St. Louis Queer Support & Healing
This organization has already been registered
Someone in your organization has already registered and setup an account. would you like to join their team?Profile owner : l****c@t*****h.o*g
Mission Statement
Our mission is to empower and strengthen the queer/LGBTQIA+ community in the St. Louis MO-IL Metro Area –by facilitating healing spaces and building community capacity for peer support, advocacy, education, healing justice, storytelling, leadership, and systems change.
About This Cause
We are a community-based, grassroots organization focused on facilitating healing spaces spaces and building community capacity for queer St. Louisans to thrive. We have experienced firsthand the isolation, stigmatization, and fear that can arise from lack of understanding and acceptance by the people around us. Many of us would have led different lives or made different decisions if we had a supportive, empathetic queer/LGBTQIA+ community when we were going through a hard time. Before SQSH, no queer-specific helpline had existed in St. Louis since the 1980s. Drawing on identity-based peer support models, we developed a 50-hour peer counseling training curriculum using survivor support experience and a LGBTQIA-specific lens. We recruited volunteers from all over St. Louis and graduated our first training class in August 2019. We held a Launch Party to celebrate with our community; over 100 attended. We received a call the first day our Helpline opened. Since then, our volunteers have helped to ground shelter residents experiencing panic attacks, provide space for QTPOC activists to feel heard, and facilitate healing for victims of sexual abuse. In 2020, we expanded our hours and offered appointments. Our 2019 trainees became 2020 trainers, passing on their wisdom to new trainees. Since our founding, SQSH has mobilized 100+ volunteers, taken 200+ calls, trained 30+ peer counselors, and plans to expand to Missouri and Illinois in the future.