Newsletter 04/08/2024

Blogs are taken from our previous newsletters. Stayed updated by subscribing to our newsletter on our website!

In This Newsletter:  Berkeley Pride Resource Fair, Sponsor Us!, Job Opportunities, Clinical Application, HIV Program Update, Community Program Updates, Pacific Center Events, Community Interview, Outside Events, Donate, Support!

Correction note: In last week’s newsletter (sent out 4/2/24), the photograph included with Beckie Underwood’s community interview was taken by Kit Pollinger. Thank you to Kit for providing the photo!

Save the date for the Pacific Center’s Berkeley Pride Resource Fair on Saturday August 17th, 2024.

Follow our newsletter and social media to stay updated!

Older and Out Group Facilitator

PEARLS Coach for Older Adults

Ryan White Associate Clinician

Grief Group Facilitator

Oakland Older and Out Support Group

Email mae@pacificcenter.org for questions or more information. 

Applications for the 24-25 clinical training cohort are live HERE.

Questions? Contact clinic@pacificcenter.org

Graduate level psychology trainees, master's level trainees and associates as well as newly licensed clinicians receive valuable training working with our diverse LGBTQIA+ and QTBIPOC clients.  Our year long program meets all Board of Behavioral Sciences & Board of Psychology licensing laws.  Clinicians in the training program are supervised by licensed clinicians.

Join the Pacific Center for Mental Health for a 9 week processing group for people with HIV/AIDS. It’s a place to build community and process themes related to HIV. We explore topics around embodying intersectional identities, sexuality, internalized HIV stigma, grief and loss, trauma and abuse, addiction, and isolation. Living Fully begins on Tuesday, April 16th and goes through June 11th, 2024 (5:30 - 7:00 pm PST). This group will meet over Zoom video every Tuesday for the following 9 weeks, excluding holidays.

Instructor bio: Melanie is a massive psychology and science nerd, and always stands in an anti-oppression framework. She is queer artist, white, first generation American, and a psychotherapist. She is highly relational as a therapist, and her style is anchored in cognitive science, attachment theory, mindfulness, social justice, parts work, and somatic psychology. Melanie values science equally with the domain of intuition and art. Melanie Ferrari is a Registered Associate Marriage and Family Therapist #125787, Registered Associate Professional Clinical Counselor #9630. Supervised by Pablo Navarrete-Martinez, LMFT # 113991)

If interested, please use this link!

Free Mental Health Services for HIV+ folx  in Alameda & Contra Costa County!

Join Pacific Center for ongoing FREE mental health services (individual, couples and group counseling). If you earn under $67,000 annually, HIV+, and live in Alameda or Contra Costa County, our services are free for you. LGBTQ+ friendly, catering to QTBIPOC, but open to all in need.

Contact DeAngela, Sr. HIV Program Manager:

Email: deangela@pacificcenter.org

Phone: (510) 766-2967

Click here to learn more about our HIV services!

Your mental health journey starts here!

Meditative Arts Workshop: Join us at the West Berkeley Family Wellness Center for two part immersive workshop blending art and mindfulness. Unleash your creativity and find inner peace through beadwork.

Instructor bio: Malika Rubin-Davis is a mixed race black woman who grew up in Sonoma County, Ca. She has always had an affinity for arts and crafts. This was supported by artistic parents, Waldorf education and a BA in Visual Art. She worked as an educator in East Bay Public Schools for seven years and is now finding her way as an artist and educator. She teaches Yoga, has shown her paintings in individual and group shows in the East Bay and finds joy in teaching the things that she loves. For Malika, the artistic process is incredibly grounding and helpful, especially with mediums that require repetition. As a child, she could spend hours making friendship bracelets or playing with a bead-loom. As an adult she is self-taught in some beading techniques. She finds the process of making beadwork a beautiful mixture of creative expressions, and meditative repetition. To learn more and sign up please visit: https://bit.ly/PCmeditativearts

Come swap till you drop on April 13th, 2024 from 10am-2pm! Exchange clothes with fellow queers! No one is turned away! This is our grand re-opening of our gender affirming closet that is set to be open soon!

If you can't make this event but would like to donate clothes please email: info@pacificcenter.org.

EARTH~WATER~AIR~FIRE: A 4-week medicine making series connecting humans with each of the healing elements of nature.

**For QTBIPOC and BIPOC with Batul True Heart of Maaso Medicina

In this 4-week series we will make time to presence and connect with one element of nature per week. We will be curious about our emotional well-being as it relates to our relationship with nature. Made of the elements ourselves, we are each an integral part of nature. We will remember our humanness, and our own unique essence, as we transmit it through our medicines.

Instructor bio: Batul True Heart (they/them/theirs), is a 2Spirit, Yaqui~Chicanx~Panamanian traditional healer, community & clinical herbalist, and death companion living on Lisjan Ohlone Land in Huchiun, also known as Oakland, CA.

To learn more and sign up please visit: https://bit.ly/PCewaf

Mental Health at the Intersections (MHTI) is a FREE day-long conference for mental health providers and community workers that centers care & support for those who sit at the intersections of race, gender, and sexuality. This year we are focusing on the mental health and wellbeing of LGBTQIA+ BIPOC youth. There will be workshops for youth ages 11+ and workshops for adults who work with youth. 

Registration has opened, click here!  

Please reach out to our Training Program Manager, Glo Rodriguez at glo@pacificcenter.org with any questions. We hope you are able to join us.

When did you first find out about the Pacific Center?

I was on a bus in October of 1977 and met a guy who took me to the Pacific Center. That was my first encounter. Then I went to a social event for Halloween and met my first boyfriend.

Had my first real date. That was shocking, coming from New York. I went home with the guy the next day. We went to breakfast and went to a movie, and I was like, ‘Wow, we can do things in the daylight!

Describe your experience at the Center. 

I went to groups. I loved the Monday Night Men's Rap Group. And then social events around the holidays, like a Thanksgiving potluck, Christmas Eve, St Patrick's Day, stuff like that. I went to the Saturday game night several times. 

I also liked the Halloween party. It seemed like a really cool place, a very welcome place. And it was a nice alternative to the bars.

Have you seen any individual programs emerge and grow or wind down during the time that you've been associated with the Pacific Center?

Pretty much everything I did wound down. There's no more game night, right? There's no more men's rap group. There's no more socials for holidays.

What do you think makes the Center stand out?

Well, I guess it's [the Center’s ability] to reach out to people, especially younger people, who are gay and don't really know where to go. And people who were previously married or in heterosexual relationships, support for survivors of that. I think support groups are an important thing.

What would be the most supportive for you personally at this point in time?

Until recently, the Older and Out Group was a therapy-based group. Now it is a peer-led group and has two facilitators.

I wish they would still have a therapy-based group for older people. That was important to me and others in the Older and Out Group. 

Is there any particular moment that you cherish from your time at the Pacific Center?

I cherish the memories of those earlier groups. Like I said, I wish they would bring back the Monday Night Men’s Rap Group. It was a nice opportunity for people to socialize. 

Have you seen the Center experience or overcome any challenges?

Finding a new building.

Is there something specific about the new space that's problematic?

It’s a very busy street, with very little parking.

What’s your dream for the future of the Pacific Center? 

More social groups.

Interview and Editing Credit: Mel Hofmann and Rob Albon 

Join us Berkeley City College Wellness Center: Creating Safe Spaces for Queer Faces! We will be there tabling!

Join Lakeshore LGBTQ Cultural District at their Drag Around the Rink!