Clear skies. Low 42F. Winds light and variable..
Clear skies. Low 42F. Winds light and variable.
Updated: October 10, 2022 @ 10:03 pm
JENNIFER WALTERS
JENNIFER WALTERS
MADISON – As a therapist, Jennifer Walters says people will often tell her that therapy “sounds like a great idea,” or “oh, I should really try it.”
Getting people to take that next step, however, to take action to address their mental heath, is the hard part.
Walters is part of a slew of Madison volunteers, businesses and organizations that will seek to make it easier for residents when the Mayors Wellness Campaign will host its inaugural Madison Walk of Wellness downtown on Saturday, Oct. 23.
The event will feature numerous vendors, speakers and activities focusing on mental health and wellness in various forms.
“People feel they don’t have time in their busy, chaotic lives, so we want to bring those wellness opportunities to them,” said Walters, founder of the Support Network of Madison and an organizer of the event. “We want people to experience these opportunities and maybe they’ll dedicate themselves to doing them as part of improving their mental health.”
Walters founded the Support Network of Madison last spring in an effort to bring neighbors together through community events to build relationships, stave off feelings of isolation and support mental wellness. The organization will host a booth at the Madison Walk of Wellness offering different colored ribbons, each color signifying a unique mental heath focus.
“There are so many areas under the mental health umbrella and we want to give people that opportunity to express themselves through a colored ribbon that signifies that mental health focus,” Walters said.
“We hope it will help people to connect to other people who may be going through that same journey. If one person is willing to wear their ribbon and they see the other person is willing to wear the same ribbons – postpartum [depression], for example – we hope that may spark a conversation.”
She added it is perfectly fine for residents to wear no ribbon at all, no mental health sticker. People do not have to expose anything about themselves nor say a word, she says, “but as long as they just come and listen, it can be enough for us to start pulling further from the shadows this issue of stigma.”
Worthy Beneficiary
The point of the Madison Walk of Wellness is to aid Madison residents by helping to connect them with various wellness services, including meditation, therapy, yoga, acupuncture, aromatherapy, speech therapy, discussion groups and more.
But a local program, one that has been waving the flag for mental health in Madison for decades, will also benefit. Project Community Pride at the Madison Area YMCA will receive leftover proceeds from the event.
The organization connects young people with free, accessible mental health services that their families otherwise may not be able to afford.
Walters, a fifth-generation Madison resident, credits the organization with diverting the course of her life in a positive way when she was a teenager. The counseling not only benefited Walters, it inspired her to become a therapist.
“They are one of my most prized pieces of our community here,” she said. “It’s very important to me that programs like that thrive and continue.”
The Madison Walk of Wellness organizing committee was unanimous in its support of choosing Project Community Pride as the main event beneficiary, she said.
‘The Support Is Right Here’
The Madison Walk of Wellness is intended to be the first event in an ongoing initiative to support mental health and wellness in town under the umbrella of the Mayors Wellness Campaign.
The event’s organizing committee is comprised of numerous local volunteers and officials, including members of Madison Rotary, which hosted the 2021 “Community Needs Assessment” from which the idea for the local mental health initiative arose.
The inaugural event will include numerous wellness activities downtown, mostly on a closed-off stretch of Waverly Place, but also in front of businesses like The Pink Pear and inside the Museum of Early Trades & Crafts Education Annex for group meditation.
Many activities, such as a bubble dance party for kids in front of Tons of Toys at Main Street and Central Avenue, will have a fun spin to them. McCool’s Ice Cream Parlour will invite residents to practice mindfulness while enjoying a bite of ice cream.
The event is to kick off at 11:30 a.m. with speeches on mental health and wellness in front of the Hartley Dodge Memorial building. Walters will be among the speakers to share her own personal mental health journey.
From there, attendees will walk to the Waverly Place event space and to participating businesses and organizations for the wellness walk itself. The event will wrap up with live music from popular local band The Thorns on Waverly Place.
“We want to make focusing on mental health acceptable and common,” Walters said. “
“We want to open the conversation to where people understand that you don’t have to go to a therapy office to get therapy. Like the Support Network, our goal is to bring mental health out of the shadows and into everyday life. That is really the focus of this event as well.”
Walters said she feels society as a whole has done a good job overall in helping to erase the stigma surrounding mental health since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“But here in Madison, we want to bring that close to home so people know that the support is right here. It’s your neighbors, it’s your friends, it’s the businesses here that support you and care about you and want to give you the resources to get through.”
Local organizations and businesses are sought to help sponsor the inaugural event. To get involved, groups interested in sponsoring can send donations to Madison Main Street Foundation, PO Box 364, Madison, N.J. 07940. Donations to the 501©(3) nonprofit organization will be distributed by the mayor’s office to qualifying wellness organizations.
Business and organizations can also pledge their support for the ongoing wellness and mental health effort by visiting https://tinyurl.com/25s9vm7f.
JENNIFER WALTERS
MADISON – A town-wide event on Saturday, Oct. 23 invites residents to prioritize their personal well-being – and have a fun time doing it.
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