“You try to prepare for all eventualities, but no one ever staffed up for this kind of peak,” says Chondrena Vieira-Martin, Executive Director of Thrive Counselling, a United Way agency that provides psychotherapy.
Twenty-five full and part-time professional counsellors support between 4,000 and 5,000 clients every year, and there has been an unprecedented increase in individuals, families and couples in trouble owing to the pandemic. Not only are there more clients, but they are more fragile, and their issues are more worrisome. The pandemic has compounded life stressors, with many facing anxiety, depression, and even family violence.
There is very little publicly funded psychotherapy to address these issues but Thrive offers a means-based fee scale, and the service is otherwise supported by the United Way. These challenges are entirely independent of socio-economic means, and the fact is many of Thrive’s clients can afford and do pay the top of the scale.
For others, resources are a factor. Psychotherapy should be the first line of defence in the face of anxiety or depression, before or at least in conjunction with medication, but because of means, often sufferers are treated with medication alone.
The United Way has been a lifeline financially and in terms of support and resources for Thrive, especially during the pandemic. Agencies have helped each other out, and it was lifesaving for staff to interact with others experiencing skyrocketing demands in social services. “The interdependency of autonomous agencies meant they could be really nimble and responsive,” says Chondrena.
Thrive Counselling
Thrive not Survive
100% in-person before the pandemic, Thrive had to convert in a hurry to 100% virtual. “Without intentional efforts, virtual services can become more transactional and less relational; it really highlighted that the relational aspects were key to coping. Our interactions with other United Way agencies faced with similar challenges helped us find ways to improve the experience of the move to online services.”
One of the key aspects of the pandemic was that many parents had to deal with children struggling. “There is nothing more stressful for a parent than worrying about a formerly thriving child now seeming to descend into a mental health abyss.”
Faced with dramatically increased demand for their services, emergency funding administered through United Way was critical to Thrive’s response. None of us ever knows when we or someone we love will need the services Thrive or other United Way agencies provide. You can support Thrive by donating to the United Way.
Many of us have charities we support for personal reasons. However, there is a wide variety of needs in our community. The United Way goes to great lengths to identify these needs and find and assist vital agencies with good processes to address them. United Way funds mean these agencies can spend more of their resources helping Oakville residents and less of them looking for money. As donors, we can’t know the best way to spread our donations around, but donations of all sizes from many Oakvilleans can be turned to their best effect through the United Way. And who knows when we, or someone close to us, will need help from one of these services. Our donations to the United Way ensure they will all be there for us if that day comes.
