If you asked me a year and half ago to describe the sounds heard in my home while getting ready for school in the morning, I would not be able to share happy ones….

“I don’t want to go, please don’t make me”
“I have no friends”
“I can’t do it”

Things would either then turn to anger or tears; I never knew which one it would be. Then after getting her to school the texts would begin….

“Please don’t make me stay”
“I can’t be here”

This coincided with loss of friends, loss of passion in her favorite sport, loss of motivation. As parents all we could provide was unconditional love but were ill equipped to do much more.

Flash forward to today and the sounds you hear are very different. You will get to see two sisters going back and forth into each other’s rooms sharing clothes. You will hear lots of playful banter and all 3 girls teasing their mom.

I was miserable; I lived in a very toxic environment with people I never wanted to be around.  I slept all the time, I stopped caring about school, I stopped caring about everything and became incredibly numb. I felt like I had nothing to look forward to and began to believe that life would be easier if I wasn’t here. I went to parties more often because that’s what everyone else was doing and they all seemed to be having fun. I wanted to feel something and I felt normal going to these parties, by the end of the night I usually ended up feeling worse about myself.

You don’t have to be alone. With places like the Atlantic Wellness Center being available to people like me makes it a lot easier to get help.  I’m just glad I got the help that I needed or else I wouldn’t be here telling you my story.

Our Daughter was in a very difficult place last fall. After a brief illness and missing a few days of school, she did not want to return to school. The break seemed to reveal her high level of anxiety of being in her first year of Middle School. As parents we sought all of the healthcare resources we were advised to take yet things just got worse. Things were becoming unbearable for our entire family as we walked with our daughter through a terrible season of poor mental health. We reached out to Atlantic Wellness Community Center and settled right in with Danielle. Our Daughter has been seeing Danielle weekly, for several months and we are well on our way to getting our daughter back to school full time. We hesitate to think of where we would be if we didn’t have such a great partner in Atlantic Wellness Community Center. AWCC has genuinely been our family’s lifeline!