Mental health and building resilience: Practical tools for well-being in 2025

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In this episode, Dr. Elizabeth Harry speaks with leaders from U-M (Dr. Kelcey Stratton), Office of Counseling and Workplace Resilience (Dr. Whitney Begeman) and MHealthy (Karen Schmidt) about key mental health and well-being challenges in 2025. They explore how post-pandemic trauma, burnout, social isolation and workplace stress continue to impact health care professionals.

The trio of guests share insights on practical tools like micro-breaks, peer support through the COMPASS program and nature-based practices from the NatureRx initiative. They emphasize the power of small, sustainable habits—like five-minute daily check-ins and better sleep hygiene—to boost resilience. Whether you're a caregiver, leader, or staff member, this conversation offers meaningful strategies for thriving in body, mind and spirit.

Episode guests:

Kelcey Stratton, Ph.D.
Whitney Begeman, Psy.D., L.P.
Karen Schmidt, M.P.H.

Resources:

• Office of Counseling and Workplace Resilience (OCWR)
• MHealthy
• Well-being Collective

Transcript

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

Welcome to the Well-Being at Michigan Medicine podcast. I'm Dr. Elizabeth Harry, and I'm thrilled to have our team from OCWR, or the Office of Counseling and Workplace Resilience, joining us today.

In 2025, well-being isn't just about green smoothies and gym memberships, it's about creating sustainable balance in a world that moves faster than ever. From navigating digital overload to redefining self-care and mental health, the conversation around health is more personal, more holistic and more essential than ever. Whether you're a therapist, health coach, or someone just trying to feel better in your daily life, this is the year to rethink what thriving really looks like. Let's talk about what it means to be truly well in body, mind, and spirit in the world we're living in now.

So thank you all for joining us. And could you just start by giving a brief introduction of yourself, your work at Michigan Medicine and what brought you to the work you're doing now?

Kelcey Stratton:

Hi, I'm Kelcey Stratton. I serve as the chief behavioral health strategist in university HR. And my role focuses on supporting faculty and staff mental health. And so I have the pleasure of working with a lot of campus and Michigan Medicine partners as we think about mental health at the individual team and organizational level.

And I've always been really interested in the interplay of individual mental health in the environment or workplace mental health. And so helping people connect to their strengths, their inner resilience, but also looking at those systems and organizational level factors that influence mental health has been really important for me.

Whitney Begeman:

And I'm Whitney Begeman. I am the director of the Michigan Medicine Office of Counseling and Workplace Resilience. I'm a clinical psychologist by background, and in my role I lead a team of healthcare professionals who focus on supporting the psychological health of our healthcare community. We provide short-term counseling services as well as workplace resilience training and interventions at the team, the unit and the department level. And what brings me to my work is a deep care for caring for those who care for others.

Karen Schmidt:

Well, good afternoon everyone, and thank you Dr. Harry for having us today. We are excited to be here in part of this conversation. My name is Karen Schmidt and I'm the senior director for Health and Well-Being Services. We support faculty and staff. And under Health and Well-Being Services, we have three units. One is our mental and emotional health colleagues, so you'll be hearing from Kelcey and Whitney today from the Office of Counseling and Workplace Resilience. As well as our faculty and staff counseling and consultation office on the campus side.

Health and Well-Being Services also includes MHealthy, which is our wellness risk reduction and culture of health efforts. So that's things from physical activity to nutrition, alcohol management, tobacco treatment, social determinants of health. And we also have a community initiative called Project Healthy Schools.

The third bucket within Health and Well-Being Services is our Child and Family care services where we provide resources to help balance professional and personal life as well as host and run three children's centers. We're excited to be here today.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

Well, I'm so glad to have you all, and I just want to start by thanking you all for the incredible work and breadth of the support that you all offer. I often tell people we have an embarrassment of riches at University of Michigan in terms of support in this way.

So I'm curious, you have many vantage points that you're able to see our faculty and staff from across all the work that you do. And I'm curious, as you look at 2025 and thinking about specifically mental health, what are some of the biggest challenges that you see for the mental health and well-being of our faculty and staff at University of Michigan?

