Christine Sismondo Archives - Mental Health Commission of Canada

Custody Without Care: An Action Plan for Strengthening How Corrections Handles Mental Illness

Kati Oliver — Tue, 16 Jun 2026 08:50:31 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

In December 2016, when 30-year-old Soleiman Faqiri died in temporary custody at the Central East Correctional Centre (CCEC), in Lindsay, Ont., he’d never even been convicted of a crime.

Soleiman, who had a history of schizoaffective disorder after being involved in a car crash, had been accused of aggravated assault, assault, and uttering threats following a dispute with a neighbour. He was being held at CCEC, a facility that’s primarily a remand (or pre-trial) centre. He was waiting for an assessment to determine if he could be better served in a forensic hospital. Few who were familiar with how much Soleiman’s mental illness was worsening while he was in custody, though, had any doubt that he was in the wrong place.

“Soleiman was there for 11 days,” says his oldest brother, Yusuf Faqiri. “Three days before his death, my dad and I went to a courthouse and we testified. So did the nurse from the correctional centre, who said, ‘We can all agree that Soleiman is not well and we can also all agree that he should not be where he is.’”

Yusuf Faqiri

Yusuf says that the judge ruled that Soleiman should be removed from the facility and sent to a hospital.

“But he didn’t make it,” Yusuf says. “And the reasons are devastatingly simple: first, there was no bed available because of a bed shortage. Second, he was so sick that they could not even assess him to be unwell. We took care of ‘Soli’ for 11 years, yet it took the system 11 days for him to be killed under their care.”

Soleiman’s mental health continued to deteriorate over the next three days at CCEC. Then, on December 15, after guards used violent force on him and left him in a prone position restraint (associated with asphyxia and circulation risks), a medical emergency was declared shortly after, and within minutes Soleiman was pronounced dead. The pathology report documented more than 50 bruises consistent with blunt impact trauma. The inquest found guards had committed 60 policy breaches in connection with his death, and the Chief Pathologist ruled his death was directly linked to the actions of the correctional officers. Seven years later, in 2023, an inquest into his death was finally held. The jury ruled his death a homicide.

We don’t know exactly how many people living with mental illness die in custody in Canada every year. We do know, though, that one is too many. We also know that Soleiman Faqiri’s fate points to larger systemic problems, which also took the lives of 19-year-old Ashley Smith in Kitchener in 2007 and Edward Snowshoe, who, in 2010, died by suicide after 162 days in segregation at the Edmonton Institution. These systemic issues also disproportionately impact First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples, African, Caribbean, and Black, and other racialized and equity-deserving communities.

Action on mental health and criminal justice

For the past five years, the Mental Health Commission of Canada has been working in partnership with people with lived and living experience of criminal justice involvement and with experts working within and adjacent to the criminal justice and forensic mental health systems to develop Finding New Pathways: An action plan for criminal justice and mental health in Canada. This national action plan presents 68 recommendations for creating more compassionate, responsive, and supportive criminal justice and forensic mental health systems. It prioritizes prevention, diversion, end-to-end supports, and continuity of care. One key issue that the action plan takes aim at is the overrepresentation of people with mental health concerns in Canada’s criminal justice system.

It has been estimated that over 70 per cent of federally incarcerated people in Canada met the criteria for at least one mental health disorder. Over 10 per cent of people in custody met the criteria for serious mental illness, a rate that is two to three times higher than in the community.

As such, pre-emptively diverting people with mental health conditions away from the criminal justice system is a key component of the action plan.

“Even the best of jails, with the best of intent and the best of programming, aren’t very therapeutic,” says Howard Sapers, executive director of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), former correctional investigator of Canada, and a key advisor during the development of the action plan. “Jails aren’t hospitals.”

Sapers says that anyone presenting with a serious mental illness — as Soleiman Faqiri was — must be treated as a patient first and redirected to a facility designed for therapeutic care.

“I’m not saying anything that controversial,” Sapers adds. “If you were in the middle of a heart attack or had broken your legs in a fall, you’d be put in an ambulance and taken to the hospital, where you’d be treated as a patient first.”

Unfortunately, people with substance use health and mental health concerns aren’t consistently treated that way. Many are sent to correctional facilities despite needing urgent care.

Action on the criminalization of mental health

Whether this injustice is due to stigma, insufficient mental health resources, the lack of training in mental health care among first responders, or a combination of factors arising from stressed and broken systems, the criminalization of mental health in Canada is something we need to become more vigilant about.

“Was Soleiman’s death unique? Not by a long shot,” says Sapers, noting that the number of people experiencing mental health challenges in Canada’s correctional institutions is increasing, as is the number of people experiencing pre-trial incarceration.

“So, you have this huge cohort of people who are both mentally unwell and not yet convicted of an offence being sent to remand centres,” Sapers explains. “Instead of being sent someplace for rehabilitation or treatment, where they might have a case team around them, they’re being sent to the most crowded, the most chaotic, and the most unsettled facilities in our correction system.”

“That’s not a recipe for smooth sailing,” he adds. “It’s a recipe for tragedy.”

Catherine Latimer, executive director of the John Howard Society of Canada and another key advisor during the development of the action plan, says now is the time for action to find (or create) off-ramps for people living with mental health issues who become involved with the criminal justice system.

“It’s not enough to just prevent people from being sent to the corrections system, though,” Latimer adds. “Because the criminal justice system, itself, causes mental health concerns, from the anxiety, stress, and depression that comes with being charged with a criminal offence, as well as the hurdles people face in the correctional system.”

Those hurdles include being cut off from community supports and coping with crowding and excessive noise, and, in some cases, violence. Individuals also face threats and punishments, such as solitary confinement, which can be devastating.

“I’ve spoken with people sent to prison who went from being chippy and fine to showing signs of suicidal distress within 72 hours of being placed in isolated confinement, so it can happen very quickly,” says Latimer.

Solitary confinement is currently capped at 15 days in Ontario, after a 2019 ruling by the province’s Court of Appeal. If 15 days sounds like a long time, well, it does to Catherine Latimer, too.

Reforming the justice and corrections systems

It isn’t only people who are incarcerated who have a higher risk of mental health issues in these systems.

From correctional officers to first responders and dispatchers to nursing staff in correctional facilities, our public safety workers often experience high rates of post-traumatic stress disorder, substance use disorder, anxiety, and depression. Supporting these workers is a crucial part of a holistic approach to reforming our broken systems.

It’s one thing to have a plan and another to take action and initiate meaningful reform. Nobody knows this better than Yusuf Faqiri, who is still working to get justice, as well as to raise awareness, a decade after his brother died in temporary custody. Nobody from the Ontario government has issued even an apology to the Faqiri family, despite the homicide ruling.

“On the night of his death, I made a promise to my mother that we would get to the truth of Soleiman’s death,” says Yusuf. “And then on the day that we buried him, I promised my brother that I would not let his death be the last chapter of his life. After my brother’s death in prison, my family lost faith in the system, but we still believe in justice.”

Yusuf’s tireless efforts helped secure the inquest. He continues to advocate for transparency and accountability in the corrections system. Recently, he collaborated with the Mental Health Commission of Canada to highlight his brother’s story in the action plan, helping to illustrate the need for change in the system.

“Soleiman’s death is an opportunity for us to transform corrections,” says Yusuf. “It’s an opportunity for redemption. It’s an opportunity for us to look in the mirror and see what we become as a society when we put people living with mental illnesses in jails.”

He adds, “As tragic as his story was, this is an opportunity to honour him by trying to bring about systemic change.”

Resources, sources, and documents

Finding New Pathways – An action plan for criminal justice and mental health in Canada

Finding New Pathways – Reference Guide

Author: Christine Sismondo, PhD, is a historian and a regular contributor to the Toronto Star and other publications. She writes regularly about drug policy, intersectional feminism, and health care, and has received both a Canadian Online Publishing Award and a National Magazine Award.

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Sweeping Changes: Spring Cleaning and Mental Health

Ian Peralta — Tue, 10 Mar 2026 12:00:23 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

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During the pandemic, Christine Hooper, a registered dietitian and yoga instructor who lives in Toronto, found a novel way to lessen the effects of social isolation — cleaning house.

“It’s how I got through COVID,” Hooper says. “I was all by myself with nowhere to go, so I slowly went through all my stuff and cleaned and organized everything.

“I didn’t tackle too much at a time,” she recalls. “I just took a couple of hours every night while I was watching mindless TV and flipped through my things, box by box. It helped that I had time for things to percolate.”

