Employee recognized for outstanding achievement at Oakland Community Health Network conference

Oakland Family Services Outpatient Supervisor Lauren LaFleur, Glenda Vidosh, and Specialized Services for Youth Director Debbie Smith at the Your Voice, Your Value conference.

Glenda Vidosh’s efforts to support people within the public mental health system didn’t go unnoticed Aug. 6 at Oakland Community Health Network’s Your Voice, Your Value conference.

Vidosh, a certified parent support partner/community liaison at Oakland Family Services, received the Outstanding Achievement Award as part of the 2019 Peer Recognition Awards, which are held during the conference. The awards celebrate contributions made by peer support specialists, who have lived experience and work to provide assistance to those going through the same issues.

“I didn’t know I was nominated so I felt shock and disbelief,” she said. “I’m so honored. It validates my life work prior to being here at Oakland Family Services, when I was raising my children with emotional and mental impairments.”

Vidosh was recognized particularly due to her involvement with the development of Oakland Family Services’ first comprehensive, adolescent, Dialectical Behavior Therapy program, which began in October 2018. DBT may be used to treat suicidal and other self-destructive behaviors and teaches patients skills to cope with, and change, unhealthy behaviors.

Vidosh completed more than 40 hours of training specific to the Dialectical Behavior Therapy model and is currently one of the only parent support partners in Michigan trained to utilize these skills with parents and adolescents. She facilitates the parent portion of a weekly skills class and co-facilitates the portion of the skills class that brings parents and adolescents together. The class involves teaching one of the five Dialectical Behavior Therapy skill modules to a group of teens and their parents. Vidosh meets with the parents for one hour, reviewing the homework and skill taught the previous week. The teens then join the parents and during the second hour Vidosh becomes the co-facilitator, helping to keep the teens/parents engaged and on track while the clinician teaches the skill of the week.

Vidosh also attends weekly consult team meetings with the Oakland Family Services clinicians and provides skills coaching over the phone and in person to all of Oakland Family Services’ parents involved with Dialectical Behavior Therapy.

“Glenda's passion for the mission of building better futures and ending stigma is what makes her special,” said Debbie Smith, director of Specialized Services for Youth at Oakland Family Services. “She works tirelessly for the youth and families that we serve. She is willing to go above and beyond to learn new things to help our families.”