The people doing the most to support young people's mental health are, across this cohort, among the least supported themselves. Founders, frontline staff, parents, teachers, and community leaders absorb trauma daily, manage organizational survival on thin margins, and show up for their communities without anyone asking how they're doing. The interviews make clear that unless these supporters receive deliberate wellbeing resources, the care they provide becomes unsustainable.

The Weight on Founders and Frontline Teams

Rini Sinha, head of strategy and creative at Ember Mental Health, described a framework her team developed after years of working closely with grassroots organizations:

Ember's head of wellbeing holds one-on-one conversations with each partner organization to understand what they need. As Sinha put it, "For many of them, it's the first time someone has asked them that question. It's complex in this sector because you need to keep giving, giving, giving and not think about yourself."

June Larrieta, head of impact at Ember Mental Health, described what happens when that question goes unasked for too long: "Something we've observed through our work at Ember is that when there isn't the capacity or resources to focus on wellbeing, then team turnover tends to happen, with people leaving teams and cycles of hiring happening, which isn't ideal, particularly if you're the founder of an organization. We've also seen a lot of burnout, to be honest, and that brings questions about how to sustain long term."

Smaller organizations feel this acutely. “We're only 11 of us, so we're all stretched,” said Giselle Dass of CAFS in Sri Lanka (whom the SHM Foundation referred us to). The volume and severity of issues they handle across their school-based, clinical, and community work compounds the pressure. “It does get draining,” she said. “If there are serious, significant issues, it is an added strain on the organization.”

Larrieta pointed to flexible funding as part of the answer. "Flexible funding is incredibly important,” she said. “We spend a lot of time talking about the importance of flexible funds so teams can use these resources for their core costs, wellbeing, and sustaining their team's infrastructure to support these programs."

What Deliberate Support Looks Like in Practice

The organizations that have begun addressing staff wellbeing have taken notably different approaches. That variation matters, because it suggests wellbeing support cannot be standardized or prescribed from outside.

At CAFS, Dass built a structure that treats staff wellbeing as operational. "We have monthly well-being sessions,” she said. “As a team we sit, discuss things, hash things out. Every team member has a supervision meeting where they're allowed to talk about not just clients they see, not just workshops they do, but even issues that they personally have."

Rather than creating a separate wellbeing program, Roca, in Massachusetts, turned their own intervention model inward. "Fundamentally, part of what we recognize is that the tools that we use to support young people are the same tools that we can support ourselves with,” Anisha Chablani-Medley said. “We want our supervisors to use Rewire with staff when they're supervising."

In practice, that means staff process their own responses before engaging with the young people they serve. "A lot of times when we're doing processing around young people, we process our own stuff first to work through that,” she said. “That gives us a way to think about what's going on for us in those moments, how we can use ourselves best, and then trying to help the young person figure out what's going on for them."

Ember created a dedicated funding mechanism. "Many, many organizations are struggling with their team's wellbeing,” Sinha noted. “We have an Ember Caring for the Carers Grant that goes towards the wellbeing of those organizations." What organizations choose to do with those funds varies widely. "Wellbeing for organizations looks very different," she said. "For example, one organization said very clearly, 'We don't want to do anything that is related to a coaching session. We want to go out, do something away from our day-to-day work, probably have ice cream together.'"

Why This Matters for Young People

Chablani-Medley drew a direct line between how Roca supports its staff and whether those staff can do their jobs. "We've learned a lot about how to support staff in doing this work long-term,” she said. “The more we can train and equip staff, the more they feel supported, the more equipped they feel with tools to be able to show up with young people the way we most want."

She also named a tension that runs through nearly every organization in the cohort: "One of the challenges is between capacity building and operations. Our work is driven by crisis. You can get in a mode of operating that way. To equip staff, you have to be able to slow down and build capacity and competence so that people can manage in a way that doesn't take everyone out."

When staff do have that space, the effects are real. "If the staff is upset or stuck about what's going on or something that's happening with the young person, we have a tool,” she said. “It helps slow us all down and grounds us and gives us a way to understand what's happening for us, and then make a choice about what we want to do. When people are able to slow down and consider choices, it's relieving."

Parents and Families Carry The Same Weight, With Fewer Resources

The need for support doesn't end at organizational boundaries. Parents and families were repeatedly identified as the people youth depend on, yet they often lack both the tools and the emotional bandwidth to fulfill that role.

Ayuen Rhoda of Grassroots Empowerment and Development Organization (GREDO) in South Sudan (who Waves for Change referred us to) described parents who "can barely even afford two square meals in such a life, and they're not always available for their children emotionally or mentally." When parents are overwhelmed, children lose a critical source of stability. As Rhoda put it, "If all parents in South Sudan are taught how to handle their children using the Take 5 program, it would be easy for children to confide in their parents whenever they're going through a tough time. As it is, one thing that leads children away from home is when they know they cannot talk to their family about things that are challenging them, and that becomes a very big problem."

She was clear that no single organization can carry this alone: "It's not something to be managed single-handedly as an organization. It's something that needs all parties and institutions in this country to make it work."