MonkeyBrains: JCCC4 Mental Health meetup/discussion followup

marineam

Thanks to everyone who attended the Mental Health meetup! Despite the lack of agenda or my inexperience in running any type of discussion group it turned out to be pretty productive!

First off, as promised I have created a private email list (in Google Groups) and Facebook group for any interested SeaMonkeys to discuss any and all mental health related topics. Please comment here or contact me privately via [email protected] if you are interested in joining either group. Also pass the word along to others you know who attended the meetup since I don't have any sort of list of who did.

Secondly I wanted to share a quick list of ideas that came up during and after the meetup that could help improve the cruise experience. This is just what I happened to remember, let me know if I missed any other ideas.

• Buddies: A more one-on-one version of the ambassador program. Instead of just looking for people wearing pins, monkeys who have trouble joining conversations/groups/etc could be paired with a single person who can help them out. What this pairing looks like would probably very greatly depending on the people involved.
• More meetups: There was a strong consensus that the meetup happened too late in the cruise and that its size (I think over 20 people attended) was getting too big for many folks except the most outgoing to feel comfortable discussing much of anything. A consistent time/location for meetups would also be important. Having two meetups daily, one in the morning and one in the afternoon/evening, sounded like a good way to arrange this.
• Quiet monkey spaces: Many people need time away from the noise/chaos of the organized events and cruise ship in general to recover or recharge. Often the most obvious or only good choice is their state room. It would be good to make sure everyone has other options for quiet time that don't require isolating themselves completely from others. The best option would be a dedicated SeaMonkey quiet area where people can read, knit, or just sit while maintaining some sense of the SeaMonkey community.
• Quiet general spaces: Since space on the ship is limited it may not be practical to always have such a dedicated space so a published list of known-to-be-quiet areas around the ship would be useful. Suggestions for this list included: the library, helipad, deck for outside lounge areas, and St. Topaz (the highest outside lounge above the bow).
• Official event video broadcast: This came up in a discussion after the meetup. For a wide variety of reasons (including depression/anxiety, lack of sleep, seasick, hangover, or sick w/ cruise-crud) there are always monkeys who miss big performances because they are stuck in their room. This is a damn shame because missing events makes feeling crappy even worse and not knowing about *awesome thing that happened* or *weird inside joke* becomes a constant reminder about missing the event as it keeps coming up in conversations for the rest of the cruse. The ship seems to have the capability to film/broadcast performances on TV and it would double plus uber awesome if we had a TV channel to broadcast JoCo performances live on.

Sorry if I missed something or if you weren't able to voice your concern or idea during the meetup, but now is your chance! Post concerns/ideas here or send them to me privately. Lets figure out what can be done so all monkeys have the awesome time they deserve! :-D

RangerRick

I don't know if they can make it broadcast only to JoCo cabins since we pay extra to see the performers on top of the normal cruise costs, but if they could do the event video broadcast, holy cow that would be awesome.  I missed Jim Boggia and Thrilling Adventure Hour because I just felt like crap, but I think I could have handled staying up to watch them in bed.  Maybe they can hide them behind the same pay wall that porn is behind and then credit it to seamonkeys for free? <g>

Jennafyr

It would be awesome to put it behind a paywall and see how many non-monkeys also want to see the shows.

marineam

My hunch is that isn't practical in the cruise's system to limit this "Channel JoCo" to only SeaMonkey rooms but considering the channel # and event times wouldn't be advertised to the rest of the cruise I bet it'd be fine. Sure some folks will randomly find it but maybe that'll get some Snork->SeaMonkey conversions for the following cruise! :-)

tasermonkey

If we couldn't get a private TV channel, could we some how stream it via the internal ship's network? I don't actually know the ship's wireless network could handle the video being broadcasted or not, but would be cool to just open up your tablet and watch it, if you felt under the weather and in your stateroom.

marineam

Considering the ship wifi could barely provide access to Twit-arr in state rooms I highly doubt video streaming could happen. As far as I could tell there simply are not very many access points and a hell of a lot of walls.

kate

From what I have heard, there are a number of reasons that the events are not broadcasted.

marineam

I can certainly understand if some cannot be due to logistics or by performer request but I'd be curious what the reasons are in general.

UnmagicalMe

RE: Video, I'm guessing that a bit of it has to do with RCI liking to take cuts out of pies.

Missed/additional items:
Identification: People willing to spend time with people in need/crisis should have some form of identification, be it a bracelet, a sticker on their badge, or what-not because "buddies" might not always be around.

Help from Home Office, either officially (resources, planning, polls, etc) or unofficially (just making sure the word gets out). I should have an in or two to bring this to their attention if they avoid commenting themselves, but I'll give it some time for the thread to marinate.


