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Q&A
SANDY MARIANO
CHIEF PROGRAM OFFICER
What kinds of mental health supports do we offer our guests? Our team of three experts works together to address a host of different and often concurrent conditions that our guests struggle with such as chronic mental illness, PTSD and addiction. Our Recovery Support Navigator works to ensure the health and safety of our guests who are battling addiction while promoting their recovery and stability. Our Mental Health Clinician provides therapy, resources and crisis intervention to our guests. And through our partnership with the Department of Mental Health, we have a specialist who works with guests who are struggling with severe mental illness that has kept them chronically homeless, to secure supportive housing and care. What does this help look like, day-to-day at Rosie’s Place? It could be helping a guest to get her prescription filled so that she can maintain her equilibrium. Or that we help a woman secure a therapist or a spot in rehab. It could even look like the full meditation class being led in our Wellness Center. Consistency and access to help are what so many of our guests are missing in their lives. And that’s exactly what we strive to provide. Every day, through the welcome we give and the judgementand barrier-free help we offer, we are telling our guests that they can count on us, that we are here for them however they need us for as long as they need us. Over your career, have you seen perceptions of mental illness and mental wellness shift? For so long, folks living with mental illness have been seen as other, less than, less intelligent and even weak. And this public stigma creates selfstigma for people struggling with mental illness, trauma and substance use disorder. They can feel ashamed about their conditions, hopeless or unworthy of help so sometimes they don’t seek it. I think the pandemic is helping these perceptions to change. The acute anxiety, depression, trauma and grief that so many people have been forced to confront over the past two-plus years has really de-stigmatized the discussion around mental illness and amplified the importance of mental health. In many ways, we are all sharing some of the same struggles and that has been equalizing and liberating in this work.
A Mother’s Journey and a Daughter’s Thanks Recognizing that many of our guests live with mental illness, Rosie’s Place provides wraparound services to address their immediate, long-term and specialized needs. Below is an excerpt from a letter we recently received from the daughter of one of our longtime guests that speaks to the impact such an illness can have on one woman’s path—as well as the difference that our help can make, thanks to your support.
offered. She spiraled out of control and bounced around between shelters and rented rooms.
On a whim one day, Mom took a bus to Boston and somehow made her way to Rosie’s Place. At first, she was a guest in your shelter and eventually, you all helped her to stabilize her mental illness and secure an apartment of her own not far from Rosie’s Place. She was happy to be back in Massachusetts and determined to live independently. I want to thank everyone at Rosie’s Place for all you did for Over time, she reconnected with her family there as well as my mom who was one of your guests for many years. She some of her children. suffered from untreated bipolar disorder for more than 40 years and I believe it was through the interventions of your I visited her whenever I could and we spoke on the phone incredibly dedicated staff that she was finally able to get often. Mom would frequently take the bus to Rosie’s Place stabilized, on medication and live the life she deserved in for meals and to connect with services and the friends she had made there. She always spoke highly of the food, the her “golden years.” staff and the guests at Rosie’s Place.
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You gave my mom dignity, you lifted her up and helped her get back on her feet and see value in herself and her life…You sheltered her, provided safety, stability, social and mental health services, food, clothing…the list is truly endless.
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Sandy Mariano has been with Rosie’s Place since 2002. Over the years, her role has expanded and evolved, just as our programs and services have. She began as our Mental Health Shelter Specialist and for the past 11 years has served as a member of our senior management team. Today, Sandy oversees all of our Advocacy programs, which include mental health support, and our emergency services and education programs.
My mom was born and raised in Massachusetts. Her loving parents provided her with a childhood she fondly remembered. Unfortunately, as Mom came of age, her manic depression/bipolar disorder manifested and although she was once hospitalized for it, she did not remain on medication and her very serious condition went untreated.
Several years ago, my mom’s mental and physical needs became more complex. With the help of the Housing Specialist at Rosie’s Place, I was able to move Mom into an assisted living facility where she could receive the care she needed.
This past September was the first time I was able to see my I think her family felt so much shame around her illness that mom in two years due to the pandemic. We celebrated her they never spoke of it for decades, living in denial and simply birthday and had a lovely reunion. trying to hope or will it away. My family was shocked and saddened when my mom My mom was just a young woman when she met my dad suffered a sudden heart attack just two months later and and three weeks later, they eloped and moved to Michigan passed away. Mom was a great lady, most people who knew where my dad was from. Within the next several years they her said she was so kind and generous, especially when had four children together. My parents were married almost properly taking her medication. 20 years when my mom, who was on a constant roller coaster ride due to her untreated bipolar disorder, divorced I am incredibly grateful that she found Rosie’s Place and that you saw her as a whole person, not just someone struggling my father. to control her illness. You gave my mom dignity, you lifted Despite her illness, instability and difficulty maintaining her up and helped her get back on her feet and see value employment or managing money, my mother received in herself and her life. Through the variety of services that custody of all her children. For years, our lives were in a you provide and have access to, she was given the proper perpetual state of chaos. medical and dental care she desperately needed. You sheltered her, provided safety, stability, social and mental My siblings and I were just teenagers and young adults health services, food, clothing…the list is truly endless. when Mom lost our home to foreclosure. She wasn’t willing to accept that she was mentally ill and needed medicine to Thank you, Rosie’s Place, for giving my mom the compassion control her major mood swings and refused any help we and kindness she deserved.