Whitney Begeman:

When I reflect on the requests for services at the Office of Counseling and Workplace Resilience, both individually and for team support, three things immediately come to mind in that. Continued impact of trauma and stress from living and working through the pandemic very much is still top of mind for folks. As well as grief and moral distress related to the challenges of caring for patients with increasingly complex needs. And the last thing I would say really concerns about physical and psychological safety in a dynamic environment such as Michigan Medicine.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

And I think those are probably echoed across the country would be my guess. Have you talked to your colleagues nationally? What are we seeing across the country?

Whitney Begeman:

Yeah, Michigan Medicine is certainly reflective of what we're seeing at other organizations, healthcare and otherwise, just in an academic medical center, universities at large.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

And Karen and Kelcey, I'm curious when you think about the health and well-being challenges more broadly, what are you seeing that people are facing this year?

Kelcey Stratton:

There's a lot of change and uncertainty in the world, and so that shows up in people's lives, personal lives, professional lives, and that can show up maybe in anxiety, worries about the future. And so helping people navigate change and uncertainty.

Another thing that comes to mind is a conversation around social isolation, finding a sense of belonging and community and perhaps since the pandemic over these last several years, helping people connect to those communities that are supportive to them. We know how important relationships are for overall health and well-being. So that's a really important focus.

Karen Schmidt:

Kelcey, in addition to the mental and emotional health needs, we look at the data from the MHealthy Health Questionnaire and in 2024, we had about 24,000 folks complete the Health Questionnaire. And what we learned as we think about different health risks is that sleep, about 54% of Michigan medicine folks who completed the Health Questionnaire, which was around 12,000 individuals, was one of the highest health risks.

Second was physical inactivity at about 34%. And we know that one of the high areas of stress that folks have is financial well-being. So we have an initiative around financial well-being and social determinants of health to help folks address and meet basic needs as well as food security.

And finally, I'd share child care needs continue to be of concern. And so our child and family care resources do a beautiful job providing resources and helping folks connect to resources that help with child, elder and self-care.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

I have to say, I have availed myself of those resources many times on snow days when we need backup child care. So I have to say thank you for offering those resources.

Kelcey, I just want to touch on something that you said that I think is so important, this idea of connection and isolation and how have you seen that shift sort of post-pandemic culturally with this tension between the flexibility that remote work offers us, and particularly as we think about child care stresses and also that loss of sort of connection or ability to come together as a community?

Kelcey Stratton:

It's a great question, and I don't think there's a single right answer for it either when we talk with teams that some teams have really set an intention around connecting with one another, whether they're working remotely or hybrid or in person. But I think that commitment to really checking in on one another to connecting on a regular basis is really important.

I agree that having flexibility in one's work and personal life can be really beneficial and perhaps people are being able to invest more time in their other relationships too, which is wonderful. And so that's a nice trade-off. And at the same time again, how do we make sure that that intention is set around relationships, that people are finding those relationships to be valuable and supportive for them. And there are even some organizational programs that we've been able to develop to further support, like our peer support program is a way to really bring social connection into this really busy and demanding and stressful healthcare environment and helping people connect with their colleagues in new ways.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

I love that. Can you tell us just a little bit more about the peer support program and how people can find it?

Kelcey Stratton:

Yes. So our peer support program is called COMPASS, and that stands for Compassionate Peers and Stress Support. But we also really appreciated that metaphor that when there are challenges, we often rely on other people to help us find our way. And so it's about connecting faculty, staff, really anyone at Michigan Medicine has access to the peer support program, but connecting people with other individuals who maybe work in similar environments really understand it, they get it in a very unique kind of way. And then they are available for confidential social support, emotional support, guidance. They can help bridge to other resources. So this is really meant to be a peer-to-peer kind of support. And there's a website that people can check out, its compass.med.umich.edu, that gives a brief overview of what the program is.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

And will that help them reach out if they want to be able to connect, they can do through the website?

Kelcey Stratton:

Yes.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

Great. Thank you. And so I'm wondering what you all are seeing, and particularly Whitney in some of the interactions that you've been supporting folks through, of how people are managing stress and anxiety in a world that feels sort of always on.