Christine Hooper

Since she lives in a modest one-bedroom, Hooper was surprised to discover how much had accumulated over the years. But, after months of going through all her stuff, she slowly transformed a crowded bachelorette pad into a lean apartment equipped only with things she needed or truly loved. The experience also made her realize how good “spring cleaning” projects made her feel. She even started volunteering to help friends transform their spaces, which she said felt like a “creative act.” Could your dust-buster double as a stress buster? Hooper’s sense that cleaning can help you cope with difficult situations is starting to get a little scientific backing, despite the fact that very little research on any possible connection had been conducted until 2023, when “Actual Cleaning and Simulated Cleaning Attenuate Psychological and Physiological Effects of Stressful Events” hit the stands. An international team that included researchers from the University of Toronto found an association between the physical act of cleaning and the lessening of “residual anxiety” from a “stress-inducing physical scene.” Cleaning helped boost “adaptive cardiovascular reactivity,” a physiological reaction that can make it easier to cope with stress. That may have been the first physiological evidence, but anecdotally, many humans had already observed this. For musician and writer Blair Frodelius, the therapeutic qualities of cleaning have been clear for a while. “I feel less pressure, less anxiety, and less stress in my life,” he says. “I guess the best word to describe it would be ‘unburdened.’” Which may be why many, if not most, cultures and religions have rituals that involve sweeping out the bad energy to make room for good vibes, be it Lunar New Year or Guatemala’s La Quema Del Diablo, which involves giving the house a deep clean, then burning the devil in effigy. “There are a lot of cultural components and cultural messaging that have to do with cleaning,” says Dr. Natasha Williams, a registered psychologist. “I was born and raised here in Canada, but my family is from the Caribbean, where cleanliness is often talked about as next to godliness, you know?”

Dr. Natasha Williams

Growing up, Williams recalls the whole family pitching in to scrub the washboards and fold the laundry so that everything was spotless on Sunday — and ready for the start of the new week. The value of that experience has stayed with her, to the point that her dynamic practice in Toronto melds advice on mental health and empowerment with ways to declutter all the spaces — physical, mental, and even digital.

“The thing is that mental health is whole health,” Williams adds. “So that includes physical health, our social environment, and our physical environment. If your environment is cluttered, that is going to impact the way that you cope on a day-to-day basis.”

Less is more for many, but not for everyone

Williams stresses that cleaning is a highly individual issue. Some find comfort in a cozy room full of memorabilia and stacks of books; others prefer a sparse space.

Clare Kumar, whose Happy Space Podcast is all about neuro-inclusion and design, says the gap between minimalists and maximalists goes beyond personal taste and decorating trends.

Clare Kumar – Photo: Dan Coutts

“Some people can become overwhelmed by too much visual stimulation,” explains Kumar, who also used to be a professional organizer. “I think a strategic restoring of order in a space can sometimes be a nervous system regulation. I call it a ‘moment of exhale’ because I find it starts to calm us down.”

Hunting for treasure without ever leaving home
Still, even people who are highly motivated to dial down a room’s sensory overload might struggle to let go of certain things.

“I tell people to look for treasures, so I try to reframe it in a really positive way rather than devaluing things by calling it ‘clutter,’” says Kumar. “Identify the things you really know you want to have in that space, then infuse them with joy and celebration rather than guilt.”

Wendy Stone, founder of Halifax’s Lighten Up Organizing, a trauma-informed service, agrees that using positive, judgment-free language is especially important when “stuff” is part of a coping mechanism.

Wendy Stone

“If you have somebody with severe trauma issues around their things, you can’t call it junk or garbage or just start by asking if they really need it,” says Stone, who has transformed countless homes into well-organized spaces since she founded her business in 2018. “You need to ask why they’ve kept it and then talk about it before you can ask whether they need it.”

Stone remarks that it’s a slow process. And it should be. She recommends not planning to do a whole house or apartment on a single weekend. “It’s all about keeping the focus in a very small space,” she says.

“But it’s so important to try to work on making your home a place you feel good about and feel safe in,” Stone continues. “Because, really, I think our spirit is attached to our space.”

Practical tips from our panel of neatniks:

An orderly and clean house is great, but don’t strive for perfection. “Because we’re human beings and human beings are not perfect, there’s no such thing,” says Dr. Natasha Williams. “Perfection is a myth.”
“Start small,” Blair Frodelius advises. “Five minutes a day equals two and a half hours per month. So, if you can do 10-20 minutes a day, wow!” If you need a prompt, he notes there are apps that remind you to do all sorts of tasks — from the kind that only come up a few times a year to regular daily or weekly chores.
Wendy Stone advises: If you’re sorting stuff in the bathroom and you find a hammer, don’t immediately take it to the tool room. Instead, sort in place and make piles. “We’re not going to move around the house,” she says, “When we’re done, the stuff that goes to the kitchen or the living room goes all at once. That saves your energy and you’re more likely to finish the task at hand.”
Christine Hooper recalls that she ran across a stack of love letters from her first boyfriend during the big dig of her apartment. “I read every single letter. Then I chose my favourite and got rid of the rest,” she says. “Sometimes people keep multiple things that remind them of a person or time in their life. You often only need one.”
Getting rid of things can feel wasteful and few of us want to feel like we’re contributing to a landfill. Clare Kumar counsels people to look to local charities that need donations for gently used items so they get a second life. “I’ve always wanted to make a TV show that takes unwanted items and follows them to homes where they become treasures.”

Cleaning rituals around the world

In parts of the Middle East, Central Asia and the Balkans, humans have been celebrating Nowruz, a spring equinox celebration, for over 3,000 years. There are many components to the festival but one important one is “shaking the dust” — cleaning house before the equinox.

Better known as Swedish death cleaning, Döstädning isn’t an annual ritual but instead a philosophy that espouses simplicity and minimalism at any age. The name may sound morbid but, in the end, keeping things clean is about caring for loved ones by making sure they aren’t, one day, burdened with a house crammed with possessions. And helping family and friends is good for us, too.

Most of us know all about ridding ourselves of items that fail to “spark joy,” thanks to Marie Kondo’s books and TV shows. Fewer people know that Kondo took inspiration for her work from Ôsôji, a traditional Japanese cleaning exercise designed to let go of regret to make room for all the good fortune and energy coming in the New Year.

Fact sheet: Managing the Winter Blues

Further reading: The Therapeutic Power of Blue Space

Author: Christine Sismondo, PhD, is a historian and a regular contributor to the Toronto Star and other publications. She writes regularly about drug policy, intersectional feminism, and healthcare, and has received both a Canadian Online Publishing Award and a National Magazine Award.

Illustrator: Kasia Niton – https://sunnystreet.studio/ Instagram: @sunnystreet.studio

The post Sweeping Changes: Spring Cleaning and Mental Health appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

From Diagnosis to Dignity: Rethinking Support for People with FASD

Ian Peralta — Tue, 20 Jan 2026 13:03:07 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

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Dr. Melissa Dobson calls herself a reluctant “snowplow mom” – a term for people who actively engage with teachers and administrators at school to remove obstacles for their children.

All three of her adopted “awesome kiddos” are neurodivergent. When her middle child was a toddler, he was diagnosed with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD), a lifelong disability that affects the brains and bodies of people exposed to alcohol in the womb.

Dr. Dobson is also the associate chair in the Bachelor of Technology program at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology and a member of the family advisory committee for the Canada Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder Research Network (CanFASD).

Dobson says she used to think that her middle child might never be able to write his name or even calm down enough to have a full conversation. Now he’s halfway through high school. All her kids are expected to graduate in the next few years.

“So now I feel like we’re hitting a place where we’re going to face the big problems,” says Dobson. “Bigger kids have bigger issues. We’re having mental health issues, and there are things that I can no longer pave the way for as they get older. So now it’s about figuring out how to create a community that can support them.”

Dobson isn’t alone in her worries. People with FASD and those with mental health problems are over-represented in unhoused populations, substance use disorder programs, and in Canada’s criminal justice system.

“FASD is so complex because it intersects with so many other areas, particularly the justice system,” says Kathy Unsworth, executive director of CanFASD, a national research network focused on FASD, who notes that the over-representation of FASD in the justice system, particularly among youth, is estimated to be 30 times the general population.

People with FASD aren’t the only segment of the population over-represented in Canada’s justice system. Approximately 73 per cent of men and 79 per cent of women who are federally incarcerated in Canada meet the criteria for one or more current mental disorders.

Expert adviser Howard Sapers is working with the Mental Health Commission of Canada and a national advisory group on a plan of action for the justice system. Photo: Dave Chan.

What’s being done

To address this issue, the Mental Health Commission of Canada is working with a number of organizations, including CanFASD, on a National Action Plan on Mental Health and Criminal Justice to support the mental health of people who interact with and work within the criminal justice system.

“The National Action Plan is just that, a plan, not something forced on people,” explains Howard Sapers, executive director of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, and currently a member of the board of trustees of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, the CanFASD board of directors, a member of the Legal Aid Ontario prison law advisory committee, and expert adviser to the Commission.

“It’s not a federal strategy,” he continues. “It’s a call to action to Canada and all the provinces and territories and all the people that work in the systems we’re talking about, including support systems, criminal justice, and hospital-based health care.”

Systemic issues connected to the overrepresentation of people with mental disorders in the nation’s justice system are myriad, complex, and intersect with marginalized populations. Some of these, though, can be brought into focus through the lens of the experiences of some people living with FASD who often literally perceive the world differently than neurotypical folks. For example, in addition to issues with emotional regulation and time management, people with FASD often have memory gaps. Studies have shown that “confabulation”—the process of trying to fill those gaps—can make people with FASD particularly susceptible and vulnerable to making false confessions during interrogation.

One key piece on the path towards preventing wrongful convictions would be to ensure that everyone involved in Canada’s criminal justice system was “FASD-informed.” Recent reforms in Winnipeg serve as a good model for this, since the city has created dedicated courtrooms designed exclusively for people with FASD. That move could help prevent false confessions, in keeping with one of the main goals of the National Action Plan, which is to “divert people living with mental illness and substance use disorders from the criminal justice system whenever possible.”

