Mental health care is health care
As we struggle to move past the stress of the pandemic and everyday life as an LGBTQ person, Kula and other resources offer refuge There has never been a more urgent time to acknowledge the anxious and weary elephant that is standing right in the middle of in our room: the appalling lack of accessible and affordable mental health care that has become an existential threat.
After all, who among us hasn’t had our mental health tested having just come out of a pandemic? For a time, we didn’t know who was going to make it and who would not.
We lost more than a million irreplaceable friends, colleagues and family members. And some of us, lost ourselves. I don’t think it’s fair to expect everyone to just continue as normal when the wounds haven’t healed yet.
Even before the pandemic, the LGBTQ community was facing a staggering mental health crisis, especially our youth. According to the Trevor Project, over the last few years, the percentage of LGBTQ youth who have seriously considered suicide has consistently risen and now stands at an all-time high of 45 percent.
