Michael Zeeb
Employment Services
I am one of the Instructors for Peer Employment Training at META Services. Every 6 or 7 weeks, I have the opportunity to accompany 20 people on a wonderful journey of self-transformation and skill-building that leads to certification as a Peer Support Specialist. These 20 people, like myself, receive psychiatric services and have found their own unique ways to recover.
I have been teaching Peer Employment Training since 2003. I have had the privilege of teaching the course almost 30 times in Phoenix. During the last two years, I have taught it in Alaska, New Jersey, and New Zealand. In 2005, I taught the first Peer Employment Training offered onsite at the Arizona State Hospital. The transformations that I see as students “remember who they are” over the course of the 6-week training is beautiful. Even more amazing are the changes I see in graduates after they’ve been working a while.
My mother worked as an Advocate for people recovering from psychiatric issues. The example she set was inspiring and I’m sure influenced the choices I’ve made in my career. Another influential factor has been my own personal experience with mental illness.
While my symptoms began early in life, I was able to hold them in. I started having serious challenges with them when I was a sophomore at Sarah Lawrence College in the 1980’s. I learned some tools that helped me begin to save my own life. I utilized some clinical tools, but other non-clinical tools were just as important, including artistic expression, family support, exercise, diet, and practicing my own form of spirituality. Maintaining employment and continuing in school even during my toughest times were important tools. I was able to retain my identity as a student and worker. I financed my own education and graduated with a B.A. in Literature in 1988. That gave me a sense of self-efficacy.
Recovery through work has been a major theme in my life. I worked as a Counselor in Brooklyn for a couple of years, helping young adults from lower-income families to maintain employment and pursue educational opportunities. In 1990, I moved to Arizona to reconnect with my family where I taught writing to adults at Academy of Business College. I then became a Behavioral Health Technician, a Teaching Assistant and eventually an Emergency-Certified Special Education Teacher at Arizona Youth Associates. In order to be effective in the classroom, I also had to overcome my shyness! What I didn’t think I could do for myself, I learned that I could do to help these kids. I also wrote and directed plays with a theater company in Phoenix.
My next job was with the State of Arizona Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor for 2 ½ years. I also took classes at the U of A, and Lori Ashcraft was one of my instructors. Lori and this course inspired me. I found out about META and began referring people there for Peer Employment Training. I watched the wonderful transformations as they graduated and went to work at META. When META offered me a position, I jumped at it, and the rest is history! I am proud of the new credentials that Lori and Gene have encouraged me to place after my name since starting this job: “I.T.E.” Or “I’m The Evidence.” I’m surrounded and inspired on a daily basis by students and colleagues at META who are Living Evidence of Recovery.