COVID-19’s impact on Habersham’s families extends beyond the inconveniences of schools meeting via Zoom or dealing with at-home boredom, and the Family Resource Center of Northeast Georgia (FRC) is taking steps to provide the services desperately needed by families across the region. Whether it’s delivering essential infant supplies to new mothers or continuing trauma support for the elderly, the FRC is breaking new ground to bring services to support families every step of the way through the pandemic.
“We’ve definitely had an increase of mental health therapy needs [during the COVID-19 pandemic],” says Jennifer Stein, FRC executive director.
Those needs may stem from at-home conflicts, or from mental health triggers related to stay-at-home orders and drastic world changes. The FRC is working with adults and children to identify problems and make progress in overcoming them in new ways, like creating and delivering at-home therapy activities.
“Part of their therapeutic process is sometimes journaling, sometimes it’s art journaling, sometimes for children, it’s learning about values, they’re learning how to decrease the symptoms they’re experiencing. What is a healthy outlet when they’re starting to have trepidation about going outside, going to the grocery store?”
The FRC is working with their clients to meet their mental health and therapy needs during a pandemic, which includes counseling sessions over Zoom, socially distanced classes and groups, and even offering delivery of the tools their clients need to thrive amidst the pandemic.
“What the therapy does, whether it’s art, whether it’s therapy, yoga, they’re helping that adult or that child rewire how that childhood trauma is affecting their response as an adult,” Stein says. “There’s a saying that the mind might forget, but the body doesn’t.”
Most of these classes and services are available at low or no cost, making mental health services accessible to everyone who needs them.
The FRC works with connecting families dealing with unemployment to resources, like drive-through meals and drive-up donation centers, to get them the essentials they need. Ever since the onset of the pandemic, these resources have experienced changes that might have thrown others for a loop, but the FRC has adapted to get their families the things they need, even if it’s up to them to bring them around.
“We have been able to provide diapers, wipes, baby food, [and] formula to families instead of going to the hospital,” says Maddie Ash, community outreach coordinator, referring to how the FRC meets with new mothers at the hospital to help them find the resources they need. “The diapers and wipes– that’s a real struggle, especially since many of the families we serve have more than one child in diapers.”
The pandemic has created one problem the employees at the FRC haven’t been able to fix themselves– the loss of their annual fundraisers. The FRC is supported by grant funding, but in order to keep their grants, they have to raise a certain amount of money every year. They usually turn to local businesses for support, but money is tight since COVID-19 reared its head. More than anything, they need help from their community.
“Even if it’s just ten dollars, it would be a blessing,” Stein says. Stein doesn’t know what future fundraising opportunities will look like with social distancing guidelines in place, but their financial needs are just as pressing. You can donate through giving campaigns, or simply shopping through Amazon Smile choosing to benefit the FRC.
