Hispanic Federation helps those in need
When Yaneth Flores first moved to Albany, in upstate New York, in 2008, she needed some time to get used to the sleepiness of a small city. She had been working at a fish market near Boston, where she lived after fleeing violence and a bleak economy in El Salvador. She met her husband in Albany and eventually settled into life there.
But ever since the start of the pandemic, she has not been not herself. She and her husband lost five relatives during the height of covid-19, and they struggled with grief as the virus spread across the area.
Flores managed child care duties from home for their young daughter, who was born premature and developed asthma. But the activities that would normally offer a respite, like going to her 11-year-old son’s music recitals, started to feel like burden upon burden.
“Everything that was supposed to be joyful became stressful,” she said. “I couldn’t see it any other way. I couldn’t think, ‘How nice it will be to see my son play violin today.’”
It didn’t occur to Flores that she could seek mental health care. Her instinct was to repress the grief and the strain of caregiving. In El Salvador, she said, issues around mental health are not taken seriously. In her experience, people tended to stigmatize those who discussed treatment or seeing a therapist as being crazy. “It wasn’t in our culture,” she said.
Still, she wanted to change the way she was feeling, to find relief from the dread of routine tasks. She talked to her husband about finding a therapist.
It wasn’t until this year that a social media post from the Hispanic Federation, a beneficiary of The New York Times Communities Fund, about a mental health workshop it funded called “Una Mente Sana es el Mayor Tesoro a Encontrar” (“A Healthy Mind Is the Greatest Treasure to Find”) gave Flores the push she needed to seek help. She attended support groups and lessons on how to deal with stress and live a healthy lifestyle.
The workshop helped her better identify symptoms of stress, understand feelings of depression or loneliness and know when to ask for help. “It was a huge change,” she said.
Flores said she has learned to take five minutes or so whenever she needs to let go of anxieties. “Sometimes we’re drowning and we don’t realize it,” she said. “Being able to breathe, to take charge, to take time for yourself — it’s the best thing that’s happened to me.”
Flores has embedded herself in the local Latino community. She now works at Capital District Latinos, which is a member organization of the Hispanic Federation, and has found a new appreciation for her surroundings, especially as a mother. “There’s a lot that I identify with now being here,” she said. “There’s mountains. We relish the fall, the wintertime, the summertime.”
When the cold subsides and the warm weather returns, they go camping and take in the scenery on bike rides — the most energizing time of the year for the family. Having confronted her mental health challenges, Flores said, she now finds it possible to revel in those activities once again.