CooperRiis, Inc.
Mill Spring, NC

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Even Mothers Can't Always Fix What's Broken...

The following article appeared in SAMHSA's July 2015 issue of Recovery to Practice. www.samhsa.gov/recoverytopractice

By: Lisbeth Riis Cooper

As parents, we want to fix whatever is not working, be it a broken knee, a car, a dishwasher. However, when a family member experiences mental health challenges, we quickly realize that we are unable to "fix" the person. In the face of this reality, despair, anger, and sorrow become the norm, and the slow process of learning to accept one's limitations begins.

While my story may be similar to that of other families' stories, it is also deeply personal and unique. Trying to help my daughter deal with her mental health challenges made me feel that I was left holding broken pieces that could not be put back together again. These shattered feelings resulted from my personal despair as well as the difficulty and frustration of trying to navigate a piecemeal, dysfunctional mental health system. I started to think of managed care as mismanaged care. This disjointed system-something that I could not fix-reduced my daughter from being a young woman with amazing talents and remarkable potential to a mere diagnosis. Where was her peace of mind? Where was my hope? Repeatedly, we were told to learn to live with her illness, to stop being unrealistic, and to stop thinking that her condition would change.

Little did I know how much my daughter's distress would affect my own health; the unrelenting stress caused me to develop debilitating asthma. All the while, however, I steadfastly refused to lose hope or stop breathing. I kept thinking that perhaps recovery was real, not just a word.

Often, we feel that it is only possible to meet despair with anger. Instead, I chose to turn my anger into action. I asked my husband, Don, to join me in starting a nonprofit residential healing community. Although he had been looking forward to a leisurely retirement, I managed to convince him otherwise. We wanted to spare other individuals and their families some of the pain that we had endured and to introduce them to the power of a healing community. We wanted to create a place where hope, purpose, acceptance, and community would be commonplace. A place where everyone would be treated with kindness and respect. In our community, we would ask each person "What is your dream?" instead of "What is your diagnosis?" Most importantly, we wanted to invite folks into our hearts and let recovery begin. Today, Don will tell you that this is the most meaningful work he has ever done.

A couple of years ago, I read a SAMHSA study that said relapses could be reduced by up to 75 percent over a three-year period if the family had received mental health education. Every time I think about that statistic, I get chills: chills of hope and excitement as I image the unleashed power we as families hold in the recovery of our loved ones! In our healing community, treatment would be personoriented-encompassing the individual's body, mind, and soul-and include comprehensive family education about mental health.

Our inspiration and model was the Spring Lake Ranch Therapeutic Community in Vermont, where we first learned about the power of community and had our first recovery experience. Our daughter spent six months there and experienced a sense of peace and possibility for a better future, as did we.

As our vision became reality, we did not lay a stone or make a decision without reflecting on what our daughter would want. We questioned whether the setting would be peaceful and right for recovery, and if our community would be meaningful and purpose-driven.

Through the philanthropic generosity of so many, we opened the first CooperRiis Healing Community near Tryon, North Carolina, on June 15, 2003; a second campus opened in Asheville, North Carolina, in 2010. Since then, a dozen homes facilitating community reintegration into college, work, and independent living, have joined the two campuses. To date, we have helped almost 900 residents achieve and sustain their highest levels of functioning and fulfillment. With the help of a supportive community, these neighbors and family members have gone on to being students, teachers, artists, lawyers, homemakers, and dentists.

While we cannot recover for someone else, we can recover ourselves, which in turn nurtures the flame of hope in others. Although a mother cannot always fix what has broken, it will not stop her from trying to secure the best outcome for her family.

To learn more about CooperRiis Healing Community, please visit our website: www.CooperRiis.org

CooperRiis is a Healing Community for individuals seeking to recover from mental illness and sometimes addictions. Its residents come from all over the country and most often are able to achieve full community re-integration. About half benefit from scholarships provided by CooperRiis' generous donors. CooperRiis' centers in Mill Spring and Asheville employ 180 staff members who are dedicated to the recovery of their 100 clients.