In about two months, Guelph youth will have access to two innovative mental health centres they can frequent whenever they please for whatever they please.
It could be for anxiety, it could be for career support, it could be to play pool with friends or even just to charge a phone. The idea is to provide a comfortable space for youth to access mental health services and normalize the conversation around mental health.
Currently, there are three Grove Hubs in the county, with ones in Fergus, Erin and Palmerston. The hubs are all launched by the Canadian Mental Health Association Waterloo Wellington.
The Guelph locations will be in 50 College West, a 2,000 square foot space at the University of Guelph and the Guelph Y which is adding an additional 6,000 square feet onto its building.
“Instead of saying to us you want employment services and you want counselling, and you're looking for a job, we have the services come to the hub to deliver their services on a weekly basis,” said Cyndy Moffat Forsyth, director of The Grove.
She said a youth can walk in and see a counsellor right away. The hub also has a social worker on site at all times.
“Drop in anytime you can participate in an activity, or you could just be there to plug in your phone or you could be there to grab some food,” said Forsyth adding the hub offers a wide variety of activities for youth so they can hang out and feel at ease.
“We do a variety of activities, so art lessons, music lessons, tutoring support, there might be activity around learning about how to be an ally to a racialized community member at school. There might be a movie night or yoga or meditation lessons.”
Forsyth described that before COVID, there were no wait times for services and now children are waiting an average of 226 days to receive care, the longest wait times CMHA WW has ever seen.
“Since the pandemic, there's been a 40 per cent increase in the demand for mental health services in Guelph and Wellington County,” said Forsyth.
She said the number of youth accessing services immediately jumped when the hubs launched.
“In September, we had 74 activities and we saw over 770 youth come through the doors. in October, we had 87 activities and we saw over 120 youth come through the doors. And this is in all three locations,” said Forsyth.
“I thought we'd have to build the trust over time before they'd ask for help. But what's actually happening is the majority are just coming in and saying I want to talk to someone, which tells me that the need is huge, and people are recognizing it."
Forsyth said the models of The Grove Hub were built around the model for the Youth Wellness hubs Ontario which has been working across the province.
So I think it's going to be up and running by the middle of January for sure. But I would like to push the envelope to get it open like that first week of January,” said Forsyth.
Forsyth said when The Grove hubs officially became a Youth Wellness Hubs Ontario site, the province provided them with long-term sustainable funding for the clinical aspect of running the hubs.
She said the hub has a $15 million fundraising goal and has raised $9.6 million to date from the community.
