Speaker 2: CASAT Podcast Network.

Bianca McCall: Welcome to the NOCE Dose Opioid Crisis Unplugged. The NOCE Dose Opioid Crisis Unplugged is a concise and insightful podcast offering a deeper dive into the realities faced by professionals combating the opioid epidemic. Join us as we reconnect with expert panelists from our listening sessions, providing a behind the scenes look at their work and insights into the pressing issues of prevention and diversion, harm reduction, opioid use, treatment, recovery and reoccurrence prevention. Welcome to the nostos brought to you by the Nevada Opioid center of excellence at www.nvopioidcoe.org. I'm your host with the NOCE, Bianca D. McCall, going behind the front lines with the community stakeholders who are holding up to support the opioid response programming in the great silver state of Nevada. We're here to debrief after the latest. NOCE Sponsored listening session, the first of a two part series examining the opioid use disorder impact on special, special populations. And our guest today had to jump off of the listening session to catch a flight. So when I say she dropped from the sky like an angel on assignment to be with us today, I mean that quite literally. She landed touchdown and still made time for this conversation. That's dedication. So joining us today is Dr. Tara Raines, a passionate advocate for Nevada's youth and the deputy Director of the Children's Advocacy Alliance. She's a school psychologist by training with a deep commitment to early intervention, especially when it comes to catching emotional and behavioral risks before they turn into justice system involvement. Now she's led research on universal screening in schools. She's pushed for trauma informed and healing center approaches, which I love the sound of that. And she is a national leader in anti racist mental health practices, political police, in schools reform and building a more bilingual, culturally responsive workforce. Dr. Raines speaks the language of equity and care. I'm so excited to dive into this conversation with her today. Doc, how are you feeling today? How have you been since the listening session?

Dr. Tara Raines: I'm great, Bianca, thank you so much for having me on today. I'm happy we're going to get to have a little bit more conversation. I felt like things were just getting moving, just getting juicy on the listening session when I had to pop off. So, so I'm happy to be back and chat some more.

Bianca McCall: No, absolutely. And Dr. Raines thank you so much not only for being here today, but for the lens that you continue to bring to every space that you, that you enter, your perspective. It's so Needed, especially when it comes to bridging behavioral health education and policy in a way that actually reflects what youth and families are experiencing in real life. Right. And what stood out to me during, your time on the listening session was how consistently you called us to action. I love how you remind us that the system won't change itself and that you encourage us all. Yeah, you encourage us all to get involved, advocate, run for office even.

Dr. Tara Raines: You know, I think we have to. Right? Like, we. We have to own our community. And I think, you know, for years, a lot of folks have been passive and hoped for the best and expected. Expected leaders to make decisions that are in favor of all communities. And that isn't happening. And so we have to, you know, step up. And we need folks to run for office. We need folks to. To be the decision makers that our children and families need so that they can thrive.

Bianca McCall: Absolutely. And. And I'm. I'm gonna share a little bit of. A little bit of self disclosure here. Like, my mind, it's kind of like a running soundtrack, right? Life is a soundtrack. And so when Dr. Raines when you get on and you start telling us, you know, run for office and things, I have the song get up off that thing, you know, that just.

Dr. Tara Raines: It's about action, right? Like, we. So often we find ourselves, you know, in community groups or, you know, as concerned, Concerned people talking about the problems and not talking about the solutions and not, you know, drawing the path to. To the solution. Right? Like, if we know that there's a thing we need, then we need to get together and make that happen. and so I think, you know, we talk about our opioid crisis. We talk about, you know, the difficulties of kids experiencing trauma in schools. We talk about any. Any number of societal issues, any number of. Of issues that children and families are struggling with in Nevada. And we need to get some solution oriented, right? And come together on solutions. one of the things, if you don't mind, I'll talk a little bit about one of the things we got done this legislative session at Children's Advocacy Alliance. you know, we put together a coalition. We called it our Mental Health Action Coalition. Thanks to Ashley Pruitt. because she was like, because we want action. And I was like, yes, we want action. And, with that coalition, you know, we brought three bills to the legislature. And, you know, one of those bills made it out, was signed by the governor. And that's to build our children's mental health workforce. Because we could all agree, like, we don't have enough providers, we don't have enough training programs. We don't have the training programs. We need to really make sure that we have, have the workforce that we need for our state, for our kids, for our families. And so as that coalition, we came together, we decided, hey, this is a thing, and we took it to legislators. We were fortunate to have incredible Senator Win carry it for us. And it was signed by the governor, SB165. And so I think it just shows that if we can come together, if we can decide on solutions, if we can, you know, you know, work with our champions, then we can make a difference.

Bianca McCall: Yeah, yeah. So you mentioned, SB165, also SB95, major M wins for early intervention and workforce development. but we all know, Doc, that policy doesn't always translate into practice. What do you think needs to happen next, to make sure that schools can actually implement these changes in a way that centers care and equity?

