With a mighty small budget and two persons, Bapu Trust started “Seher community mental health program” in Lohiyanagar basti in 2004
By 2007, Seher had a “mental health clinic” in two or three low income areas. A counsellor would sit, and wait…. and wait…. The few people who straddled in soon dropped off! Those who were “crazy” were referred for medication. After two years or so, the team at Bapu Trust learned that a “mental health program” was a dead end, it didn’t open doors, it closed them.
Over time, Seher has evolved from “mental health” to “prevention, promotion” and “recovery”. The program incorporated dozens of training programs to implement the practices of:
- peer support
- therapeutic support groups
- negotiating community and family systems to “reduce stigma”
- referral to “comprehensive health care services”
Seher became intensively human process oriented, with person contact between field worker and community person(s), including family members and neighbourhoods, being the mainstay of the program.
Using Arts based Therapy helped to bring Bapu Trust in communication with those who were seen as “unable to communicate”. Bapu Trust’s “TGs” (therapeutic groups) were highly popular in the communities. Services were overlaid with service research, to understand what was helpful, what was not.