Kathy Unsworth, executive director of the CanFASD Research Network, leads the national organization that studies and advocates for fetal alcohol spectrum disorder awareness.

A system without support

Unfortunately, FASD is also underdiagnosed or misdiagnosed for several reasons, including both stigma around alcohol use and the profound lack of resources for diagnostic clinics. Experts at CanFASD suggest a conservative estimate is that one in 25 Canadians is on the FASD spectrum, a number that’s significantly more prevalent than other developmental disabilities. Despite this, several provinces don’t even have a single clinic. Sapers says he’d like to see screening at police contact, court contact, and corrections contact, so that, eventually, a smaller proportion of people with this disorder would go through the justice system at all. Especially since it’s tough for jails to be therapeutic and, as the John Howard Society argues, FASD and the criminal justice system are a poor fit.

“The behaviours that are often associated with FASD, such as not following instructions well, are behaviours that can be very problematic in a jail,” says Sapers. “I’ve dealt with individuals living with FASD in a jail that get a lot of institutional disciplinary charges because they refused to follow a direct instruction. Often, though, they’re not refusing. They are just having trouble processing it.”

People with FASD may also lose access to their community health-care providers when they enter the corrections system. In some provinces, including Ontario, health care is administered by correctional services. That can disrupt and derail treatment protocols and interventions.

“We can improve outcomes, and we can improve brain functioning for people with FASD the same way we can improve anyone’s brain health,” says Dr. Jacqueline Pei, a professor in the faculty of education at the University of Alberta. “But we’ve also learned that it’s not a one-size-fits-all solution, and we’re not going to find a magic pill or a clear recipe for interventions that work.”

Pei notes, though, that there has been one important ingredient involved in the recipes for interventions, namely, co-creation. People living with FASD need to play an active role in creating the therapeutic intervention. There are no top-down solutions with FASD. And, speaking in broad strokes, correctional institutions tend to be places with a lot of top-down policies.

To address that, the National Action Plan – scheduled for release in 2026 – aims to support the mental health of justice-involved individuals at all junctures of the criminal justice and forensic mental health systems, including the people who work in the system. Finally, it’s important that continuity of care and support is continued post-release. Sapers says studies have shown that one of the riskiest times for people who’ve been in contact with the law is the month following their release, and there should be programs preparing people for release from “day one.”

Chris Fillion, a FASD advocate, says progress is promising, but there is room for more education and systemic change to incorporate awareness into everyday practice.

Making strides

That brings us right back to the importance of community. Winnipeg’s Chris Fillion, an advocate with lived experience of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, says a lot of progress has been made towards making services FASD-informed in his city, but there’s still a long way to go.

“It does get frustrating for folks like me to go into hospitals or go into clinics or, say, people who are going to rehab, but when you get there, you find the people working there are not all FASD informed,” says Fillion. “It’s not woven into everyday practice.”

Fillion adds that people outside of the social service sector have a poor awareness of the basics around FASD, and, of course, stigma makes these problems much worse, since it discourages open dialogue.

Getting past stigma and rethinking supports for people living with FASD will involve a lot of heavy lifting. It starts with awareness, prevention, screening, and a recommitment to social services, says Melissa Dobson.

“I’m sure it costs far less to make sure that they have a house over their heads than to deal with encampments and homeless populations and criminal justice issues,” she says. “But I think if you could solve the world for a person who is severely impacted by FASD, you can solve the problems for the world,” Dobson adds. “It’s like building a ramp for the people who have an inability to climb stairs. I think it’s the same. If you could redesign classes, healthcare, and justice to fit those people, it would fit all the people.”

Further reading: Mental Health and Justice — A Call to Action.

Fact sheet: Common Mental Health Myths and Misconceptions.

Illustrator: Remie Geoffroi

The post From Diagnosis to Dignity: Rethinking Support for People with FASD appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

When Men Step Up

Ian Peralta — Thu, 27 Nov 2025 05:00:52 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

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The 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-based Violence is an annual international campaign that begins on November 25, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, and goes until December 10, Human Rights Day.

When Joshua Hopkins learned that his older sister and two other Renfrew County women were murdered in one of the worst incidents of intimate partner violence in Canada’s history, the news was too shocking for him to process.

As more information emerged in the aftermath of the September 2015 murders of Nathalie Warmerdam, Anastasia Kuzyk, and Carol Culleton—by a former partner to all three—Hopkins, despite his numbness, pain and disbelief, did have one crystal clear realization.

“It really should not have taken my sister’s murder for me to understand how misogyny and domestic violence affect the society that’s around us,” he says. “I think, often, when men hear the terms ‘domestic violence’ or ‘violence against women’, it sounds like a women’s issue, but it’s not.”

Gender-based violence (GBV) and intimate partner violence (IPV) are increasingly being seen in a new light, one that re-frames the violence as a systemic issue that we have a shared responsibility to prevent. And, in response, men are stepping up by establishing initiatives to address these issues and owning the crucial role they play in changing a culture that helps sanction gender-based violence.

“It’s so important for us, as men, to act as allies,” says Hopkins, an acclaimed opera baritone. “We have to stop putting blame on the victims and focus the lens on the abusers, which, statistically, are mostly men. We need to focus on why men are so angry.”

For his part, Hopkins worked with composer and pianist Jake Heggie and poet/author Margaret Atwood to create Songs for Murdered Sisters, a song cycle that underscores how these murders are part of a pattern of violence, not only individual tragedies. The song cycle has been performed live in multiple venues, including a sold-out performance at Carnegie Hall earlier this year. A Juno-nominated album version and a film version are also available through the initiative’s website.

Despite an increased number of organizations working to prevent gender-based violence, it’s still prevalent in Canada. According to Statistics Canada, more than two-thirds of solved homicides of women and girls between 2009 and 2022 were gender-related. The past decade has seen an increase in gender-related violence, and 2022 saw an unprecedented 184 Canadian women and girls murdered—mainly by men. Nova Scotia, British Columbia, New Brunswick, and more than 100 municipalities in Ontario have recently declared gender-based violence an epidemic.

Benefits for men

As with many forms of abuse, intersectional identities play a role. Indigenous women and girls, newcomers, racialized and marginalized women, 2SLGBTQI+, non-binary people, women with disabilities, and women in remote and rural communities have an elevated risk of experiencing GBV. Preventing violence against vulnerable populations is a matter of human rights and a fundamental component of building an inclusive society.

Leading the charge to address this public health crisis are a number of well-established Canadian projects and organizations including the Courage to Act Foundation and initiatives run by the Canadian Women’s Foundation, as well as an increasing number of initiatives led by men, including Men &, White Ribbon, and Next Gen Men, all of which emphasize the crucial role men have to play in preventing GBV. And some of the organizers say that participants are often surprised to learn that the work that goes into changing the culture of masculinity has plenty of benefits for men.

“Men’s mental health is an entry point for having a conversation about how we can challenge and break down the systems that are harming everyone,” says Next Gen Men’s Trevor Mayoh.

“Over one-third of men will not talk about mental health in the workplace because they feel like their job could be at risk,” he explains. “Men tend not to take proactive care of their health generally. Instead of going to a doctor when a problem starts, they’re more likely to hold out until it gets bad.”

Mayoh associates this inability to admit vulnerability—a key trait in what some call “classic masculinity”—with epidemic health problems that disproportionately impact men, including opioid overdoses, chronic loneliness, social isolation, and suicide deaths. Roughly 75 percent of people in Canada who die by suicide are men, according to research from the Mental Health Commission of Canada.

“We have this culture that absolutely does privilege men, albeit, looking at it through an intersectional lens, some men more than others,” says Mayoh. “That same culture is quite literally killing men too, though, so men have skin in the game and a key role to play in terms of dismantling the patriarchy.”

Messages about the patriarchy and privilege, he notes, aren’t always easy for men to accept when they’re struggling with pain, stress, and family crises. To encourage meaningful conversations about rethinking masculinity, organizers have found it’s often helpful to create men-only spaces where they can feel safe and comfortable with making mistakes and being “messy.”

Through Next Gen Men’s extensive work, the organization has found that the two primary things holding men back are a fear of getting things wrong and the fear of being cancelled. When they’re in a room with people who look and sound like them, it can feel safer.

“This shift has to happen on a peer-to-peer level,” says Mayoh. “It’s not going to come from driving down the street and seeing a billboard saying, ‘Don’t hit someone’; It’s going to actually come from when a friend in a locker room or in the car says, ‘Hey, that’s not funny.’”

Meaningful change

Men taking an active role in the prevention of gender-based violence, then, is essential. One notable instance of this is Rita St. Gelais, a licensed psychotherapist working with men in Alberta who have a history of abuse and are looking to change their behaviours.

“If you’re going to address domestic violence and try to end it, you need to go to the source, which is the people who are choosing violent behaviours,” says St. Gelais. “However important it is to work with people who experience domestic violence, we’re not going to end it that way.”

Most of the resources allocated to support people in violent relationships are, quite understandably, earmarked for people who have experienced violence. Getting serious about stopping a cycle of violence requires investing in the people who want to change, though.

“I think there’s a strong stereotype that these people are monsters consumed by rage at all times,” St. Gelais explains. “If you can see them as people and move past that initial gut reaction, meet them where they’re at and give them dignity and respect while maintaining dignity and respect for the people that they’ve hurt, then it’s possible to help people who want to change.”

