BIG BEND NATIONAL PARK — The Warriors Research Institute (WRI), a Baylor Scott and White health system program, is helping bolster mental healthcare for the Big Bend National Park community by establishing a peer support program.
WRI was founded 13 years ago to improve care for first responders and veterans and is now expanding its scope to include park employees. Since September 2022, WRI researchers have been visiting Big Bend from Waco, conducting trainings and helping establish a program where members of the park community support one another through mental health challenges.
“There are 16 peer supporters that are active right now,” Dr. Suzy Gulliver, a clinical psychologist and director of WRI, said. “So we have this robust program, and we’ve been going back about every month to do a check in and to give more skills to the group of people that are doing the most peer support.”
WRI staff developed a peer support curriculum for the park after a series of initial focus groups. Through an anonymous survey, park staff nominated individuals to become peer support specialists. The idea is to rely less on professional help and more on coworkers and community members, Gulliver said, who have a greater understanding of specific job stressors and exposure to living in an extremely remote place.
“Park Service work has all sorts of challenges — anything from having to respond to a species of wildlife that’s been hit by a vehicle and has to be humanely destroyed to not having enough people to man the gates,” Gulliver said.
“I haven’t fought a fire or chased down a bad guy or killed a bear, but a peer supporter, matched to that occupational group, has done those things, and they know what it feels like,” she added. “When they are given a few effective communication skills, listening skills, assessment skills — when they have those in their hands — they can have greater power than a well-intentioned but quite removed clinician in coping with day-to-day, job-specific stress.”
Deputy Superintendent Rick Gupman said he first pursued more mental health support for first responders as the head of law enforcement for the national park, then when he was promoted to his current role he realized the broader need for increased mental healthcare for the entire park community. Employees of Aramark, the park’s concessionaire, the Big Bend Conservancy, the park’s friends group, and Border Patrol are now also part of the peer support program.
“It’s been a slow expansion, trying to recognize need and acknowledge ability and resources internally,” Gupman said. “We can’t really take care of everyone, but we’re trying to build that program so that we can serve a larger group.”
WRI meets with peer support groups monthly, online and in person, and will return to the park in February to train a new cohort of peer support specialists. They are able to offer their services to the national park for free and are continuing to pursue grants in order to continue to do so, Gulliver said.
While peer support programs can be an effective “first line of intervention,” Gulliver said, specialists are also trained to know when to refer an individual to a professional psychologist. Both her and Dr. Victoria Torres, who is also heading up the initiative, are available to assist peer support specialists if they are unsure how to move forward with a situation, she said.
“In the initial training, and then through every check in, we work to make sure that people’s decision trees are effective and ethical, frankly, so that people know what’s in their lane and what isn’t,” Gulliver said.
Peer support specialists are also trained in how to identity and respond to those at risk of suicide, a critical mission of the program, Gupman said.
Times where more professional assistance may be needed in addition to peer support, Gulliver said, are in the wake of significant crises. Within the past year, two visitors have died by suicide in the park, promping local agencies including park employees to respond to difficult scenes. “You do want to do follow-up when people respond to a crisis event, but it’s not boiler plate.” Gulliver said. “It’s very adaptive to the event itself and to the people who participated in the event.”
But even in such extreme situations, she said, peer support holds up as an effective tool, she said. “We have increasingly a better evidence base that peer support is, in some cases, even more effective in dealing with the common disorders in the mental illness arena than some professional help,” Gulliver said.
The concept of peer support has a long history, she said, but gained traction with the United States Department of Veterans Affairs and National Alliance on Mental Illness as a way to treat first responders in the wake of 9/11.
While WRI is currently working with Big Bend National Park exclusively, they are interested in expanding services to other parks where the model developed in Big Bend will serve as a template, she said.
“Big Bend is leading the way for other Park Service [employees.] Because at the national level, they have a peer support program, and they have trained peer supporters for critical incidents, but they don’t have a boots on the ground standard of having multiple people trained in peer support right at your home park,” Gulliver said.
Gupman — a peer support specialist himself — said, so far, the program is a success and the support of WRI clinicians is vital to ensuring the peer supporters themselves are taken care of. “Peer support specialists are there because they genuinely want to help people,” Gupman said. “But then this is the layer of people that are taking care of the peer support specialists who, frankly, have to deal with some pretty stressful stuff.”
Gupman said he continues to advocate for an increase in mental health professionals in South Brewster County, particularly an in-person option in addition to telehealth appointments. He said he intends to reintroduce the topic to the Big Bend Regional Hospital District, which first heard his concerns on the matter last March. As it stands, those residing in the national park wishing to visit with a therapist in person must travel to Alpine — a two-hour trip each way.
“We joke about mental health days, but that’s literally going to be a mental health day in order to see a mental health professional in person,” Gupman said.
“We choose to live in Big Bend National Park. But that doesn’t mean that we choose to have mental health crises while we’re living here,” he added. “I’m very much advocating for an increase in mental health professionals in South Brewster County, for everyone.”