Staff Spotlight: Alijah Lanteigne, Care Manager

Care Manager Alijah Lanteigne was meant to be in a career helping others, first discovering cosmetology before landing at United Counseling Service (UCS) in 2016. She loved working directly with people, but didn’t like the need for perfectionism that cosmetology required. Now, as a care manager, she feels happy to be in a position helping others improve their lives every day, in a different way.

Alijah started her journey at UCS in the agency’s South Street Group Home, which gives adults with mental illness opportunities to build on independent living skills. After a few years, she moved to UCS’ Developmental Services division before taking a job at Southwest Vermont Supervisory Union to work with children. She returned to UCS and has been a care manager, formerly case manager, ever since. Alijah loves the opportunities her job allows her to guide her clients in making positive changes in their lives, and to celebrate all of the little victories along the way.

Celebrating little victories

“Our clients grow so much,” says Alijah. “Even if they’ve been with us for 30 years, they’re making these little changes along the way, and you can cheer them on. They still make accomplishments while they’re there. There are still things to celebrate and do. It’s super rewarding.”

Sometimes there are tough days, but often, clients return to UCS and thank staff for their help. Alijah believes that negative behaviors mean that someone is expressing a need and that everyone deserves to feel seen, heard, and understood. A lot of trust can be built on a foundation of simply listening to a client and showing up for them. Many of Alijah’s clients have experienced traumas, including childhood traumas, which can cause significant difficulties in navigating everyday life. Things like personal hygiene, caring for one’s home, and going to medical appointments are often challenges.

“One of the reasons I wanted to get into the mental health field was that the mind really intrigues me,” says Alijah. “The differences in synapses going off and how trauma changes that. One terrible event when you were a kid, that you didn’t even get to pick, can change your whole life—and you have to figure out how to get out of it.”

Trusting the process

Alijah emphasizes the importance of taking small steps to achieve big goals. She recalls helping one client learn self-care by breaking down the process into more manageable milestones. First, she used her cosmetology background to help her client with nail care, then taught her how to wash her hair in the sink. The process took a long time, but her client moved on to washing her hair in the shower, and then her self-care work began to pick up speed. “Slowly, as she took care of herself, she took care of her house,” says Alijah. “Up until she passed, she was doing those skills that we taught her.” That client made so much progress in her care routine that she was able to move into her own apartment.

Though some clients are only with UCS staff for brief periods of time, the effects can be impactful. Alijah will always remember one client who was with UCS for only a couple of weeks. She would check on him regularly, only ending her workday when she knew that he was safe. His mother expressed to Alijah and other staff how grateful she was that they looked out for him. She showed them photos of him when he was young, before he experienced substance use challenges. Alijah believes this experience affected the way she and her team worked together going forward.

“You always think of everybody as a human,” says Alijah. “I’ll never lose that part of it. You see them as a vulnerable human who needs support.”

Positive ripple effects

On a wider scale, the work Alijah and her team do ripples out into the community. Many of Alijah’s clients face challenges related to housing, and a housing shortage makes this even more pressing. Many clients have strained relationships with landlords, so Alijah and her team work to rebuild those relationships in the same ways they build trust with their clients—by listening, showing up, and doing the work. This can involve anything from helping a client clean their living space to checking in on a client regularly to make sure they are doing well to communicating directly with landlords. It’s not about a job description—it’s about doing what it takes to help someone live their best possible outcome.

Alijah and her team are of one mind when it comes to helping clients. “If we can do it and it’s within our means, you’ll catch us there.”

Their efforts to make good with local landlords made it possible for clients to rent apartments who were previously on a do-not-rent list. When one client experienced maintenance issues with her apartment, her landlord told Alijah that he had a better apartment for her client anyway. This is relationship-building that can’t be rushed and is invaluable to the community.

Alijah has high hopes for her community. One of her biggest concerns is youth mental health. She explains that her child’s school only has one mental health counselor for all students, and that the need is so much bigger than the number of counselors available to provide services in the community. She sees the effects of childhood trauma on the adults she works with every day and believes that if more young people can access mental health services, their mental health challenges can be eased in the future. Increasing accessibility is the key to tackling this issue, and it may be a long road to get there. With people like Alijah working to take on the challenge, we may get there a lot sooner than we think, one step at a time.