It’s a big job, one that involves a lot of dark and heavy material. It can be so emotionally taxing, in fact, that it prompted her to found an initiative called Two Chairs, which aims to make it easier for therapists to get therapy. People working in this space need to prioritize self-care, but, as St. Gelais explains, sometimes those who preach the importance of caring for themselves don’t take their own best advice.

Despite the emotional toll, St. Gelais finds her work deeply fulfilling. It’s also deeply necessary. When the Renfrew County inquest into the triple murder committed finally concluded in 2022, several of the 86 recommendations for change involved therapeutic interventions for men with similar histories to Basil Borutski, the convicted murderer of three who died in prison in 2024.

“Basil was in and out of jail for various assaults within the course of his life, but it didn’t change his behaviour,” says Joshua Hopkins, noting that Borutski was ordered by the courts to enroll in an anger management program but skirted it.

Many advocates, folks at risk and families of victims have called for profound changes to the justice and carceral systems, noting that they lack resources to prevent gender-based violence. Some even question the carceral approach and advocate for early education programs, projects to change the culture of masculinity, and investing in mental health supports.

“This idea that we’re just throwing men into jail without some kind of rehabilitation or being able to teach them a better way of dealing with their anger and stress, isn’t going to bring change,” he continues. “Programs that deal with this issue and are able to make real change are vital.”

Further reading and resources: The Manosphere and Mental Health.

Author: Christine Sismondo writes about personal and public health and other contemporary social issues from her office in Toronto.

Illustrator: Kasia Niton – https://sunnystreet.studio/ Instagram: @sunnystreet.studio

The post When Men Step Up appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

Financial Advice for the Times We’re In

Ian Peralta — Thu, 13 Nov 2025 13:00:20 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

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Financial literacy in these times must encompass emotional awareness, in addition to budgeting skills. This type of education would allow people to consider the intersecting and overlapping factors that inform their decision-making and their futures. This is what the Money & Mental Health series aims to do – inform people about the connections between their wallets and their well-being. This year’s theme is focused on new literacies for new times. So far, we talked about:

o Week One: Consistently talking about inconsistency. Generational preoccupation and disillusionment.

o Week Two: Financial dystopia and distress. What happens when traditional milestones are out of reach and online temptations take people off track?

In this series closer, we delve into tactics for today, organized under ABCs, so that we can find a way to keep our financial anxieties to a minimum in this age of uncertainty.

A—Advice

Everybody’s probably run across at least one “money matters” story that leads with the hopeful notion that some goal, be it home ownership, retirement, or raising a family, isn’t as far out of reach as many people in Canada think. As we scan down the page for the magic advice, the heart starts to sink. It turns out that all our dreams can come true, but only if we happen to have enough spare money lying around to invest in financial products at a rate of about $150 per week.

For anyone struggling to make their minimum payments every month, advice like this doesn’t just miss the mark; it’s also likely to trigger fresh financial anxieties and possibly even a touch of despair. For that reason, it’s important to remember that, when it comes to money, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution, even if that TikTok reel you’re watching is promising easy answers for all people, whether their income is great or small.

A lot of financial advice also offers purely individualistic solutions and fails to mention the many factors that are beyond our control. Everything from where we live to who our parents are and when we were born has a massive impact on how much we’ll earn over a lifetime. It’s much harder for young people to buy a house or raise a family than it was for previous generations, largely due to a few compounding factors: an increasing income gap, more people in Canada engaged in precarious work, and an affordability crisis caused by the rising cost of living.

Given all this, it’s clear that not all financial advice is created equal and that some of the conventional wisdom about saving and budgeting simply doesn’t apply to everyone –– especially not to younger generations.

“If you compare your situation to your parents, you might feel like a failure. It’s just different – that is the difficult part,” says Jessica Moorhouse, whose popular “More Money Podcast” has made her Canada’s “go-to money expert.”

Hustle culture

There are unique challenges facing every generation, but finding a job is high on the list of problems younger adults have today. Currently, youth unemployment is hovering around the rates seen in periods of severe economic crisis, such as the recession after the stock market crash in 2008.

The most recent figures (from July 2025) indicate that the youth unemployment rate (15 to 24 years old) was 12.6 percent, the highest rate since 2010, excluding the first years of the pandemic. That number is based on people who are currently seeking work, as opposed to engaged full-time in a post-secondary program or unable to work for other reasons.

The youth employment rate tells another story, namely that the percentage of younger adults who are actively working has tumbled to less than 54 percent — the lowest level since the late 1990s, when members of Generation X were trying to find a way to get a foot in the door.

There are likely a number of factors in play, notably economic uncertainty related to the imposition of tariffs on some Canadian exports and, in addition, a slowdown in hirings for entry-level jobs that’s the result of speculation that AI (artificial intelligence) may be able to replace some junior positions. Given all this, it’s hardly surprising that some younger adults have begun to feel that developmental milestones, such as home ownership, starting a family, or retirement, are unattainable.

“Gen Z tends to cope with humour and bravado,” says Serena Dawson, a 19-year-old who lives in Ontario and is currently taking a gap year (name changed to protect anonymity). “We are living in a ‘hustle culture’ where a lack of work-life balance is praised. Hashtags about ‘grinding’ are trending, and influencers make videos about their 5 AM to 12 AM workdays, spanning multiple jobs. Other common slang includes ‘hustle,’ ‘grind,’ and ‘get that bread.’”

Dawson continues: “Since so many people are struggling financially, the relatability of these online accounts and the ‘motivational’ conversations about our work ethic help us feel less alone in our anxiety, depression, and lack of sleep.”

The antidote to all of this, she says, is to work on creating community and finding ways to share the experiences and anxieties that come from working 17-hour days and still somehow struggling to pay the rent.

Jessica Moorhouse suggests being candid about the systemic problems that are making it hard for younger folks to make ends meet, but, at the same time, sharing positive things that can give you hope.

“You have to find the silver linings for yourself,” says Moorhouse. “It’s important to try to find something to give you the drive to pursue and improve your financial situation, despite what the world is telling you, and carve your own path. What’s the alternative, giving up?”

B—Boring

Sure, that friend building a social media empire might appear to have discovered a really exciting and glamorous way to get rich overnight, but, in reality, the best paths to financial security often sound pretty dull. That’s why Moorhouse espouses the “get rich slowly” approach.

“Keep it boring, keep it simple,” she says. “That will keep you grounded and keep you on your path. Let me tell you, I’ve talked to a number of people over the years who went to some extremes to achieve FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early), only to realize when they finally reached that milestone, they still weren’t happy.”

Moorhouse says that going all-in on becoming a millionaire by the age of 30 might sound great, but it has serious limitations, since it might keep people from pursuing other important things, such as education and/or creating close connections with friends, family, and members of the community. So, instead, work on the basics.

“Make a plan, start investing early, look for low fees,” Moorhouse advises. “Start small, set up that foundation and be consistent – that’s the thing.”

Low fees might sound like a particularly boring topic (even for financial advice), but it’s a crucial and often overlooked aspect of growing a nest egg. Since the fees appear negligible, people overlook factors like the MER (management expense ratio), not realizing that some funds sold through a range of financial institutions have fees high enough to drain any potential for growth. Beat the Bank: The Canadian Guide to Simply Successful Investing, by former banker Larry Bates, provides a thorough overview of the issue, along with tips on finding alternatives.

Although some evidence suggests Gen Z is investing at a younger age than previous generations, any gains made from early investment could be easily undone by buying products that don’t deliver decent dividends. At its core, this is an equity issue, since, statistically, wealthier people get better returns on their investments and, on the flip side, pay lower interest rates. Although this disparity generator is built into the current personal finance system and is hard to avoid, basic financial literacy should be an essential starting point for everyone, so they can grasp just how much money is at stake with high interest rates and fees.

“Financial education isn’t something one receives in public school, but learning about the basics of investment through free resources can open your eyes to many opportunities,” says Serena Dawson. “I know a few people in my generation who invest a small amount of money each month – from $50 to $100, whatever they can spare – and it provides some growth for them.”

One final dull way to beat financial anxieties is to open a “boring business.” Whether it’s a side hustle or a career for life, running a landscaping business, house-cleaning service, or snow-removal company can provide a steady income. None of these services are likely to be automated and replaced by AI anytime soon, either, so it’s a good bet for the future.

C—Carve Your Own Path, Care, Community, Communicate

A recent uptick in interest in boring businesses, as well as Gen Z’s side-hustle culture, might well be the first rumblings of a future boom in entrepreneurship in Canada.

Historically, people who have been locked out of the traditional job market (usually due to discriminatory practices based on gender, ethnicity, disability, sexual identity, or age) have turned to entrepreneurship. Serena Dawson says that one answer to problems in the job market is to redefine work-life.

“Alternative forms of work are very popular with Gen Z,” says Dawson. “Even pursuing a side hustle based on an interest is a way of incorporating joy into work life and makes non-stop work a little more bearable.”

We may also see more people redefining home life, as fewer younger adults can afford to live on their own, even with the recent cooling of the housing market, which has finally seen rental units come down in price.

A recent Maclean’s article, “Why Gen Z Will Never Leave the Nest,” explored the phenomenon of folks staying with their parents and noted that the intriguing thing is that many don’t seem to frame it as a “failure” to launch. Instead, people are celebrating the social support dividends that can come from intergenerational living – as well, of course, as the fact that everyone saves money.

