WESTERN BUREAU – In an effort to help families to better understand and care for their mentally ill relatives, the Committee for the Upliftment of the Mentally Ill (CUMI) this week began its monthly counselling sessions at their Brandon Hill location in Montego Bay.

“We set it up for our own clients so when we send them home, rather than going home to be a problem, they would be going home where they are empowered to help themselves because they can understand their illness and why it is happening to them – and also (to) empower the relatives to cope,” Joy Crooks, CUMI’s nurse/administrator, told the Observer.

But while the sessions target the 116 registered CUMI clients and their families, Crooks said, they were expected to attract others, particularly the recently discharged mentally ill persons from the island’s Bellevue facility.

“There are family members who are getting (relatives) from Bellevue, and they have had no counselling, no follow-up. They are trying to use our sessions to help to cope with problems that have been created since they have had (them) home from Bellevue…” she said.

The sessions, which are being offered free of cost and which will be held every second Tuesday of each month, are being conducted by Clinical Psychologist, Pearnel Bell. Bell, who works with the CUMI Children’s Programme, is conducting the sessions on a voluntary basis.