Alice M Burroughs

Nonnie Talks about Mental Health Alice M Burroughs

The essence of the Nonnie Series(TM) is connection and communication. Talking about life's challenging topics isn't easy. This Series seeks to offer a way for trusted adults and children/young people to find common ground and talk about the 'elephant in the room'. Mental health is vital to self-worth. Addressing it has been a foundation of all 12 books. The Nonnie SeriesTM seeks to open the door to parent or adult/child communication by addressing complex issues with grace, humor, sensitivity and warmth. The Series seeks to explore the need for mental health throughout life by encouraging connection for parents/trusted adults, and children/young people. Nonnie Talks about Mental Health is the 12th volume in The Nonnie Series(TM). In prior volumes, Nonnie addressed the 'elephant in the room' topics of Consent, Death, Disability, Gender, Pregnancy and Birth, Puberty, Quarantine, Race, Relationships, Sex and Trauma. Nonnie Talks about Mental Health prepares the learning dyad of young person/adult to take on potentially controversial topics like depression, attempted suicide, counseling, and the stigma often associated with mental illness. Nonnie guides by opening the door to conversation by using Tamika and Alex as role models for learningWriting Nonnie Talks about Mental Health was bittersweet. Left alone, I doubt I would stop writing these books that are a true labor of love. My amazing artist, Alice Burroughs, told me she wanted to retire from illustrating Tamika and Alex and Nonnie, after my 9th book, Nonnie Talks about Disability, and I respected her wishes. Then, the pandemic changed our lives. I responded to the closure of our Common Ground Teen Center on 3/16/2020 by holding twice daily virtual meetings with young people. Those wonderful experiences morphed into ten free virtual summer camps for 12-14-year-olds; I personally logged 1100 Zoom hours in June-July of 2020. The pandemic increased my concern for the mental health of the young people I serve from the start. My daily virtual contact with them reinforced their need. I sought out Alice to request illustrations for Nonnie Talks about Quarantine, which she graciously donated. I then distributed over 500 copies of the book-which I wrote in three weeks. Number 11, Nonnie Talks about Relationships took longer to write than any other book; I was diagnosed with my second breast cancer in the month I wrote the storyboard and discovered as a patient what I knew as a nurse-pain does rob a person of energy. Nonnie Talks about Mental Health was an obvious choice for #12 and the last in the series. Mental health, stress, and the challenges our children and young people face permeate all the books in The Nonnie Series(TM). It was logical to end with it.