Mental Health Association in New York State, Inc.
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Community Connections, Spring 2003

What the ICM Program Means to Me
By Robert Conormon

I am a client in the MHA in Ulster County, Inc.’s Intensive Case Management Program (ICM), which is located in Willow Park in Kingston, NY. If this program was not available to help people like me, who suffer from a mental illness, I wouldn’t be able to function as I do in the community today. The ICM program has given me the opportunity to be a productive part of the community that I live in, by giving me services that are needed for people like me that suffer from a mental illness.

MHA’s Supported Housing Program, which helped me to find my own apartment, provides me with a stable environment to live in. This allows me the opportunity to do the everyday things that people that don’t have a mental illness are able to do in their own homes. The support that I get from this “hands on” approach by the staff is very effective. The staff that works with me help me maintain the stability that I need to be a productive part of the community. The staff works with me to ensure that I remain a part of the community and since I have been a part of this program, I have not needed to be hospitalized. This has been the most stable environment that I’ve been in for a very long time.

I have been part of the ICM program for the last year and a half and I have been treated as a person, not just a person that has a mental illness. And this level of commitment and genuine care that the staff here, at Willow Park have shown me, has given me the opportunity to move forward in my life in a positive way.

I am presently involved in the services that this program provides for their clients and I’m presently enrolled in a computer class here at the center. I also participate in other activities that are available to me. This program has helped me in a lot of ways as a person and it has been a very positive experience for me as a consumer that has a mental illness.

Thank you for having programs like this because they provide a service to clients like me that really need them.

posted 6/13/03