I grew up in rural South Dakota, and I never once saw a wildfire like the ones burning across Nebraska this spring.
Colleen Stegenga
Columnist
About
Colleen Stegenga is a licensed social worker in private practice with her own business, Embracing Change Counseling Services, specializing in mental health support for farmers, ranchers, and agricultural families. Reach her at colleen@embracingchangecs.com or visit www.embracingchangecs.com.
In a culture that prizes hard workers and rewards those who push through, Thomas Eisenbarth found himself doing exactly that: pushing.
We train for a lot of things out here on the farm. We teach our kids to drive a tractor before they can reach the pedals properly. We take fir…
Rural communities value cooperation, helping your neighbor, and putting the good of the community first. These are beautiful values – until they become a trap that leaves you exhausted, resentful, and invisible in your own life.
The phone rings in the middle of the night. There's been an accident. Your spouse, your parent, your child, your friend, gone in an instant. N…
It's January. You're sitting at the kitchen table with spreadsheets, loan applications, and a knot in your stomach.
But here on the farm, January feels different than it does for the rest of the world. The idea of adding MORE to your plate with ambitious resolutions feels laughable.
The last car pulls out of the driveway. You wave from the porch until the taillights disappear, then turn back to a house that suddenly feels too big and too quiet.
We hear a lot today about a mental health crisis among farmers and in rural communities. Is this a new problem, or are we finally talking about something that's been there all along?
