237: Helping Farmworkers Manage Stress

Update: 2024-07-18

Description

Farmers and ranchers have some of the highest suicide rates of all United States occupations. Misty Oebel, Health and Farm Stress Extension Educator at Michigan State University works with a team to help farmworkers manage depression and anxiety. Their educational initiatives, outreach, and teletherapy give farmworkers who often live in remote areas access to help without a commute or social stigma. Misty highlights the importance of community support, recognizing signs of stress, and maintaining a resilient mindset through learned optimism. She reminds listeners that the farmer is the most important asset on the farm.

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Transcript

Before we jump in, please note that this episode contains discussion on suicide. If you prefer to skip this one, there are nearly 250 other episodes to choose from. If you need resources or support. Call or text the suicide and crisis lifeline at 9 8, 8 for 24 hour free counseling services in the United States.

[00:00:26 ] Beth Vukmanic: Of all occupations in the United States, farmers and ranchers have some of the highest suicide rates. Welcome to sustainable winegrowing with vineyard team. Where we bring you the latest in science and research for the wine industry. I'm Beth Vukmanic, executive director. Since 1994, we have brought you the latest science-based practices, experts, growers, and wine industry tools through both infield and online education so that you can grow your business. Please raise a glass with us as we cheers to 30 years.

In today's podcast Craig Macmillan, critical resource manager at Niner wine estates with a long time sip certified vineyard and the first ever sip certified winery. Speaks with Misty Oebel. Health and farm stress extension educator at Michigan state university. Misty works with a team to help farm workers manage depression and anxiety. Their educational initiatives, outreach and teletherapy, give farm workers who often live in remote areas.

Access to help without a commute or social stigma. Misty highlights the importance of community support, recognizing signs of stress and maintaining a resilient mindset through learned optimism. She reminds listeners that the farmer is the most important asset on the farm. Before we get into the interview, I wanted to share a message from Lupita, a vineyard team.

Juan Nevarez is Memorial scholar. She says my parents left Mexico to give my siblings and me a better future. I want to make them proud by finishing school and pursuing my dream of becoming a pediatrician and the Salinas valley so that I can give back to my community.

We know that higher education is important to many students, but paying for college could be challenging.

This unique program provides financial and support services to the children of California's vineyard and winery workers. So they can earn a higher degree. You can help a student like Lupita, make their dreams come true by making a gift. By visiting vineyard team.org/scholarship. Or look for the link in our show notes. Now let's listen in.

[00:02:35 ] Craig Macmillan: Our guest today is Misty Oebel. She is a health and farm stress extension educator with Michigan state university extension. Thanks for being on the podcast.

[00:02:44 ] Misty Oebel: Well, so much for having me.

[00:02:46 ] Craig Macmillan: And today we're going to talk about a concept called farm stress. When I first heard the term farm stress, I was thinking of farms that were stressed, you know, land that had been overworked or was in decline and that kind of thing, cause that's a lot of the stuff that I talk about and study, but that's not what we're talking about in this context.

What does farm stress mean in your world?

[00:03:05 ] Misty Oebel: So in my world, I'm focused on behavioral health. I look at providing education about stress, particularly chronic stress and its impact on the agricultural community. So I think it might be more accurate if we went by the term of like farmer stress or stress on the farm, but that's not the way it's titled.

So farm stress is what we go by.

[00:03:25 ] Craig Macmillan: One of the things that brought your project to our attention, and it's really extensive. MSU Extension is doing a lot of work in this area. It's really impressive, and we'll hear some more about that. Suicide rates are one of the highest in the occupations of farming and ranching of any occupations in the United States, actually.

Which a lot of people might be surprised to find out. And related to that, there's also very high incidence of Depression and or at least meeting the criteria for depression and for generalized anxiety disorder. And, you know, by these, I want to make sure that we're clear that, you know, we're not talking about simply being like, Oh, I'm sad.

Oh, I'm depressed, but actually things that impact your ability to function, your actual mental illness conditions

[00:04:05 ] Misty Oebel: Right. That's exactly right. When we're looking at these numbers a lot of we're studying it through self report. So it's asking questions. It's not asking a question like, do you feel depressed? It's asking a question like, are you having problems with your appetite? How is your sleep changed? How are your relationships with other people?

Are you experiencing irritability on a regular basis? Those are the kinds of questions that they ask.