Nate

PokeyPuppy

I would also mention in regards to the meetups - having an initial format similar to the speed meetings might be helpful. I don't know if anyone else attended them, but I found last year and this year that they tend to be a mix of extroverts and introverts, which seemed (from my perspective) to work well. I'm really extroverted, though, so I'd be interested in other's perspective.

aymazing

Random suggestion: I have been using mindfulness meditation for the last 1+ year to help manage/deal with anxiety & depression.  Would anyone be interested in having guided and/or group meditation sessions on the boat?  Or even sharing materials for guided meditations if people want to try alone in their rooms?  I have digital files of a bunch of guided meditations I'd be glad to share (and heaven knows the Inter-tubes have plenty of material to borrow).

Jennafyr

@aymazing

Mindfulness techniques have really helped me, I would be interested in a group-like meditation session.

Madeleine

@aymazing, I'm not sure if I'm going yet, but if so I would love a group meditation session!

lucioperca

Another vote for mindfulness exercises. I'm suddenly reminded that I've been shirking on that lately.

Soupskin

Learning meditation has been on the neglected end of my todo list for ages.  Guess I should assign a priority!

dcwlopez

I didn't make it to the original meetup, but would it be bad to admit that I've had a book on Mindfulness for over 2 years and have only made it about 30 pages in (twice). But on the boat, I was the most calm I've been in forever, so that might be a great incentive for me to finally learn the techniques.

Bry

(Mildly wish that this thread had been titled "Re: Our Brains.")

aymazing

Thanks for all the feedback about meditation, glad I'm not the only one with an interest.  Not sure what the process is, but if I don't see this on official schedules/plans, I'll try to wrangle a shadow activity so we can gather and share our zen.

PokeyPuppy

@aymazing - This would probably need to be a shadow activity, but is a great idea! I haven't put a shadow event together previously, but I think it's just a matter of having a loose idea of what you'd be looking for, and then setting it up once on the boat? I'm sure someone else could offer more info!

chicazul

The only thing that's required to have a shadow event is to pick a place and time to meet and tell people!

If you'd like to book a room and/or be on the shadow cruise schedule, there is a form to fill out a few weeks before the cruise starts. Failing that, once on the cruise there are sign-up forms for each room that has available time slots. There was also a way to sign up to get your event mentioned in the Sea Monkey, but I didn't actually try it—I assume it was a form at the info desk.

Jennafyr

I found the mini golf course really quiet and relaxing late in the evening.

No one was around and so I walked the whole course really paying attention to the sound of the wind and the ocean, glancing at the stars above, just being in that moment with as much intent as possible.

I found it to be immensely de-stressing.

Not to mention it have me a really calm, pleasant memory to recall when stressing out going forward.

I think there are other places on the ship we could find too.

If there are any days that the Labyrinth is empty, it has nice low lighting and comfy alcoves that would be good for getting away from everything else.

I am sure other people will have other places in mind, too.

chicazul

If we can collect a list of these public spaces that are conducive to introvert downtime, I will personally guarantee that this information makes it into the official handouts and announcements at the start of the cruise. A few (like the ship's library, which has this mandate anyway) can be designated as quiet spaces, where conversation is discouraged, and others just suggested as lesser-known hangouts that might be less crowded than the game room.

I'm sorry I missed the mental health meetup, but I'd like to chime in that mindfulness meditation has been a huge help in getting my anxiety under control, and I think meditation sessions are a great idea!

Edited to add: I will also lobby for a designated Sea Monkey Quiet Room, though due to competition with shadow cruise events, reserving a private area might be difficult. (Cloud 9 seems ideal, but was definitely used for several events.)

A buddy system as suggested in @marineam's summary was originally going to be part of the Ambassador program but fell victim to lack of planning—it's definitely on the radar for next year! If you have any further suggestions please share!

ZombieBender

The labyrinth is empty during the day everyday unless we have a shadow event, it seems to be the least utilized venue of all. The alcoves seem especially quiet like they are made to focus only nearby sound and block out everything else. I forget their names but there are some rooms on the upper decks for gaming that had been also under utilized. I don't know what the limits are on what can be reserved for private functions, apparently there was a deal to get DJ access for Monkeys in the Labyrinth but it didn't bar snorks access to the venue.

chicazul

@ZombieBender The Labyrinth was reserved for Sea Monkey use until 6pm every day! If Home Office manages the same arrangement next year that can be a good refuge, although it is home to some of the more crowded shadow cruise events. The Cloud Nine and Seven Hearts(?) rooms were also reserved for us for pretty much the whole cruise. Unfortunately the "reserved for private event" signs caused a lot of confusion, and the rooms probably would have had more occupants if more Sea Monkeys had realised that we were the private event in question! All of these venues were available to book for Shadow Cruise events and I witnessed them all in use, so I'm not sure it would be possible to block them off entirely as quiet zones.