Gen Z has proven frugal in other ways, too. Second-hand shopping and thrifting may look like a quirky trend, but it’s rooted in a move away from spending too much money on environmentally unsustainable products, such as fast furniture that has dominated living rooms and, later, landfills for decades.

All of this, in a way, is about self-care. We may think of self-care as spa days or retail therapy, but the deepest level of self-care is really about making some effort to look after Future You. And it’s a big part of the answer for younger adults who may be worried about AI, trade wars, the rising cost of living, and a bleak job market.

“Practice self-care religiously and unapologetically,” says Serena Dawson. “With limited time to rest, the unaffordable prices of housing, food, and entertainment, it’s hard to take care of ourselves these days.”

Dawson continues: “We’re all under extreme stress, and without government action and legislation created for the common person, we won’t be able to change that reality. So, it’s especially important to care for oneself and each other and to find ways to de-stress.

“Lean on your support system and share a meal with a neighbour; talk to your friends openly and honestly; turn to your faith for guidance. And for the love of all things holy, nourish your body! In a world that divides and isolates us, the most important thing we can do is to care for ourselves and to build community.”

Resource:

Author: Christine Sismondo contributes to the national conversation on policy and ideas as a writer and researcher.

The post Financial Advice for the Times We’re In appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

Let’s Get Visible

Ian Peralta — Tue, 26 Aug 2025 04:00:47 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

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Older adults are more likely to suffer from social isolation and loneliness is increasingly being recognized as being bad for our health. The good news is that mattering and belonging can flip the script. Our series explores these and other related concepts.

Some get frustrated by the feeling of “invisibility” that many older adults experience. Others, though, consider it their super-power.

“The feeling of being invisible comes up in the hit show Matlock, with Kathy Bates, where she says that, as women get older, they ‘become damn near invisible’,” says Dr. Gordon Flett, Honorary President of the Canadian Psychological Association 2024-2025 and former York University Canada Research Chair. “And then she goes on to say that she can use that to her advantage because people don’t see her coming.”

Not everyone is able to find a silver lining in the cloud of invisibility, probably because “feeling seen” is an important part of feeling like you matter to the world around you. And “mattering” is important to our well-being, according to Flett’s research, which has shown that feeling like you matter is associated with resiliency. Conversely, “anti-mattering” is connected to stigma, discrimination, psychological distress, depression, and loneliness. “Feeling invisible to others is at the heart of anti-mattering,” says Flett.

Although some older men complain that they feel invisible on occasion, the phenomenon is so widely felt for women over 50 that it’s been dubbed the “Invisible Woman Syndrome.” What this suggests is that stigma for older adults isn’t only a matter of age. We also experience age stigma in relation to our intersectional identities—class, ethnicity, gender, religious beliefs, and other identity markers.

Kathy Bates stars as the brilliant septuagenarian Madeline Matlock in drama series, MATLOCK, inspired by the classic television series of the same name. Madeline achieved success in her younger years and decides to rejoin the work force at a prestigious law firm, where she uses her unassuming demeanor and wily tactics to win cases and expose corruption from within. Photo: Brooke Palmer/CBS via Getty Images.

Who turned on the cloaking device?

For this reason, Dr. Susan Braedley, Professor at Carleton University’s School of Social Work, says that, after fifteen years of studying long-term care and age-friendly communities in national and international research projects, one of her teams’ key findings is that inclusivity must guide the planning and designing for care homes, retirement communities, and programming for older adults.

“We’ve seen a lot of promising practices,” says Dr. Braedley. “And then we’ve seen some things to avoid, things that caused great distress to older adults.”

For example, she recalls a day program designed for people with mild cognitive impairment in a Canadian community where many residents’ first language was Mandarin. Personal support workers didn’t speak Mandarin, and the activities all assumed that participants were familiar with mainstream Canadian customs and holidays.

“If you think you’re supposed to know the answers but don’t, it can be really confusing, because you start to think your memory is worse than it is,” Dr. Braedley explains. “The program produced a lot of anxiety. It was supposed to reduce social isolation for people living with dementia and, actually, I think it was having the opposite effect. Cut-and-paste programs don’t work.”

It’s not all bad news, though. In the course of her research, Dr. Braedley observed scores of programs that were culturally appropriate, community-based, and well-designed for the actual participants. And, in those spaces, Dr. Braedley witnessed and, herself, felt, a lot of joy. One of her many favourites was a program offered at the 519, a non-profit agency in Toronto that serves 2SLGBTQI+ communities. This program matched younger volunteers from the community with older adults experiencing loneliness.

“The older people had amazing experiences, sometimes just by having someone to help them negotiate the city when they were feeling uncertain about being out on their own,” she says. “But what was so interesting is that many of the younger people were working remotely and were saying, ‘We’re lonely, too. We’re isolated’.”

Eddy Elmer, a Vancouver gerontologist and research consultant specializing in aging and mental health, says that older people from 2SLGBTQI+ communities are far more likely to be socially isolated and lonely.

“Some of it’s just because it’s a smaller population base, so it’s harder to meet people or find a partner,” says Elmer. “LGBT people over the age of 70 also grew up at a time when being gay was highly stigmatized. It was illegal, it was criminalized, and it was pathologized, so they’re more afraid of being rejected and discriminated against.”

Elmer fears that we’re taking steps backwards now, with changes in our online climate, and a general rise in anti-2SLGBTQI+ sentiment. As such, he warns that risks are on the rise, particularly for transgender older adults.

The mysterious case of the vanishing older adult

Older people experiencing income insecurity, homelessness, incarceration, or pre-existing depression all tend to be more vulnerable, as are older men who have recently experienced a life transition, such as retirement. Some attribute this to the fact that, broadly speaking, women have larger social networks. When men stop working, by contrast, many lose their most important social space.

For many, though, it’s also about a shift in self-perception and a loss of identity.

“People are saying to me, ‘I was a high school principal, or a professor, or a lawyer and I had all these different roles and identities’,” says Dr. Raza Mirza, Director, National Partnerships for HelpAge Canada. “And then they retire, and their perception is that ‘Now all I’m seen as is as an older person and we’re all kind of lumped into this one big group. That’s my identity now’.”

One of Mirza’s many research projects aimed at helping older adults is a study with Men’s Sheds Canada of called “Men’s Sheds,” a program designed to help people establish new roles as mentors in society and connect and engage with other men of all ages.

“The idea is to empower older men,” he says. “It’s also about health promotion, though, because they can talk to one another through life transitions, share resources and share information that impacts the mental and physical well-being of older men.”

That could have a serious impact given that, simple preventative measures and screening can make a big difference when it comes to the social, mental, and physical health of older adults. Hearing aids and eyeglasses, for example, are a low-intervention way to reduce social isolation and improve well-being.

“Sensory loss is very important because many older adults have hearing or vision problems,” says Dr. Fereshteh Mehrabi, post-doctoral research fellow in Concordia University’s department of psychology. “Dramatic hearing loss is much more prevalent among men than women and, often, they choose not to even try to communicate of socialize at all because it seems like too much of a bother, which can contribute to frailty over time, as reduced communication and social engagement may lead to physical decline and isolation.”

Seen, heard, and invited to the party

There’s some debate about why older men experience hearing loss, but there’s little doubt as to why many older men don’t want to use a hearing aid, namely, because that’s associated with older people. In other words, people often choose to withdraw from the world rather than deal with age stigma. (Incidentally, the new generation of hearing aids are far more discreet, and the tech allows users to do neat things like tune out ambient noise to focus on the person speaking, which, if you think about it, sounds like a good superpower to have).

Older women aren’t immune to hearing problems, but, by the numbers, Mehrabi says that, for women, screening for and preventing frailty should be the top priority. Women are far more likely to experience frailty than men and her recent study, published in Age and Ageing found that, over a long-term period, frailty leads to social isolation and loneliness, perhaps for the simple reason that it’s harder to go out and join in social and physical activities. It doesn’t help that, even though women’s fitness is a massive growth industry, there are plenty of cultural and systemic barriers keeping older women from building muscle with good diets and resistance exercises.

“The perfect neoliberal older person has enough money to last them the rest of their life and is using their Fitbit to keep them active and healthy,” says Dr. Braedley. “The idea is that we have so much control and we can keep ourselves healthy if we eat right and do all the good things. Which is ridiculous because we all die.”

“Many, many people, and disproportionately women, don’t fall into that model of the perfect, self-reliant, older person,” she adds. “So, I think it’s about that. I think it’s about classism, sexism, racism, and ableism all combined.”

Back to those invisible women, it’s important to note that it can feel like a superpower for some, but it’s damaging to others. “The older person who feels invisible and comes from a marginalized background will not see being invisible as having any sort of benefit,” says Flett. “For folks experiencing co-occurring injustice, inequity and invisibility, that’s a very painful combination.”

That makes it everyone’s responsibility to find a way to make people secure in the knowledge that they matter—no matter what their age.

Further reading: Mental Health for Older Adults: 5 Practical Ways to Boost your Mood.

Resource: Shoulder to Shoulder: Experiences in Men’s Suicide Prevention.

