The brick cottage on the edge of the Ascension St. Francis Hospital grounds has been renovated after being vacant for about 20 years. The doors opened on October 1st, not to new families, but as an alternative to hospitalization for individuals experiencing a mental health crisis.
Evanston’s New Living Room, located at 311 Elmwood Avenue, offers free and voluntary mental health crisis intervention. This is the second of its kind sponsored by Turning Point Behavioral Health Care Center, a local mental health organization, and one of at least 20 to receive funding from the state.
Turning Point’s Skokie location, which has been open for 13 years, has a 98% success rate in diverting people from emergency rooms and jails, Chief Clinical Officer Tina Cortez said.
Cortez said people in crisis often call the police or end up in the ER because they don’t know where to go. She added that while these measures are appropriate in some scenarios, the vast majority of people experiencing a mental health emergency just need a place to calm down and talk to someone.
“If you’re in a crisis and you don’t know if you need a hospital, if you need help talking about it, you can do it literally in your living room,” Cortez said.
Keith Turner, who works at Living Room in Evanston, said Living Room is staffed by licensed mental health professionals and trained recovery professionals, all of whom are involved in mental illness and drug therapy. He has experience using it.
“Once I tried to see a patient in the hospital, and it seemed really traumatic,” Turner said. “I had to wait in the emergency room for several hours and ended up going home. But if I had had the opportunity to come to a place like the living room, it would have been a game-changer. .”
Turner said she heard about the living room and thought it looked “very cozy.” The main area, the actual living room of the house, has an antique fireplace, an armchair, and large windows that let in natural light.
After basic needs such as food and water are met, guests enter a small break room and speak one-on-one with a recovery support specialist.
While mental health service workers often have guidelines in place that prevent them from self-disclosing, Cortez says the living room model encourages staff to use their experiences as points of connection and support. he said.
Staff member Derrick Caston said, “After experiencing the path I’ve taken, I realized what I lacked, and I wanted to provide that and show that I can endure.” I can do it,” he said. “I thought I could be the help I needed.”
Although variations of the living room model have been around the country for more than a decade, the Illinois Department of Human Services launched an official program in 2020. Efforts to create a living room model in Evanston will begin in 2022, when the City Council approved a budget of up to $900,000. The American Rescue Plan Act will fund the project.
Living Room in Evanston currently has limited hours from 12 to 8 p.m. daily, but Cortez said it eventually plans to be open seven days a week.
In addition to Turning Point, the Evanston location is staffed by PEER Services and Impact Behavioral Health Partners, who can refer guests to substance abuse services and employment assistance, Cortez said.
“The success stories we often like to hear are that someone comes into their living room and is linked to all the other services as a result, but recovery is not a linear process, so when you need it, Sometimes I keep going to the living room,” Cortez said. “Good days and bad days, it’s always nice to know that your living room is here for you.”
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— “Everyone is welcome”: Peer-led model of walk-in mental health crisis care comes to Evanston
— A guide to Evanston and Chicago mental health therapy resources