ZombieBender

@chicazul, excellent, maybe not many knew that was the case with the labyrinth, I didn't, plus they didn't serve drinks there until later in the evening. I was also not aware the the upper rooms were reserved this time. I know some people found the conference room crowded and or all tables full, I don't think many knew of the upper deck options, we sort of found then on our own the last cruise, the upper game rooms were are great place to go to for a break from full game room but I didn't get a chance this cruise.

rhaje

Getting your Shadow Event listed in the Sea Monkey was simply a matter of getting it on one of the room reservation sheets before 5pm the day before. All of the sign-up sheets were either outside the Jamaica Room or at the Info Desk (locations were detailed in the Sea Monkey every day).

The Labyrinth was exclusively ours every day until 6pm. But, we didn't have an ad-hoc reservation sheet for the room because most of the events that request the space have tech needs of some sort, which we need to clear with the ship's staff (and also sometimes cost extra money). Also, the space was booked for just about every minute we had access to it when we weren't in port, and there were not a lot of requests for Shadow Event space on port days.

Cloud Nine was available to us during the day anytime there wasn't an Official Event on at-sea days only, and most of that time was booked before the cruise started. Cloud Nine and Seven Hearts were both available to us every evening for a couple hours, but the timing usually overlapped with another official event. I believe that the Seven Hearts room only had one reserved time-slot during the entire cruise.

aymazing

@chicazul  Thanks for the guidelines about scheduling the shadow cruise events. You can bet that I'll be watching for the first opportunity to get a space/time for meditation since it seems to have enough interest.  I'm rolling around ideas of how to manage noise "pollution" in case the space isn't ideal, and would welcome suggestions (I'm happy to bring equipment with me if we all need a way to plug headphones into a single source to listen to a guided meditation while simultaneously drowning out ambient noise).  I feel like the mindfulness meditation has been a huge component of an improvement in my depression/anxiety over the past year, and I would love to help share the experience with others.

beth

Adam Bernstein does mindfulness music meditation workshops. I've already suggested that he do one on the cruise and I will follow up with him.

SapphireMind

There is a chapel too and that would likely be good as a  quiet space

AuntiLaura

I hid in the chapel a good deal last year on the cruise.

I didnt make the meeting, as I was pace-y and couldnt settle down. Started a new med right before the trip, which seems to be miraculous other than the energy to burn. (Lamictal, if you want to know. )
but on the other hand, I only gained 3 pound on the cruise, as I was constantly walking from one end of the ship to the other.

c4bl3fl4m3

I'm going to be a new SeaMonkey this year although I know a few other returning ones.

One of the reasons I held off going before was because I have some serious mental health challenges and I was concerned about making a cruise work for me with them. After copious internet searching for where to get help at our ports of call in case I go into crisis on board (and feeling ok, if not mostly satisfied with what I've found... some of these places need better mental health support), after searching for a travel insurance company/plan that covers mental health emergencies (of course, now I can't remember which one I found), and after having the idea of getting early pre-boarding so I can get over my anxiety re: being on the ship before I have to deal with meeting people, I had the idea of having daily or semi-daily peer support meetings on-board via the Shadow Cruise to keep each other sane, give each other support (because we'll be cut off from our usual support networks if we didn't bring them with us,), talk about our feelings/problems, etc. (I'm concerned about agoraphobia, amongst my usual issues, for myself... I get twitchy in the Midwest because it's so flat and I feel like there's no where I can run and hide. I'm kinda nervous about being out at sea when there's nothing but empty water around and I'm literally trapped on a ship.)

I'm glad to see I'm not the only person who wanted to do something with mental health. I don't want to take over anyone else's thing (esp. if it's established) but this is something I feel I want to do, even if it's just me sitting in a room talking with one other person. Would someone else rather do this? Should I try to organize this? Should I wait to be on board?

UnmagicalMe

As we are only 4 months out, I think it might be time to resurrect this thread to get some solid ideas in place that way we have time to print any materials or get stickers/wristbands/whatever.

My personal thoughts:
I like using wristbands to identify folks willing to be dragged aside to help mitigate crises.
Daily gatherings, possibly utilizing multiple rooms or areas to keep group size down since 20 person groups tend to be overwhelming for some people.
A list of quiet spaces and useful mental health information should be given out in the on-boarding paper pile if we can get the Home Office to play along.