Third Town Hall Meeting to be held Oct. 26
WAYNESBURG – Experts in various fields will come together Oct. 26 in the third town hall meeting format to discuss how mental illness can often lead individuals down a path to drug and/or alcohol addiction.
The event will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. in the Greene County Courthouse and will address what some of the speakers refer to as a “co-occurring disorder.”
Heading up the speaker panel will be Dr. Michael Crabtree, a psychology professor at Washington and Jefferson College and a licensed psychologist with a private practice.
Other speakers include Dr. Morris Harper, who will discuss medical treatment options and the importance of therapy components in treatment; Thomas Schlosser, a substance abuse therapist who will speak about therapy and recovery; and Mathew Pelton from Teen Challenge, whose topic will be recovery and long term sobriety.
Christine Gardner, a member of the Coalition for a Brighter Greene, an organization that helped kick start the town hall meeting concept, said these meetings “have been morphing and have become a voice for families that have been crying out for help.”
She said this meeting, themed “Mental Health-Substance Abuse Linkages,” will “enable us to discuss what we have learned, what’s being done and most importantly, what work still needs to be done to save lives and families from this epidemic.”
At last year’s town hall meeting, a wide array of guest speakers focused on topics such as educating youths about the dangers of drugs and alcohol, how the epidemic is impacting the area and what resources and services are available to those in need of help.
And most importantly, they agreed that prevention is the most vital weapon in the war against addiction, and that there is hope for those seeking help.
Most who spoke agreed that there was no easy solution to the problem, but stressed that all aspects of the community – parents, schools, churches, law enforcement and service agencies – need to work together in fighting the epidemic, and that parents need to talk to their children about drug and alcohol abuse.
Gardner pointed out many people suffering from some form of mental illness often resort to drugs or alcohol as a means of self medication.
“And we know where that’s going to lead,” she said.