Whitney Begeman:

Yeah, it's such a relevant topic to explore. From the OCWR perspective, our counseling and workplace resilience services aim to help our community members develop their understanding and awareness of their own strengths and growth edges so that they may more skillfully and intentionally navigate their daily lives. And whether it's in a counseling appointment, an educational presentation, a team-based intervention or a leader consultation, our focus together is going to be on thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. And we're going to assist folks with developing skills and perspectives that can help them respond to or move through the demands of their day in a way that both allows folks to feel and be effective while also prioritizing their psychological health.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

That's amazing. And so as you're thinking about the topic issues that bring people to OCWR, what are some great reasons for people to reach out and are there any particular reasons that you would not be the right place to reach out?

Whitney Begeman:

In almost all cases the right place to start, I think I appreciate that idea of there's no wrong door, if we are not the right place to find you, the answers or the interventions you need, we will work with our partners to get you to the right answers or the solutions you need.

And one of the things that I think is unique to our office is the leader consultation. And that's one thing I'd like to highlight, that leadership can be quite lonely and we're expected to hold a lot, navigate a lot, pivot a lot, and there can be real value in having an outside set of eyes and ears to help consult and collaborate on coming to an awareness or brainstorming possible solutions or pathways. Again, whether that is a direct offering that OCWR can help develop with you or if we can clarify other partners to join with a leader in supporting, whether it be themselves or their team.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

That's such a great resource and one that actually came up very recently in our Belonging Retreat of this sort of isolation that leaders often. So I really appreciate you highlighting that. And as we think about some of these issues that are affecting our leaders, affecting our front line, one of the topics that we talk about particularly in the workplace environment is burnout. So we've talked a lot about mental health and behavioral health so far, which is very important and a medical condition. And we have trained clinicians and trained professionals as you are to help treat that. And then we have the occupational hazard of burnout, which is becoming a very prevalent issue and has been on the rise for many years even before COVID. And I'm curious if you could share, as you've had experience in talking with people that may be experiencing burnout, what are some early warning signs that you see that people often might ignore or might not realize are early signs of burnout?

Whitney Begeman:

Oftentimes people will reach out to OCWR for any range of concerns, and for them it may not be registering as burnout. And in the context of those conversations or interactions, I would say what we tend to notice is that our Michigan medicine community is really passionate, dedicated, and folks are highly capable. And so it can be challenging for people to really be able to identify when ambition or a pull to work harder is edging them toward burnout rather than professional fulfillment.

And then the other thing I would say that we tend to notice is that people start to experience a lessened capacity or awareness of the ways that very simple self-care or decompression activities can sincerely be helpful. It kind of just starts to fade away that idea that there are very accessible small ways we can dose ourselves with self-care. And folks are instead very focused their goals and working more or harder.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

And this decompression piece that you mentioned is so important. And so I'm curious, when you're working with folks that are experiencing burnout or that you think are maybe having a challenge decompressing, what are your favorite go-to tools or tips that you recommend for them?

Whitney Begeman:

I actually might invite Kelcey to comment on this one.

Kelcey Stratton:

Sure. One of my favorite resources that the OCWR team has are these start of shift and end of shift cards, and they're very simple reminders but they're also really powerful, about how to create some structure and some boundaries around one's day, but also time and energy and demands. And there are also these invitations to just slow down and to pause and have even micro-moments of rest because we all need to rest and recover. And finding these routines that are supportive for a sense of calm or connection with other people can be really important.

I've always appreciated the work of George Bonanno is a resilience researcher who has talked about this resilience flexibility sequence, which is really a simple three questions. It's what do I need? So that requires some emotional awareness, but also some context awareness about what's happening right now. And then what can I do? So really simply what is possible in this moment? Because it's not always possible to change a difficult situation, but what can any of us do in a situation to make it a little bit better or a little bit more manageable. And then this isn't working? And really that feedback. And we all need a lot of tools that not every skill or strategy is going to work all the time, a little bit of trial and error. And so that awareness, having a repertoire of different skills and tools, but I would say making that time for pause and rest in important ways throughout the day is really vital.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

I love that. We recently had Dr. Sanjay Saint on talking about his Sacred Moments program that he's working on, and he had a similar sort of recommendation of creating the space to allow those moments to occur within the healthcare setting. And similarly, we had Ethan Cross on who was talking about the toolbox for emotional and how so many of us sort of stumble upon tools that work for us but maybe aren't kind of explicitly taught these things can really help. And so I love this idea of even just thinking about what can I do? What's within my sphere of control? What do I have access to? Which is really helpful.