Author: Christine Sismondo is a Toronto writer who hopes to one day live with friends in a communal living project modelled after The Golden Girls. We still need a cheerful character like Rose Nyland to join the collective and entertain us with her stories. And, it almost doesn’t need saying, but Kathy Bates is always welcome!

The post Let’s Get Visible appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

We Have to Talk About Ageism

Ian Peralta — Tue, 12 Aug 2025 04:00:59 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

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Older adults are more likely to suffer from social isolation. Loneliness is increasingly being recognized as being bad for our health. The good news is that mattering and belonging can flip the script. Our series explores these and other related concepts.

“I think I was 50 the first time a younger person in the office asked me when I was going to retire,” recalls Pamela, a 62-year-old government employee who lives in Edmonton. “He said it was high time people like me got out of the way to make room for people like him.”

Pamela, a pseudonym to protect her identity, has worked for the same department since the mid-1990s. She’s qualified, knows all the ins and outs and, according to her, actually trained her last two bosses for roles she applied for. She never even got an interview. She recently filed a workplace discrimination complaint against her employer, because she believes she’s the victim of ageism.

“Being constantly passed over for promotions is frustrating,” says Pamela. “Worse than that, though, is being made to feel like you’re a burden.”

Dr. Alison Chasteen, a social psychologist at the University of Toronto.

Pamela isn’t alone. A recent Employment and Social Development Canada survey found that almost half of respondents 55 or older felt they had experienced ageism, a form of discrimination that the World Health Organization says is one of the “most socially normalized.” Not only is age stigma prevalent, but it can also damage older adults’ abilities, says Dr. Alison Chasteen, a social psychologist at the University of Toronto.

“If you activate negative stereotypes in older peoples’ minds, that can elevate a cardiovascular stress response that can also affect memory function, so they don’t do as well on, say, a free recall test where you have to recall a list of items,” says Dr. Chasteen, noting that it’s also been shown to impact motor function.

Fixed mindsets

Internalizing negative stereotypes to the point that they feel like they define our characters isn’t unique to older adults experiencing ageism. Self-stigmatization is a common phenomenon that runs across all forms of stigma but, when it comes to ageism, there’s another layer, because older adults may, themselves, have held negative ideas about ageing when they were younger.

Given how pervasive and complicated age stigma is, an essential first step in tackling it is to stop using terms that carry negative connotations, such as “the aged,” “old-old,” “senior citizens” and “the elderly.” These imply a fixed identity and/or evoke images of frailty. By contrast, the term “older adult” reminds us that age is relative and ever-changing.

“Really what we’re talking about here is ageism,” says Katie Ellis, Program Manager at the Mental Health Commission of Canada, who recently led a research project on mental health and older adults in Canada. “Using language with negative associations really does have a negative impact on quality of life, because stigma can stop people from thinking they can get better access to care or participate in certain activities.”

Stigma and social exclusion go hand in hand. Pamela says that, even though she’s resisting the push for her to quietly retire from her life-long career, she’s often left out of after-work gatherings and finds that holiday parties can be awkward because she’s not in the cool kid crowd. She’s lucky to have good friends outside of work, but it’s easy to see why age stigma is closely associated with mood disorders, diminished well-being, and feeling less inclined to seek medical treatment, as well as loneliness and social isolation.

Mental Health Commission of Canada program manager Katie Ellis led a research project on older adults and mental health. Stigma can lead to a negative impact on quality of life.

Mattering and belonging – what’s the difference?

“I think the big thing with discrimination and prejudice and stigma is that you’re no longer seen as a unique person with valued attributes,” says Gordon Flett, Honorary President of the Canadian Psychological Association 2024-2025 and former York University Canada Research Chair. “A key element of ‘mattering’ is just being seen as an individual with valued attributes and, instead, you’re seen according to a prescribed box that you’re put into, and you feel unvalued or devalued.”

“Mattering” shares a lot of space with the idea of “belonging” but takes it a step further. It’s possible to belong to a club but still feel unimportant. Mattering means that people value your contributions and, simply enough, you matter. That sense of purpose and meaning seems to offer protective qualities, since it’s correlated with resilience and better health outcomes. Anti-mattering, on the other hand, is closely associated with discrimination and stigma.

“Anti-mattering is so destructive because it means treating people like they’re insignificant or invisible or unseen, unheard and unvalued,” Flett explains.

It’s hard to get people to see beyond stereotypes if you rarely, if ever, interact with people outside of your generation, though. Few Canadians do, since “age bubbles” define a lot of peoples’ social lives. As ageist as some workplaces may be, it’s not uncommon for people from different generations to work on projects together on the job site. By contrast, many social spaces are often tightly age-segregated in ways we don’t always even notice.

“I went to a wedding with my sister and my mother recently and we expected to spend the evening together,” says Dr. Raza Mirza, Director, National Partnerships for HelpAge Canada. “But my mother was sat at a table with older adults, and I was sat at a table with younger people who I didn’t have anything in common with. I would have far preferred to sit with my mother.”

The assumption that older adults only want to talk to people their own age is particularly striking to Mirza, whose career is focused on fighting age segregation through intergenerational projects. Although many are in their infancy, there are a lot of pretty cool projects aimed at getting people out of their age bubbles.

In Alberta, the Canadian Alliance for Intergenerational Living launched a pilot project last year that placed students looking for affordable housing into retirement communities in exchange for leading classes in, say, art, scholarship, or fitness.

St. Lawrence, a school in Champlain, Quebec, arranges intergenerational living situations by offering students two meals a day and free lodging in a residence for older adults in exchange for 10 hours of volunteer work in the home per week.

Vancouver’s Volunteer Grandparents has a “Family Match” program that sees older adults sign up to help mentor kids whose biological grandparents can’t play active roles in their lives. Ontario resident Heather Walker wanted to take part in the program but was too far away, so they made her a pen pal to a 15-year-old.

“She seemed like a younger me,” says Walker, who will celebrate her 70th birthday this summer. “Her passions were writing, and social justice and I had so many questions, my letter back was five pages long.”

Now she has a new role as a pen pal with an entire class in an elementary school. She helps them with things like sentence structure and sends them Valentine’s Day cards and other special treats.

Burst your bubble

One of the better-known age bubble-bursting projects is Raza Mirza’s “Intergenerational Classroom,” an initiative that sees a third-year University of Toronto Ageing and Health class pop up in a common room at Christie Gardens, a Toronto retirement community and long-term care home. Students and residents take the class together for the entire semester.

“It’s been highly, highly successful, because we facilitated a platform where people can feel valued,” says Mirza. “We keep hearing that people felt they had a role, felt that their contributions were meaningful, and felt a sense of belonging. But there was also reciprocity, so it wasn’t this older person who was just the recipient of information or sharing information. There was this back-and-forth exchange.”

Nobody gets stuck in the corner at the kids’ table, either. Everyone has a chance to break out of their age bubble and get to be seen as a unique person. It’s a fabulous model showing a path forward for us to fight against stigma, negative stereotypes, and anti-mattering. And, in fact, it might even help people re-define what “being old” means.

“We’ll start the class by asking the students, ‘At what age do you think a person is old?’,” says Mirza. “People say things like 40 or 50 or 60. Then, after being in the class and listening to older adults for 12 weeks we ask them the question again. They say things like, ‘I’m not sure’ or ‘I think old is a perception or a feeling.’ They focus on the similarities they have and the things that they have in common,” he adds. “They don’t focus on the age difference anymore.”

Resource: A free course on dismantling structural stigma in health care aims for meaningful change for people experiencing mental health and substance use issues.

Author: Christine Sismondo is a Toronto writer who hopes to one day live with friends in a communal living project modelled after The Golden Girls. In a perfect world, there’d be someone like Sophia in residence, because intergen living is the best.

The post We Have to Talk About Ageism appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

A Cure for Loneliness?

Ian Peralta — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 04:00:05 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

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When Pat Flude was experiencing painful side effects during her breast cancer treatment, a doctor from the pain clinic at Toronto’s Princess Margaret Hospital (PMH) gave her a “social prescription” for a mindfulness-based cognitive behavioural therapy class.

“I went every week for about three months,” says Flude, a 78-year-old retired teacher and cancer survivor. “The psychiatrist who led the program, Dr. Mary Elliott, was marvelous. It was so excellent; I even did a follow-up class in loving kindness.”

Since everyone in the class was also being treated for cancer, there was a real sense of community. Flude says she looked forward to the reunions that took place at quarterly graduate sessions. “For me, at that time,” she recalls, “it was really life’s blood.”

Although not every hospital is as proactive as PMH at offering prescriptions for things other than drugs, the “social prescribing” movement is growing by leaps and bounds. The guiding principle is to address the social determinants of health – non-medical factors that influence health outcomes – that are often neglected in medical settings. To fill that gap, primary health care providers refer a patient to a senior resource coordinator who steps in to “prescribe” wellness opportunities (specifically chosen classes or outings based on interest) often for older adults who have higher rates of being at-risk for loneliness and/or social isolation.

From isolation to inclusion

“The big one is social connection,” says Connie Newman, executive director of the Manitoba Association of Senior Communities. “We’ve got some older adults who haven’t been out of their apartments for too long. With a social prescription, we can connect them to one of Manitoba’s many older adult groups.

“Some might be at the local legion; in other communities, it could be the local senor centre,” Newman explains. “Wherever it is, the clients sometimes need a little support to join.”

