The
unwillingness to try is worse than any failure. Nikki Giovanni
Fathers matter deeply in their child's life —they
help build confidence, resilience, and a sense of security.
We can empower dads by
including them, supporting them, and giving them the tools and space to stay
actively involved. Join us for our May Transition Talk!
May
19, 2026, 6:00 – 7:00 p.m. ET - register for the recording to listen later
Empowering Fathers
Fathers are often underrepresented in conversations about supporting
youth with disabilities especially during the critical transition to
adulthood. This webinar aims to change that narrative. Join us for a powerful
and practical session focused on empowering fathers as active, engaged
members of their child’s support team.
Guest Speaker:Rob Harris, Family
Engagement Specialist | Certified IEP Facilitator | Peer Support Advocate
Dave Jones, MSW, LMSW, Awarded by Visiting Nurse
Association of America (VNAA) as Innovator of the Year for
his outstanding work with fathers.
It’s not very often I see
sights that move me to tears. The treatment of people at the hands of ICE
agents makes me sick to my stomach and disturbs my spirit deeply. Im telling
you, if you truly want to see me break, show me, in real life, a human being being
ill-treated or left without dignity. That is what reaches me at my core.
Today being Sunday, I
thought it would be a good day for a drive. I left Kingston and made a decision
that I would not be using the highway. Paying JMD 4,500 for a one-way trip to
Ocho Rios is simply out of reach for most Jamaicans, and on that principle
alone, it was off limits for me. I wanted to take the old roads, the roads
people still depend on.
As I passed through Spanish
Town, I found myself reflecting on its history as a former capital. It struck
me that I had been bypassing it for years, like many others, choosing the
convenience of the highway over the reality on the ground. But driving through
it today forced me to confront something deeper. This was not just about bad
roads. This was about what happens when systems are left behind.
At one point, I genuinely
felt trapped, unsure if I would even find my way out. This could not be the
Spanish Town I knew decades ago. The roads were so badly deteriorated that
navigating them felt like mountain climbing in a car. Vehicles were twisted at
awkward angles, each driver trying to negotiate potholes that had grown into
craters, and ridges that rose like barriers in the middle of the road. It was
not simply an inconvenience. It was structural neglect made visible.
And in that moment, it
became clear that what I was experiencing was not just poor road conditions, but
a failure of maintenance, planning, and sustained attention. Roads, like
systems, do not collapse overnight. They deteriorate slowly, over time, when
signals are ignored, when repairs are delayed, and when responsibility becomes
diffused. What I saw in Spanish Town was not sudden damage. It was accumulated
neglect.
Disappointed but relieved,
I eventually found my way out toward Angels and continued on, still committed
to avoiding the highway. I made my way through Bog Walk Gorge, a route I have
always appreciated for its beauty, though lately it has been marked by tragedy.
In recent months, I had seen reports of trucks plunging into the Rio Cobre near
Flat Bridge. As I approached the bridge, traffic came to a stop at the red
light, and I settled in, knowing we would have to wait our turn to cross.
It was in that stillness
that something came into view.
At first, it was just a
figure in the distance. A young man, lean, well-built, moving toward the line
of waiting vehicles. From afar, I could not tell if he was clothed or not. I
assumed, for a brief moment, that he had come out of the river and was heading
home. But as he got closer, that assumption shattered. He was completely naked,
as bare as the day he was born, running toward us.
As he approached, I could
see he was young, perhaps around twenty-three, clean-cut, physically strong,
but something was terribly wrong. His body moved with instability, as if it
were failing him. Before I could fully process what I was seeing, he stumbled
and fell, narrowly missing his head against a concrete wall at the roadside. He
pulled himself up, and what struck me in that moment was that his face did not
look tired, only his body. It was as if his mind and body were no longer in
agreement.
When I looked into his eyes, they
were glazed, wide open, fixed upward toward the sky, unblinking. There was no
recognition, no connection, no awareness of the world around him. He ran past
my vehicle, close enough for me to see clearly that his eyes had turned almost
completely white, his head still tilted upward as if he were chasing something
none of us could see.
Tears began to run down my face,
and my heart felt as though it had split in two.
I started asking myself questions
I could not answer. What did I just witness? Why did I witness it? Who is
responsible for this young man? Why is he naked, alone, running on a public
roadway, surrounded by traffic, yet completely unseen? Cars were moving in both
directions, people watching, but no one stopped. And in truth, I understand
why. There is fear, there is uncertainty, there are risks. Who do you call in
that moment? What do you do? Where do you even begin?
But beyond those immediate
questions is a deeper one that refuses to leave me.
Where is the system that should
have reached him long before he reached that road?
Because that young man did not
arrive there by accident. There had to be signs. There had to be moments when
something shifted, when someone noticed, when intervention was possible. There
had to be a family, a community, a point where help was needed but not
received, or perhaps not even available.
And that is where everything
connects.
Because earlier that same
day, I drove through a system that had been allowed to deteriorate in plain
sight. And later, I encountered a human being who may very well have been
moving through his own form of deterioration, also in plain sight.
In both cases, the pattern
is the same.
·Signals are visible.
·Intervention is
delayed.
·Responsibility
becomes unclear.
And eventually, the system
fails in a way that can no longer be ignored.
What I witnessed today was not
just an isolated incident. It was a visible expression of something far more
systemic, the quiet, often ignored reality of mental health in Jamaica. We do
not talk about it enough, we do not invest in it enough, and too often, we do
not respond until the situation has already escalated beyond control.
Mental health support in Jamaica remains limited,
fragmented, and in many cases, inaccessible to those who need it most. There are too few facilities, too few trained
professionals, and too little integration between healthcare, community
support, and early intervention systems. Families are often left to manage on
their own, without guidance, without resources, and without a clear pathway to
help. By the time the system engages, it is often in crisis mode, when the
individual has already reached a point of visible breakdown.
What I saw today was not just a young man in distress.
It was a system that did
not reach him in time.
And that is the part that
should trouble us the most.
Because until we begin to treat mental
health as essential infrastructure, just like roads, hospitals, and schools, we
will continue to encounter these moments, not as rare tragedies, but as
predictable outcomes of systems that are not designed to respond.
And when those failures
surface, whether in broken roads or broken moments in people’s lives, they do
not appear suddenly.