And so as you think about these tools or trends, what are your favorite ones that have data that we know really work to support mental clarity and really help people with their emotional balance?

Kelcey Stratton:

Well, let's share one thing that is a little bit newer in terms of our resources around U of M. although the research and the anecdotal evidence are certainly much more developed, but that there are nature-based practices that can be really supportive for health and well-being. So research shows that exposure to nature can reduce anxiety and depression, it can improve compassion. It can in a work environment boost creativity and innovation. It can also help people connect to experiences of awe and wonder and curiosity. And so at U of M, we have the NatureRx initiative, which is a collection of various resources, it's a free app that's available through the Michigan App, but it outlines 100 different places around Michigan medicine in our campus community where people can access nature. And of course, people have all the ways to access nature in their homes, their communities, even looking at a window, looking at a picture. Experiencing nature in many different ways can be really beneficial.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

Oh, it's so true. I have a couple colleagues that between clinical shifts on one of our days will go walk a little bit in the Arboretum, I mean, we're so lucky to be so close to such a resource, but it makes such an incredible difference and I agree. I really appreciate that work. That's amazing. And so if people are looking at these resources or thinking about trying to make a change in the way that they live their lives and want to build a new habit, how do you recommend starting a small realistic habit that they can start to feel better sort of quickly if they're not feeling well now?

Karen Schmidt:

Yeah, we like to think about doing things in small little bites. One is just implementing even a five-minute rule at the beginning of your day and at the end of your day to really pause in what Kelcey and Whitney were talking about, pause to take a few moments to just be present in your body and feel what your body needs in that moment. It might need some stretching, it might need some gentle yoga. Maybe you're hungry, maybe you're thirsty, maybe a headache is coming on. And so it's important just to take that time to find out what does your body need? And that helps to set the foundation to really be mindful and active throughout the day.

Then as you move into the day, making just small shifts of the daily habits that you have, and it could be things that are very small, whether that is taking a short break, stepping outside, going into the Arboretum, telling yourself, gosh, I want to eat more fruits and vegetables, but maybe it's eating, adding one vegetable to one meal a day, making small shifts into your daily habits and achieving these small wins can lead to more confidence and self-efficacy and engaging in these behaviors as well as helping you to try new ones.

And as we think about sleep, that was one of the highest risks for the Michigan Medicine population. We know from one of our colleagues, Dr. Deirdre Conroy, who is part of the Wellness Influencer Network as well as a clinical professor of psychiatry, that sleep impacts our well-being. And we know that sleep disorders can impact our functioning at work and at home. And so Dr. Conroy has given us some really basic tips to think about how do we ensure that we are getting proper sleep, whether that is setting a sleep schedule, going to bed around the same time, waking up around the same time, and what do we do during the day to make sure we are setting ourselves up for a good night's sleep, whether that is minimizing caffeine, not smoking, getting some fresh air, getting some daylight to reset our circadian rhythm. And so all of these small little habits can really set you up, and it doesn't have to be something big, it can just take some small steps to really set up your day.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

I love that. And especially this idea of very small and tangible and not making it too hard on ourselves and not putting too much pressure on ourselves. And the other piece that sometimes I hear from people is there's no space, there's no space in my day, there's no space or time for these things. And one of the things that I encourage people to think about when they say that is check your screen time usage, because you might find that you probably have at least those 10 minutes that you talked about easily. If it means cutting down on news consumption for a little bit maybe, or social media or however we spend some of our time, that might not be restorative in the same way as some of these practices and particularly before bed because we know that can keep us up later.

