Now more than ever, adults need to help Chicago’s young people learn to cope with mental health challenges, says therapist Thomas Ivey.
By Kathleen Hayes
Bianca Guardiola positions positive notes on a vision board between classes at Chicago State University in Chicago’s Roseland Neighborhood on Monday, July 8, 2024. (Talia Sprague/for City Bureau)
Thomas Ivey has some advice for parents of teenagers: “Never say to them, ‘When I was your age,’” he said, laughing.
But he’s not joking. Ivey, 60, is a Chicago-based social worker and therapist who has mentored young Chicagoans on the South and West Sides for more than two decades. Since earning his master’s degree in social work in the early 2000s, he has counseled countless students in Chicago elementary and high schools as a social and emotional learning specialist. He has also advised social workers, school counselors and principals on how to best support students in need.
Ivey’s advice comes at a time when young Black Americans are at a higher risk than their non-Black peers to experience anxiety and depression, and the rate of Black youths who have died by suicide is increasing more rapidly than any other racial or ethnic group. Black students also have been less likely than white and Latinx classmates to seek out a teacher or counselor for mental health support, according to a 2020 report from ACT.
Ivey talked to City Bureau in 2024 about the challenges young Chicagoans from the South and West sides are facing, their lack of access to support systems and how important adult guidance is for young people grappling with these challenges.
The social isolation young people experienced during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, coupled with their increased reliance on technology, left students struggling to connect with their peers, Ivey said.
“It's important for the adults to say, ‘I recognize you had a difficult period, and we're gonna work through this together,’” Ivey said.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
What are the biggest mental health needs among youth that you see in your work?
During the period of being isolated during the pandemic, we had to put technology in students’ hands so they could learn. Now we’re back together, but students relied on technology to communicate. You can really get lost in it, right?
The eighth- and ninth-grade age group were at this critical developmental [point] where you have to learn how to navigate friendships. These natural growth steps that all young kids and young adults go through, they missed out on that.
Students are really aware [of mental health] because we’re talking about mental health more openly. At the same time, are we teaching them coping skills?
Recent studies suggest focusing more on youth social, emotional and mental health may prompt mentally well students to think they have a problem. what do you think?
I don’t see [the new focus on youth mental health] as young adults attaching themselves to buzzwords like ADHD or bipolar. It’s not about them self-diagnosing. It’s about them saying, ‘Something is wrong with me, and I need help,’ during a time where we welcome [conversations about mental health].
some South and west siders are experiencing housing and food insecurity, poverty and disinvestment. How does that impact youth mental health?
Poverty is real. As we continue to see pockets of the city revitalize, that pushes the working class and the working poor out. All that trickles down to the kids in the family. They wonder, ‘Is this gonna be my life?’ You start to worry [about] what your parents are taking on. ‘How am I going to be able to navigate this if my parents can’t?’ That lack of hope.
how can communities and families support the mental health of the young people in their lives?
I’m working with a gentleman — who runs one of the parks — to organize a free mental health wellness and mindfulness session, and invite men of all colors to do some cool mindfulness activities in this large setting. Having events like that [makes mental health support] accessible and [demonstrates] what coping strategies look like.
What should advocates and organizers focus on regarding youth mental health, especially on the South and West sides? Access, access, access.
Let’s stop thinking this generation of students is out to self-diagnose. We’re not in that ‘pull yourself up by your bootstraps, suck it up’ time anymore. They [should be] given the longitude and latitude to talk freely about what is internally freeing for them.
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