The Conversation Starts Now

The conversation starts here. In this first episode of Let’s Talk About It, host Derek Rader of OhioGuidestone sits down with Katy Baumbach, Director of Communications at OhioGuidestone, to introduce the purpose behind the series. Learn more about OhioGuidestone, why Mental Health Awareness Month is the perfect time to begin, and how this podcast will create space for real, sometimes uncomfortable, but always important conversations surrounding mental health at any age.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:05

I'm Derek Rader, host of the Let's Talk About It podcast with Ohio Guidestone. Today I'm here with Katie Bombbach, our director of communications, to talk a little bit about Ohio Guidestone and the podcast. Hi, Katie. Hi, Derek. Thanks so much for being here today. Thanks so much for having me. I'm super excited. Absolutely. We're excited to talk. So I guess first, tell me a little bit about uh Ohio Guidestone.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

Sure. So Ohio Guidestone is the state's leader in community-based behavioral health care. Okay. We have over 1,700 employees across the state, and we meet clients where they are. So we serve our clients across the lifespan and everything from mental health concerns to substance use disorders. We also uh do workforce development, foster care. We really cover the whole, the whole gamut of things across the behavioral health care spectrum.

SPEAKER_01 0:55

Wow. So a footprint across the entire state. And it sounds like you cast a pretty wide net as far as the scope and scale of those services.

SPEAKER_00 1:01

Yes. We like to say yes, we do, yes, we uh do that. So, you know, anything. We we do mental health care, we do um uh recovery, we do uh school-based services, we even have uh some primary care in the Lorraine County office.

SPEAKER_01 1:17

I love that. I love that. So this podcast, tell me a little bit about the thoughts behind it and the audience we're trying to reach and what we're doing here.

SPEAKER_00 1:24

Sure. So I'm sure you know, if you've ever tried to have a conversation about mental health, it's not always the most comfortable thing to do. Right. And it as uh during the pandemic, it became a little bit easier. It really started to come out that, you know, a lot of people are struggling and sometimes it's really hard to have those conversations. And seeing more people talk about it makes it easier for other people to talk about it. So we have a really incredible team of professionals that work at Ohio Guidestone. And we wanted to showcase A, like everything they know, but also B, how can they use that to help the greater good? So we were figuring out what makes the most sense. And, you know, we really started thinking about like, let's just talk about it. So, like, how do we get out of those like quiet conversations? Or if someone comes to you and saying, like, you know, I'm having a really tough time, or you notice your friends like, where have they been? I haven't seen them at happy hour the last couple of weeks, or I haven't seen them at, you know, soccer games, or whatever it is that you do with them, and you're a little worried. Like, how do you approach that? Or you have a teenager and uh they start to start experimenting maybe with um drugs. Like it's like, how do you have those conversations? Like, what's normal? What's not?

SPEAKER_01 2:32

Tough conversations. The really tough ones.

SPEAKER_00 2:34

And how do you make them not so tough? Um, so we we looked across our team and we're like, you know what? It's a really different conversation if you're talking to someone who is a kid, or if they are uh getting ready to retire, or you know, they just got out of college and they're like, I'm supposed to have my stuff together, but I don't. And like, I can't be I'm probably the only person in the world that feels like this.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

Right, right.

SPEAKER_00 2:57

So um the whole idea is that we're gonna take a specific concern or you know, topic, and then we'll talk across four different episodes. So the first episode will be early childhood, the second episode will be teens, the third episode will be young adults, and then the fourth episode will be adult adults. Um we can see how those approaches change. So you're gonna talk to someone who's like eight years old, very different than you are at 80. Uh, and we're really excited to show that you know there's a lot of nuance to that, and then how you can have those conversations, whether it's a friend, a parent, a kid, uh teacher, anyone. Um, and make it so that it's not so scary to ask for help or check in on someone you care about.

SPEAKER_01 3:39

Awesome. Really important conversations to have. Yes. And this will be the forum to have it. Yes, yes. I'm so excited. Me too. Me too. Thanks for being here, Kate.

SPEAKER_00 3:47

Yeah, thanks for having me.