NAMI BLACK HAWK COUNTY
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Mission Statement
NAMI Black Hawk County's primary goal is to reduce relapse, strengthen recovery, and improve coping with mental illness, through education and support, for all people affected by the disease. Because there is no cure and treatment can be challenging, recovery and healthy maintenance with the disease is a lifelong process. We provide educational material in our support groups and classes to help people gain a better understanding of this disease. We also offer emotional support by teaching coping skills and allowing people to share experiences and strategies. Our programs provide crucial information, valuable insight, and a way to engage in support networks for anyone affected by mental illness. We draw on people’s own experience with the disease; it is key to recovery. We provide mental health educational programming that offers support and disease management.
About This Cause
Since 1984, NAMI Black Hawk County has worked to improve the quality of life for people with mental illness, their families, partners, and friends in our Iowa county and surrounding communities. We will help anyone who contacts our agency or accesses our services. We are a grassroots mental health organization started by families dealing with mental illness, working to fight stigma, and to help strengthen recovery for individuals living with mental illness. We offer advocacy, education, and mutual support for people with mental illness, their families, partners, friends, community members, and professional providers through free support groups, classes, educational programs, presentations, and trainings. Our support and education programs meet the NAMI national organization’s standards of excellence, which are requirements in order to remain a local NAMI affiliate. We also educate the public about mental illness to increase understanding of people who are living with the disease. Our free services reach primarily low- or moderate-income individuals. While people do not have to be low income to be eligible to participate in our programs, many of the people with mental illness we serve are unemployed and on disability and receive mental health services through Medicaid/Title 19 (SSI) or Medicare (SSDI). The agency works to promote understanding about mental illnesses and have people recognize these as biologically based diseases of the brain. Mental illnesses are medical conditions that disrupt a person’s thinking, feeling, mood, ability to relate to others, and daily functioning. They cause great distress and often result in people finding it difficult to function normally, handle relationships, or cope with ordinary life demands. Some people who develop a mental illness may recover completely; others may have repeated episodes of illness with relatively stable periods in between. Still others live with symptoms of mental illness every day. These symptoms can be moderate or serious and cause severe disability. Suicide is the fourth leading cause of death for adults between the ages of 18 and 65 in the United States and 90 percent of all people who die by suicide have a diagnosable psychiatric disorder at the time of their death. Mental illnesses can affect anyone and are more common than diabetes or heart disease. One in four adults experience a diagnosable mental health disorder in a given year but nearly two-thirds do not seek treatment. Mental disorders are also the number one cause of disabilities in our country. Mental illness includes anxiety disorders, bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, depression, and schizophrenia. The main burden of illness is concentrated in about 6 percent, or 1 in 17 Americans. Using this statistic, approximately 7,500 Black Hawk County residents have more chronic episodes or serious mental illness. Mental health conditions can be effectively treated, and, with proper treatment and support, people can lead productive lives. Our work is an important addition to assistance from mental health professionals. We strengthen the help people receive from psychiatrists and counselors by allowing people to share information, receive support, and learn about effective coping skills. In addition, improving mental health and learning to cope with mental illness is important to overall good health.