So you all have shared some really amazing resources for support, exciting programs. I just want to offer the opportunity to share any other of your favorite initiatives that you all are working on that are here to promote wellness, well-being and general health, behavioral health and mental health here at Michigan Medicine.

Whitney Begeman:

One of the things I might like to highlight is something that I have grown passionate about over recent years, which is self-compassion for healthcare communities. And it is an evidence-based approach to improve well-being and personal resilience in healthcare professionals by teaching in the moment self-compassion skills to deal with distressing emotional situations that occur both in the workspace as well as at home, and the very short burst practices that you can engage for supporting your self-care to cultivate self-compassion, which then ultimately helps to develop compassion for others, really helps to support well-being.

Our OCWR team was trained in this framework earlier this year, and we've started incorporating these practices and perspectives into our counseling services as well as other educational programs, and we have gotten rave reviews, so we are really excited to expand that offering into our community.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

That's amazing. One of the things I love so much about the self-compassion work is that idea that you're not alone and that normalization and there's so many spaces where that feeling of feeling alone in whatever it is that you're experiencing can just amplify the experience. And so I love that sort of human connection piece of that work. That's really amazing.

Karen Schmidt:

Yeah. I'll add onto that, Whitney. A few things that we have at Michigan Medicine. One is our Social Determinants of Health Initiative where again, as we think about folks struggling from a financial well-being perspective, wanting to ensure we're supporting individuals in particular those in salary band one or our lower wage earning categories. And if someone is experiencing a financial hardship, personal hardship, we have resource coaches that are available that can connect individuals with appropriate internal or community resources to help them navigate through this financial challenge.

And we're really excited because we will be expanding our resource coach access and bringing the coaches on site to South Wellness Center for some office hours where folks can come in, talk with free confidential individuals to really work through any situation, whether if they're working through an eviction, an unexpected funeral expense, can't pay their utility or transportation bill. So really helping individuals meet basic needs.

We also have a food sharing cupboard that we'll be opening up in South Wellness Center, and that will be our 11th food sharing cupboard across Michigan Medicine. And this is stocked with non-perishable goods and some personal hygiene products.

The other thing we're really excited about is our Champion Network, and we couldn't do the work we do without our champions. We have about 600 MHealthy Wellness Champions across our organization, 300 of which are at Michigan Medicine. That number will probably go up when we open enrollment up again in June. But these are the folks who work with the unhealthy staff to build action plans and tailored plans for that unit based on the health interests and needs within that particular unit. And so that's something that tapping a wellness champion, they'll work with a coordinator and the champion supervisor as well to roll out well-being strategies.

And then finally, I'll just share, we do bring, the UHL Wellness Center does offer very reasonable memberships if folks are able to step away from patient care for a few minutes and just want to move. So that is also available as well as exercise and relaxation classes on site.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

Those are great resources. Can I ask if someone wanted to connect with one of the resource coaches, what is the best way to go about doing that?

Karen Schmidt:

Yes, it would just be through our website or they could send email directly to us and we could work either in person or virtually with folks. It's confidential, it's free. These are trained social workers that really come from a place of a big heart in a lot of compassion as Whitney you were mentioning, to really get folks to the resources they need.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

That's fantastic. And I have to put a plug in for the UH South Gym because I go there and I love it.

Karen Schmidt:

Great.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

I do have to put a plug in for that.

Karen Schmidt:

Awesome.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

So Kelcey, when we started, you were talking about the scope of this work all the way from the individual to the system. And if you could make some recommendations based on what you've seen either locally or nationally, as we think about organizations like ours, like Michigan Medicine, like University of Michigan and others that really want to promote well-being and better health, where are some of the first places to start with thinking about policy changes or cultural shifts that can really help promote well-being and better health for the people at that organization?

Kelcey Stratton:

Well, one of the things our teams have done in the last year is develop a mental health strategic plan. And so that was an opportunity to work with a lot of different partners and collaborators across Michigan Medicine as well as the U of M campuses to really focus on strategy, what are we trying to change and to enhance, but also to maintain a lot of the wonderful resources and programs that are already in place. And I mentioned that first because no one can do this alone. And so it does require those really strong partnerships.

