California Clubhouse helps adults with mental illness find their way back

As a healthy youngster, Leslie Roberts loved spending time in her father’s grocery store in Iowa, where she excelled at stocking supplies and balancing atop crates to reach fresh lettuce.

Now, recovering from years lost to manic depression, addiction and homelessness, she’s a grocery expert once again.

At California Clubhouse, a San Carlos-based sanctuary where those with serious mental illness can be people, not patients, Roberts is responsible for planning, shopping and cooking daily meals for 20 other members.

She also shares her food skills — teaching Clubhouse members how to read food labels, compare prices, take measurements, use utensils and safely cut with knives.

“It gives me a purpose, so I’m not just sitting in my apartment by myself,” said Roberts, 67, with a quick smile and chestnut hair. Her illness is controlled. She long ago quit alcohol, opioids, cannabis and American Spirit menthol cigarettes.

“It makes you feel good,” she said, “to see people sitting around a table, being happy and eating.”

But preparing even the most basic meal is a challenge at Clubhouse because budgets are tight. Roberts cooks on hot plates and a skillet. Appliances are plugged into scattered outlets because the room’s electrical circuitry is easily overwhelmed. Meals are served on paper plates with plastic utensils.

Donations from Wish Book will help improve the kitchen, and be used to purchase small dining tables for more intimate conversations. Funding will also support new materials to help with Clubhouse’s back-to-work efforts and social outings.

“It’s so makeshift,” Roberts said. “If we could sit down with real plates and real silverware, it’s a lot nicer experience for everybody.”

Helped by medication, self-care and subsidized housing, Roberts now devotes herself to the Clubhouse, founded to help those with mental illness by connecting them to job opportunities, education and friendships.

Community-focused, Clubhouse is the only resource of its kind in San Mateo County and hopes to expand to Santa Clara County.

It is not a clinical or treatment program. It is a place where people can relearn to meet the world and where they can always return if the world feels too daunting or unwelcoming. It seeks to end social and economic isolation.

“People that have had their lives disrupted by a mental health condition, such as hospitalization, can come in to do work and have meals,” said Lisa Litsey, executive director of California Clubhouse. “It’s a collegial way of being together.”

In contrast to traditional day-treatment and other day-program models, Clubhouse participants are called “members,” not “patients” or “clients.”  They partner with the organization’s small staff, sharing in decision-making.

Membership is voluntary and open to adults diagnosed with schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, bipolar disorder or major depressive disorder. A referral from a mental health professional is required.

Membership never expires. Of 400 members, about 75 routinely stop by. Its popularity is expected to increase this winter after it moves to a new location near San Mateo’s El Camino House, which provides 44 units of temporary housing and support services.

“It’s a place that, when you have a mental health crisis, you can rebound back into society, whether you need educational or job skills, or just a place to come regroup,” said Ivy, who asked that her last name not be used because of the stigma around mental illness. “I can come in the door and know that people will greet me by name.”

Activities focus on members’ strengths and abilities, not their illnesses. Diagnoses aren’t discussed.

“You check your label at the door,” said Steven, who also asked that his name not be used. “You just show up as your authentic self.”

Members come even when they’ve hit a rough patch. “If you’re a little down, or a little up, you can still just sit here,” Roberts said. “You’re not judged. And I’ve been judged my whole life.”

In programs, members take part in productive activities that help Clubhouse run.

One group responds to emails, returns phone calls, does outreach, reviews applications for staff positions, deposits checks and conducts other administrative business.

A second group is responsible for hospitality, such as meal prep, social events and outings.

“Everything is voluntary, based on what work needs to get done, or if there’s something you want to learn,” Steven said. “So if I’m interested in learning about data entry, for example, I can ask if someone can help me with that.”

Members get help applying for high school equivalency diploma classes, license training and college degree courses.

They are also assisted with job services, such as crafting a résumé and applying for work. Every Wednesday, a group discusses problem-solving and “goal setting.” Once a month, members gather for a “Career Development” dinner.

The Clubhouse has a transitional employment program, partnering with small businesses for temporary employment. If a member has a mental health setback and can’t work, a staffer will step in.

“We’ve got to build trust in the business community that they can take a chance on someone,” said Litsey, the Clubhouse executive director.

Many members are low-income, due to long or repeated hospitalizations, social isolation and sometimes family estrangement.

“They may need help to get ready. Maybe they need shoes. They might need work clothes or transportation,” Litsey said. “We help cover costs.”

Some members just stop by for coffee. One man rarely speaks but comes to play a guitar. Social outings are popular, such as trips to the movies, Alcatraz or Filoli, the historic Georgian mansion and gardens in Woodside.

If personalities clash, a staff member helps guide members through conflict resolution skills.

Its model of psychosocial rehabilitation is based on Fountain House, which has its roots in a support group formed in 1943 in a “club room” at Rockland Psychiatric Center in New York. When patients were discharged, they still needed each other for support.

The type of community that was established, known as “the clubhouse model,” has now been replicated more than 300 times in nearly 40 U.S. states and in 30 countries across the globe. Now called Clubhouse International, it has earned awards by The Brain and Behavior Research Foundation and the American Psychiatric Association.

The San Carlos-based Clubhouse was founded in 2015 by Juliana Fuerbringer of Burlingame, whose adult son developed schizophrenia while in college and had few treatment options.

Some members have gone on to notable success. One was recently hired to do Information Technology work for Mission Valley Regional Occupational Program in Fremont.  Another just graduated from Skyline College’s paralegal program in San Bruno. A third, a former teacher, is beginning to provide private tutoring.