AMHCA CONFERENCE
I would like to thank the SDMHCA for the fun learning experience at the AMHCA conference July 19 through the 22. Bonnie WerpyRye and I, as president and president-elect attended the American Mental Health Counselors Association national meeting in ST. Louis, held at the Hyatt Regency at Union Station. The Hyatt lobby is in the most beautiful old train station, with stained-glass windows and golden statues and attached is a shopping mall with cool restaurants and the convention center. It was a fun and learning experience.
The 19th and 20th we attended Leadership Training, learning about everything from a recipe for leadership (includes desire, skill, commitment, availability, humor, and vulnerability) to how to market SDMHCA, to federal legislative issues, to how to build membership, advocacy and managing finances and raising revenue for the organization.
The biggest eye-opener to me was that there isn't a national title for MH counselors or national requirements and there isn't a set way that the state MH counselor association interacts with the state counseling association. I, in my limited experience, think the way we do it in South Dakota works very well. There was a gift exchange and Bonnie had brought some wonderful Harvey Dunn art to exchange.
At the national convention I attended some excellent sessions including using spirituality in the healing process; a fun one on creative counseling, where we learned how to help clients use all their senses and creativity to heal; an outstanding one on working with borderlines; one on eating disorders; and an evening one on movie therapy. I thought the movie one was excellent given the prevalence of movie watching especially in our youth.
The big excitement was being on the river cruise during the worse storm (according to a number of waiters and servers) in St. Louis history. Luckily, the captain had seen the storm coming and had returned us to port before it arrived. But our bus had left and they had nowhere to put the 30 to 40 people on the boat. We were served a lovely dinner, while the Dixieland band played, deck chairs flew into the water and five foot waves attempted to move us out of port. It was a surreal experience--felt a little like being on the Titanic, but was exciting and now makes for a great story. The storm was Wed. night and there were still 330,000 people without power on Sunday when I flew home, so it was really a hardship on many of the people in St. Louis. We were lucky as our hotel was never without power. Anyway, that's my story and I'm sticking to it. If anyone would like to hear more about the trip, just let me know. Thanks again for the opportunity.
April Anderson
SDMHCA President-Elect.