Connie Newman, executive director of the Manitoba Association of Senior Communities: Social prescribing can open the door to connecting older adults to others in their communities.

Although research associating social isolation and loneliness with negative health outcomes began, in earnest, a little more than 40 years ago, programs to prevent or reverse these conditions and foster a feeling of belonging are relatively new. Spurred, in part, by the pandemic, which raised awareness of negative mental health effects associated with isolation, “social health” (well-being as an outgrowth of social connection), has become a hot topic lately. Japan and the United Kingdom both have ministries devoted to addressing loneliness, which some consider an epidemic, especially among older adults.

Here in Canada, the Canadian Coalition for Seniors’ Mental Health has recently launched the world’s first clinical guidelines for addressing social isolation and loneliness. Since older adults experiencing isolation often see health and social service professionals, clinicians are key people for identifying at-risk patients, so it’s very important to get them on board.

“Although there’s been a huge amount of research in the area focused on associated health risks there has been relatively little written from the perspective of how to actually help people,” says Dr. David Conn, a geriatric psychiatrist who works at Baycrest Health Sciences and the University of Toronto.

The guidelines, which are making their way into healthcare and community settings, are designed to help clinicians screen for loneliness and isolation, assess the problem and its causes and make helpful recommendations. In some cases, a social prescription might transform the quality of life of a person experiencing isolation but, for those with chronic loneliness, recovering from those feelings is often much more complicated. Neuroscientists have even suggested that loneliness can re-shape the brain in ways that make social contact less rewarding, thereby making it harder—but not impossible—to “cure” loneliness. A meta-analysis of research found that a range of therapies including animal therapy, exercise, and cognitive behavioural therapy were associated with reduced feelings of loneliness in older adults.

The power of place in fostering connection

That’s a nugget of good news but, as we should all know at this point, prevention is, by far, the best intervention. Some researchers advocate for social prescriptions for people of all generations, as well as working to remove health equity barriers, so that we have a population that’s in good health as it moves into middle age. As Dr. Conn points out, problems with depression, hearing, vision, mobility, and chronic pain can impact our capacity for socializing and staying active.

Providing an environment for people to stay fit and connected to the community goes far beyond healthcare and even public health, since it involves reimagining a range of public spaces, some of which we take for granted. Over the past 20 or more years, we’ve heard a lot about the “third place”—spaces like barber shops, cafés, and shopping malls that are neither work nor home but can foster community and a sense of belonging. The next frontier may well be “fourth place”—streets, squares, bus stops—which, if well-designed, can help promote social health and cohesion. That can only work if they’re truly accessible, however.

“The design is often good in a privileged neighbourhood,” says Julie Karmann, PhD candidate at the University of Montreal’s School of Public Health. “But if you go into a more deprived neighbourhood, you can see that the street is no longer that accessible and not that pleasant for walking.”

Karmann’s work is based in the idea that the simple act of walking can help social health, of which connectedness is an important component. Even relatively well-designed fourth places, though, often miss the mark when it comes to being truly age-friendly.

“Basic improvements like more accessible and affordable transit, safer intersections, and well-maintained sidewalks are essential,” says Eddy Elmer, a Vancouver gerontologist and research consultant specializing in aging and mental health. “People don’t want to go outside if the streets are dark or feel unsafe, regardless of age, but this is especially true for older adults who worry about slipping, falling, or other hazards.”

Maintenance, regular snow and ice clearing, as well as accommodations for persons with disabilities should seem like a bare minimum, but austerity measures in various municipalities have often led to worsening conditions. While we wait for political change, social health programs such as prescriptions can help, especially the ones that move beyond the individual and involve the community.

More walks, more smiles

“One of my favourite programs is from the Netherlands, which has a whole strategy and campaign against loneliness,” says Conn. “One of the programs is an app that connects older people who don’t have a pet with a younger person who has a dog but doesn’t have enough time to walk the dog because they’re out working all day long. It has many benefits for all involved including the dogs!”

Burnaby B.C.’s “Say Hello” campaign is arguably even more effortless. Initiated in 2020 by local physicians worried about pandemic-induced social isolation and loneliness, the project encouraged folks to be a little friendlier to the people they passed on the street.

“It’s super simple, but yet requires a whole paradigm shift, because it has nothing to do with a physician or a clinic,” says Karmann. “Just implementing the norms of greeting in the neighbourhood or smiling to the person you meet in the street can make a huge difference with your sense of belonging.”

Karmann says it’s a tiny gesture that can have a big impact on the population, not just the individual.

“It’s just knowing the people around you,” she adds. “It can be as easy as asking, ‘How are you doing?’.

Further reading: Mental Health for Older Adults: 5 Practical Ways to Boost your Mood.

Resource: Transforming Health Care, Social Care, and Community Landscapes to Optimize the Mental Health of Older Adults in Canada.

Author: Christine Sismondo is a Toronto writer who hopes to one day live with friends in a communal living project modelled after The Golden Girls. She’s not sure she’s met her Blanche yet, but hopes to soon, since someone’s got to keep things spicy. And pay the bills.

The post A Cure for Loneliness? appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

From Isolation to Purpose

Ian Peralta — Tue, 08 Jul 2025 04:00:18 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

In the summer of 2023, Vancouver Island resident Linda Fedun was feeling pretty lonely, even though social distancing measures had been lifted the year before.

“The pandemic started it, but it was when my back pain became serious that things got really bad for me,” says the 63-year-old retired daycare worker. “I couldn’t really go out. I’d be out for half an hour and then I’d have to go home in tears.

“Social isolation is hard,” she adds. “Especially since it’s just me and my two cats.”

Many older adults in Canada can relate. It’s hard to pin down exact numbers, but Statistics Canada has estimated about 30 percent of older adults are at risk of experiencing social isolation and, in 2019 and 2020, almost one in five reported feeling loneliness.

Social isolation is defined as having both a low quantity and quality of contact with others. It’s marked by an absence of mutually rewarding relationships and can lead to poor health, loneliness, emotional distress, and other negative health outcomes.

For some, that feeling is chronic. For Fedun, things improved after the doctors figured out a treatment plan for her osteoarthritis last October and she could finally reconnect with her community and get back to things like taking regular walks. One of these took her by an encampment she hadn’t even realized existed, even though it was only a few blocks from her home. There, she recognized an old acquaintance who told her she and her partner had been unhoused for months.

“I went right home and started looking for what I could spare,” says Fedun. “And then I realized it’s more than that. They needed much, much more than that.”

Fedun started asking for help from neighbours through her Nextdoor app, a social networking site that helps people connect with local folks for potlucks, buy-and-sell, and other exchanges. Members of her community responded enthusiastically with food, warm clothing, and propane for a Coleman stove. She organized pick-ups and drop-offs and connected with an advocate for the unhoused who gave her a “crash course” on housing insecurity. The pair launched a Go Fund Me campaign to help their unhoused friends get an apartment.

Social isolation is a thing of the past for Fedun and, perhaps unsurprisingly, so is loneliness. “I have a sense of purpose now,” she says.

For many, though, the answer isn’t as simple as getting back out, largely because social isolation and loneliness are two different things.

Social isolation and loneliness—what’s the difference?

“Social isolation is objective, such as the number of people in your life and how often you interact with them,” says Eddy Elmer, a Vancouver gerontologist and research consultant specializing in aging and mental health. “Loneliness, on the other hand, is more subjective. It’s the feeling that there’s a mismatch between the relationships you want and those you actually have, whether in terms of quantity or, especially, quality.

“One person can be fairly isolated but not feel lonely, whereas another can have a large social network, but feel quite lonely,” Elmer continues. “It all depends on their unique social needs and expectations.”

Since they’re two distinct problems, they require completely different approaches. And, generally speaking, it’s easier to reverse problems associated with social isolation than it is to help people overcome chronic feelings of loneliness.

“It’s probably normal to have some degree of loneliness from time to time,” says Dr. David Conn, a geriatric psychiatrist who works at Baycrest Health Sciences and the University of Toronto. “But for people who feel intense, chronic loneliness, the origins of that are often rooted in early life relationships and how they feel about people in general.”

Despite not being interchangeable, both social isolation and loneliness are associated with a range of negative health outcomes. In older adults, social isolation is correlated with frailty, cognitive decline, and depression, as well as increased chances of a premature death.

“The key word here is ‘correlated’ because establishing causation is not straightforward,” says Elmer. “But studies find that both loneliness and social isolation are associated with increased inflammation, weakened immune function, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and poorer sleep quality.”

That last symptom may be an important piece of the puzzle. According to the evolutionary theory of loneliness, poor sleep is part of a “hyper-vigilant” state triggered by social disconnection. In a nutshell, for early humans who lived in smaller hunter-gatherer tribes and had to work together closely for survival, being alone was dangerous. Loneliness is an unpleasant emotional response that might be an adaptive mechanism, since the pain of being alone can serve as a biological signal to restore social relationships and get back to safety.

Vancouver gerontologist Eddy Elmer: You can be isolated and not lonely; you can also have a wide social circle and still feel lonely. It all depends on one’s needs and expectations.

Mattering is good for the grey matter

Even though way fewer sabre-toothed predators are prowling around these days, being a member of a clan is still the safer and healthier choice for most people. A recent study from Carleton University found that higher belongingness is connected to better health outcomes for people of all ages—but particularly for older adults.

