CMHA award came as a huge surprise

By Lethbridge Herald on November 1, 2024.

LEAVE IT TO BEEBER
Al Beeber – Managing editor

The letter from the South Region of the Canadian Mental Health Association that crossed my desk a couple of weeks ago caught me by surprise.

While I expected it would be an invitation to cover an event, I never expected upon opening the envelope, I would be part of that event.

On Tuesday, the CMHA graciously awarded me a 2024 outstanding service award, an honour for which I’ll always be grateful.

 I was one of four to receive the honour and was truly blessed to be sitting with fellow recipient Knud Pedersen at the CMHA’s annual general meeting in the Galt Museum, chaired by Shelby MacLeod whose kinds words about me will forever be etched in my memory.

The letter about the award from executive director Deborah Chenery, who I had the immense pleasure of meeting for the first time on Tuesday, stated “you are being recognized for your kindness and compassion for others wellness and caring for humanity as a whole. Your articles have provided many years of mental health inspiration. You challenge people to confront their beliefs and treat others with respect and kindness for differing opinions.”

With the sun soon setting on my tenure here as managing editor, this tribute will be one I will treasure for the rest of my life, capping a long career in which recognition has been rare.

In fact, the only time I’ve previously been acknowledged for my work was being named Citizen of the Year in Fort Frances in 1987, that honour which was handed to me by a good friend and mayor at the time Glenn Witherspoon. Maybe it’s because I returned his goalie equipment without damage after borrowing it for summer league when my own goalie couldn’t make it to a game because he was waylaid up the lake working. On beers. Allegedly he was doing plumbing but I knew Scotty well. In fact, our summer hockey league team was so bad one year we couldn’t beg players to join and had to secretly sell beer out of our dressing room to pay the league entry fees.

One NHLer and friend, who was home for the summer, took one look at our motley crew and decided to spend the two weeks of summer season at his cabin. Training could wait. Which is fodder maybe for another column. 

Journalists don’t get in this business for accolades, we do it because we want to tell the diverse stories of the people in our communities.

I’ve had the privilege of doing just that since May 5 of 1980 when 20-year-old me sat in front of a typewriter at the Fort Frances Times in Ontario after editor Harry Vandetti took me for a tour of the town – in my car – showing me the highlights and stopping for coffee and a pack of Export As, which for some reason I paid for, at lakefront resort La Place Rendezvous,.

I’ve been writing columns for most of my career starting just a couple of weeks into my career in Ontario before I even had begun to get to know that community.

To be recognized for my openness about mental health is humbling. I’ve been fortunate as a columnist to have the opportunity to share my thoughts with a wide audience over the decades, an audience which goes far beyond those who read the physical paper. It’s a privilege that I’ve never taken lightly.

Mental health is a huge issue in this world, perhaps more accurately mental unwellness is a huge issue because if everyone was mentally stable there would be no need for discussion.

But unwellness affects people of every race, of every social status. It’s indiscriminate in who it impacts, how many it hurts. It can be generational and it needs to be discussed because healing of one single individual is essential if families, communities and societies are going to heal.

We need to pull away the curtains hiding mental unwellness from the light and discuss it openly and frankly. We need to eliminate the stigma of its discussion so people suffering with mental health issues can have the courage to seek help.

The unwell need to know they’re not alone, that the illnesses affecting them are not their fault, they need to understand the burdens they carry are not theirs alone and by seeking help and removing the burden from themselves, they lift the burdens from those they care about, giving them the opportunity to live healthy lives as well.

The impact mental unwellness has on this world can’t be hidden. We need to talk about it and over the years I have by sharing my own family’s experiences which I’ve done to let others know there are people who care, people who have a shared experience.

Just the knowledge that someone isn’t alone can help lift the burden of unwellness because the feeling of being isolated and alone is a painful feeling like none other.

But nobody with mental health problems is alone. Nobody. Remember that, readers. Nobody is alone. And nobody has to fight the battle to achieve mental health alone.

Thank you, CMHA for your appreciation of my work. And thank you for the work you do for so many among us.