COLORADO SPRINGS — Promoting mental health in Colorado Springs and the Pikes Peak Region is a priority for Abbey Mobolade, the wife of Colorado Springs Mayor Yemi Mobolade.
Before Yemi Mobolade was elected to the office of Mayor and possibly before he even thought of running for the seat, Abbey’s intuition told her it was possible.
She said, “Just throughout the years, there have just been a few, just side comments or you know, passing remarks from friends and people in the community.”
The Mayor’s notoriety has carried over more than expected to the rest of the family.
As a self-described introvert, Abbey decided to embrace it as an opportunity and a platform to improve mental health in the community.
“It's not one person, it's not one organization,” said Mobolade, “It is literally the city. It is the community. It is our county coming together with the bits and pieces that they have to offer.”
From being down in the dumps to full on depression she believes mental health impacts everyone in the community.
She tells of her own down days when she got counseling, and the support that’s helping an adopted child adjust in a new country with a new family.
“I have the resources and I have the connections, and it's still hard.”
She is collaborating on things like the new Pikes Peak Rising 360 website through El Paso County Public Health.
It is a resource with many different approaches to assessing and addressing your mental health.
She is also educating on simpler things that can boost the mental well-being of the whole community.
“Being a part of nature, art, music, reading, spending time with friends, yoga, exercise, like there are just so many different ways that we can address our mental health.”
Over the summer there was initiative with the goal of a thousand neighborhood get togethers across the city.
It was about building community with an underlying impact on mental health.
“When you leave that conversation, nothing has been fixed. Like the problem is still the problem. The situation is the same, but that moment of being seen and that moment of being heard makes a difference,” said Mobolade.
There is no single solution to mental health issues.
It is complex with case-by-case subtleties.
Mobolade is working with a step-by-step approach and believes it can be improved in the community.
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