“What we found was that older individuals who felt they belonged to their neighbourhood were about six or seven percent healthier than people who didn’t,” says Mehdi Ammi, Associate Professor at Carleton’s School of Public Policy and Administration. “Belonging reduced most chronic conditions and was preventative in arthritis and anything connected to chronic stress.”

Social psychology proposes that high levels of belonging can help chronic stress, so it may offer a protective benefit to folks who feel like they have a place at the table. Though some positive psychologists say that while belonging is a good start, an even stronger protective benefit can be seen in people who feel like they matter.

“Belonging is fitting in and having a place,” explains Gordon Flett, Honorary President of the Canadian Psychological Association 2024-2025 and former York University Canada Research Chair. “Mattering is feeling a sense of significance and value within that place. For example, a person could be part of a community, but still feel they’re not being taken seriously.”

The correlation between loneliness and the feeling of not mattering is very robust, he says. “The research about loneliness and the elderly show that there are just too many people who don’t have any meaningful engagement of a prolonged nature with the people who matter to them,” Flett continues. “And they’re left to feel lonely. And when people feel alone and insignificant at the same time, we call that ‘double jeopardy’.”

Conversely, mattering is thought to provide a buffer of sorts that protects individuals from significant stress, whether it’s caused by loneliness, caregiving, loss of independence, and even financial issues.

“The bottom line is that knowing people value and care about you is very comforting,” says Flett. “And I think it also means that you’ll be more likely to ask people for help when you need it.”

It can be difficult for older adults to feel valued and have a sense of meaning, especially in North America, where the culture valorizes youth, fails to provide age-inclusive spaces or age-friendly cities, and views health as an individual responsibility as opposed to a collective one. All these things are factors in widespread loneliness amongst Canada’s older adult population.

While we wait for societal changes, many older adults who have the ability are finding ways of aging in community and generating mattering experiences for themselves. For some, that might be grandparenting. For others, it might be volunteering to help other older adults.

“My wife’s uncle Derek, who almost made it to 100 and lived by himself his whole life in Fort Qu’Appelle, Saskatchewan, was well-known for his volunteer work,” Flett offers. “He delivered Meals on Wheels to people younger than him into his 90s because he was in great shape.

“I once asked him if he ever felt lonely and he cut me off. He said, ‘Not for a second. Because I know there’s people out there who care. And I can get to them, and they can get to me’.”

Further reading: Home Alone: Aging without support is becoming more prevalent for older people in Canada. How can we stem the tide?

Resource: Transforming Health Care, Social Care, and Community Landscapes to Optimize the Mental Health of Older Adults in Canada.

Author: Christine Sismondo is a Toronto writer who hopes to one day live with friends in a communal living project modelled after The Golden Girls. Since it was her idea, she gets to be Dorothy.

The post From Isolation to Purpose appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

Breaking Barriers

Ian Peralta — Thu, 03 Apr 2025 15:32:59 +0000

By Christine Sismondo

One year after the Mental Health Commission of Canada (MHCC) was created in 2007, the non-profit established its Youth Council, a program designed to engage younger adults (18 to 30) in the MHCC’s mission to improve the country’s mental healthcare system. At the time, the Youth Council program was ground-breaking in that it signalled a move towards involving people with different perspectives and lived experience in the project of changing attitudes about mental well-being and removing barriers to accessing mental healthcare treatment.

The MHCC’s Youth Council is, at its core, an advocacy group working to amplify the voices of younger people. It’s run by folks with a commitment to positive change and helmed by Em Alexander and Colbi Mike, the council’s current co-chairs.

Colbi Mike, a young Indigenous mother, documentary filmmaker and law student from the Treaty 6 Territory in central Saskatchewan, is focused on, among other things, dismantling barriers to maternal mental health and the effects of oppression on Indigenous peoples.

Em Alexander, a queer mother of two and First Nations person with European ancestry from Newfoundland and Labrador, is passionate about mental health advocacy, as well as supporting people who have experienced trauma and those facing systemic barriers to accessing quality care.

We asked the Youth Council’s co-chairs to share their thoughts about the challenges facing young people today and how mental healthcare systems can better meet the evolving needs of people dealing with the ever-changing stresses associated with contemporary times.

Acknowledge that challenges for younger generations of adults are unique

Em Alexander and Colbi Mike

Em Alexander: People my age grew up in a very different environment than our parents and grandparents, who didn’t experience the overwhelming influence of technologies like digital media. We grew up with constant exposure to world events, which can have a big impact on young peoples’ mental health and well-being. That difference makes it especially important for mental health programs to include young peoples’ perspectives and input to be successful, engaging and meaningful to the people they serve.

Colbi Mike: Youth today face extra challenges, from our economy to mental health struggles and substance use to systemic racism. Indigenous youth, in particular, carry the burden of intergenerational trauma, and ongoing discrimination and many Indigenous mothers—honestly, I would say all—encounter systemic racism. I guess it’s just a lack of understanding of who we are as Indigenous people and where we are currently in out societal healing.

Bring more young people into conversations about mental health

Colbi says: Youth bring fresh perspective, lived experience, and innovative ideas to the table and, since they’re directly impacted by policies and programs, their involvement ensures that initiatives are relevant, effective, and empowering. Ignoring their voices in the past has led to gaps in understanding our needs. Involving young people not only builds better programming, it also fosters a sense of belonging, leadership, and accountability among young people. I think it’s imperative to involve people who’ve lived in this age of this time, and to empower them with a voice, right now.

Em says: Incorporating the voices of young people is a critical step in program development, particularly for programs that aim to serve youth. The Youth Council was established in 2008, and I consider the MHCC to be a leader in the field when it comes to including young people and people with lived experience in meaningful ways in their program and policy work. It’s so important for young people to be involved in decisions that will impact them.

Give people with lived experience of mental illness a bigger role in decision-making

Em says: It goes right back to the saying “nothing about us without us,” really. If you’re creating or updating policy that is relevant to people with lived experience, then they should be involved in that process from the start. Would you want someone to design support for you without listening to your experience or what you need, or what has or hasn’t worked before? Of course not. To get it right, you need to include lived experience. This is incredibly important in policy work because it can have lasting impacts on services, access, quality of care, and other things.

Colbi says: It’s absolutely critical to hear more from people with lived experience. Policy affects real lives and those impacted should have a seat at the table. People with lived experience have insights that professionals and decision makers might overlook, and their involvement ensures that policies are not only practical but also inclusive. Engagement also builds trust, accountability, and long-term success.

As an Indigenous mother, I have first-hand knowledge in navigating challenges such as barriers, cultural disconnect, and limited support systems. My lived experience helped me approach issues of empathy, cultural awareness, and ensure that programs and policies are grounded in real-life struggles and successes.

Em adds: As co-chair, my lived experience, both personally and as a caregiver, plays a role in my approach. My goal is to approach leadership from a trauma-informed and recovery-oriented lens, and to uplift and value the intersectional identities and experiences that our members hold. It’s been a very meaningful role for me to hold over the last several years and we operate very well as a council with respect, trust, and support.

The next steps include raising awareness, education and funding

Colbi says: Education is essential for reconciliation. Healthcare professionals need to understand the lasting impacts of residential schools, colonial policies, and systemic oppression to provide culturally safe care. While there have been efforts to include this education in some curriculum, the process is slow and inconsistent. Call to action #24 (from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s 94 Calls to Action) emphasizes that this is a priority, but we still need more accountability to ensure all healthcare workers are equipped to support Indigenous patients with respect and understanding.

Em says: From my own experience working at the intersection of non-profit and mental health sectors, there needs to be more support for the mental health workforce. We’re starting to see more awareness when it comes to that problem, but one of the biggest challenges I still see is good people wanting to be able to do more to help but, at a systemic level, not having the resources or capacity to do so. Sometimes this comes down to cost of services, access, wait times, or eligibility, but there’s no shortage of people wanting to support others. I sincerely hope that funding will be maintained for mental health care and related programs and initiatives throughout transitions in political governance.

We all have a role to play when it comes to providing support for people in need

Em says: When people are reaching out for support, don’t assume their identities, or their needs, or experiences – ask them, and listen with the intent to learn. It’s a challenging time right now, particularly for members of the 2SLGBTQI+ community. There are very real threats to safety for our community created by the hate and ignorance outside of our borders—and here in Canada, too. Check in on the people in your life from these groups because they are being targeted right now—BIPOC communities, 2SLGBTQI+ communities, immigrants/refugees, and others—and they need all the support they can get.

Colbi says: Mental health is deeply tied to the well-being of families and communities and yet mothers often face stigma, isolation, and limited access to safe mental health services. It’s important, therefore, to support mothers by investing in accessible and appropriate mental health care, childcare, and transportation.

We also need to keep creating programs that integrate cultural teachings and community support, because, for Indigenous people, healing often comes through reconnecting with our culture, language and communities. Investing in these areas can strengthen resilience and identity for future generations.

Resource: Engaging with People with Lived and Living Experience of Mental Illness Effectively: The MHCC’s Advisory Councils.

Further reading: Meet the entire Youth Council.

Author: Christine Sismondo, PhD, is a historian who writes about social issues. Her work is featured regularly in the Globe and Mail, and the Toronto Star. She is a National Magazine Award winner and the author of several books.

The post Breaking Barriers appeared first on Mental Health Commission of Canada.

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