Here at U of M, we have the Well-being Collective and well-being is also part of the Vision 2034 plan. And so there's a public commitment to promoting well-being, which is really important. So that is a place to start. Part of that work along with all of our collaborators is to think about how to really integrate well-being into new policies or existing policies. So it could start with a policy review for instance. Or when we think about practices, what is supportive of well-being and what is maybe not so supportive of well-being? How do we remove some of the pebbles in the shoes as well as working on those bigger, more complex problems? And so I would say having that community of collaborators is really vital. Some of the work that all of us have been doing, and Whitney mentioned before, is about leader and manager support and training and consultation because we also know how influential managers and leaders are for setting the tone for the organization, but also within their teams at promoting well-being within their teams.

And so to help people develop some of those skills or to maintain those skills, to have guidance through difficult situations. Again, we all need extra support and guidance, especially when difficulties arise. So that can be another way to work at that organizational team level.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

So if someone's listening to all of this frontline individual all the way to one of our leaders and they decide that they want to take better care of themselves or their team, the local area, where should they start? There's a lot of resources you all described.

Whitney Begeman:

I'm partial of course, to inviting everyone in our community to engage with counseling. I encourage anyone to prioritize taking time for the short-term counseling services at OCWR as a helpful place to start. You need not be in crisis or severe distress to be able to benefit from an hour of being cared for and attended to by a trained mental health professional. I think that's one of the unique factors of a workplace mental health service, that we can be flexible and creative in responding to whatever concern somebody might have and then linking to additional resources beyond what we provide at OCWR.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

I love that. And I love how you said earlier that there's no wrong first door, front door, I can't remember exactly how you said it. So really driving home the point for folks that if they are feeling like they're facing a struggle and they don't know where to start that starting with OCWR is a great first place to start. And so can you remind our listeners how do they find you?

Whitney Begeman:

You can access OCWR services at counseling.med.umich.edu, at that website you can either send us a quick email or give us a phone call and simply acknowledge that you would like to speak with a counselor, and we will get you going.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

Thank you so much. And any other additional insights or advice you all would like to offer to our listeners before we close up for the day?

Kelcey Stratton:

I can share that May is Mental Health Awareness Month. And so this is an opportunity to do some more communications and outreach to our community to highlight various events and also to highlight the many, many resources that are available. And so whether it is in May or any month of the year, I would invite people to again, maybe make an intention or a commitment to learning something about mental health, checking out a resource, maybe initiating therapy, a counseling contact, or to have a conversation with someone to make it normal to talk about mental health.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

That's wonderful. And the piece I would add to that too is checking in on our friends and colleagues. A lot of times it's a lot easier for us to support someone else in seeking help than it is for us to get help for ourselves. And so if we have a sort of reciprocal community where we're all kind of checking in and thinking if we know someone that might need help, we can always make the suggestion or awareness of the resources such as reaching out to OCWR.

Karen Schmidt:

Yeah. And I'll just to kind of play on that, Liz, is what I was thinking about was reaching out for connection as well as expressing kindness and just making sure folks know that you're here. And so whether it's practicing kindness for oneself or kindness for someone else, but that goes a long way to boost well-being.

The other practice I would just offer up to close is the practice of gratitude. I know our colleagues at the Ross Business School in particular in positive organizational scholarship, talk about the importance of expressing gratitude to impact and boost well-being an exercise and activity called three good things. And it's about at the end of a day, just writing down in a journal what are three good things that happen today and reflect on that, whether it's watching the sunrise, maybe getting a good cup of coffee, getting a hug from a loved one, but that goes far to really boost and it does wonders for your well-being and your stress and your mood and your emotional health.

Dr. Elizabeth Harry:

Yeah, it's a really amazing work, that three good things and actually more effective at six weeks than an SSRI, which is pretty impressive. Yeah. So really, really good work. I just really want to thank all three of you for coming here, for sharing your expertise, all the amazing work that you're doing to offer support to all of our folks at the University of Michigan, Michigan Medicine. And thank you to all of our listeners for tuning into another episode of the Well-Being at Michigan Medicine podcast.