandmother\u2019s house and never came back. Mariah has suffered from depression, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder, and in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11445,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[322,4150,1521,4152,4151],"class_list":["post-11444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-billings-clinic","tag-mariah-bryant","tag-skyview-high-school","tag-yellowstone-boys-and-girls-ranch","tag-youth-dynamics","prominence-top-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11444"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11444\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}