Dr. Tara Raines: Yeah, I think, that's huge. But that goes back. I'm going to go back to beating my workforce drum. Right. Policies, come out and they're not always, rolled out with the people who are involved in the implementation fully understanding the why and the how. And so I think being intentional about, and I think we can, we can see that with some of the policy that rolled out for restorative justice, you know, over the last few years, right. Like it came out like as this big nebulous thing, like we're going to do this thing and it's called restorative practices. And this is the thing, right. And, but the time to really train teachers, to train school leaders, to train families on what to expect, expect from these practices, it didn't happen. Right. And so when, when you have policies roll out with good intentions and, and shaky implementation, then, then we see the failure of the policy. Right. And then folks say, see, we tried it and it didn't work. Right. But it didn't work because we didn't really fully commit to it with fidelity. And so one of the things that I think is great about community driven policy is when the community is driving the decision, there's already buy in. Right. And there's always already a desire to have sound, solid implementation. And so I think as long as we can really commit to implementation, then we won't see the holes with some of that policy implement policy work that we have.

Bianca McCall: Sure, sure. And I mean, so you talk about action, right? action. But, but how we begin, with action is we actually need to start with the why. Right? And you talked about this, you talked about universal screening, as the intervention. and you gave the example of truancy. Right. And it was, the statistic was what, 30 to 50% of our students are, truant, not showing up to school. And so, starting with the why and when we talk about early screening, or I'm sorry, universal screening and early intervention, that's like just asking why, you know, a student might be missing school. Right. And that might be the turning point. And so what are, what are some of the deeper whys that you've seen? you know, whether it be the workforce, in our education systems or behavioral health systems, what are some of the whys that you've seen uncovered? you know, when, when we actually pause the look upstream and, and, and how do those answers shift the way that we respond to the risks?

Dr. Tara Raines: Well, I think first we, we have to take a step back and look for the why. Right? And take a step back and really think about what is happening up upstream. I'll go back to the example of universal screening. Right. Universal screening for behavioral emotional risk allows kids to self nominate, right. Not just rely on, like I said before, rely on teachers to know who's in distress, but ask the kids who's in distress. If you ask them, they'll tell you. Right? And then you can target and guide your interventions based on who is self nominating. If we look at some of the other, the other issues that we face with systems, m. And we really look at that why, right? Like why are we having these behaviors in schools? Well, what tools do the teachers have to de. Escalate, right. Are the kids eating right? Like, we saw another universal school meals bill not make it. Right. are the kids housed? We saw housing bills not make it. and we know there's a crisis here. We know that we've got a huge number of children and families in Nevada with the high cost of housing burden, which is, means that they're paying more than 30% of their income just for housing, right? Not even groceries and not even gas or any of the, or medical or any of the other things that families have to grapple with. Right. And so we know, we have to take a step back and look upstream because we're not doing that great of a job of patching. And as long as we continue to ignore the upstream, which we saw a little bit about that this session, as long as we act like these aren't real issues we just saw and we just saw a paid family medical leave bill get shot down. Right. And, and we know there's a ton of research that says hey, if you give people leave with babies and those connections can happen and that, you know, that that dedicated time is there, there are long term out positive outcomes, like it helps the community in the long term. Like hey, if you give people time off work to care for their elderly parents, right. They're not distracted at work, they're not leaving the workforce, they're not. Right. Like there are economic benefits to these things. And so we really just have to get decision makers and leaders to focus on the upstream. Right. It's not enough to try to patch what's happening downstream because we just don't have the resources to do it. And that is why you person who is listening to this and thinking about running for office or thinking about taking a decision making position should do that.

Bianca McCall: Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely. I mean so, so you're talking about under resourced, you're talking about under equipped, overwhelmed. and these are terms that almost have become synonymous with the experience of our workforce and experience of all stakeholders in the education systems. Right. during the listening session you also mentioned, schools can sometimes be the only place that some kids regularly see a caring adult regular getting those basic needs met. Like we talk about some, some type of security in terms of structure, shelter, food, you know, all of these things. And so you know that, that really hit home for me, you know. And I'm wondering what advice would you give to educationers, teachers, coaches, office, workers, who want to show up for students but they feel overwhelmed, they feel under equipped, under resources to respond to signs of substance use or trauma.

Dr. Tara Raines: Yeah, the burnout is real. Right. And so I think that is the first thing I would say is give yourself some grace and compassion. I think folks who are working in schools, educators, coaches, school administrators, instructional aides, like everyone who's in the school building is, is carrying a load just by walking in that building. And so knowing like there will be times when you can show up, but there are times when you can't and take care of yourself, you know. And I think that was one of the terrorists perspective is one of the things we missed in returning to school after the pandemic was really caring for the folks that were in the building and giving them the tools to care for themselves so that they could then have the resources to care for the kids. Right. It's that whole airline mask thing. You can't have Teachers out there putting masks on kids and gasping for air. Right. They need to put their own mask on first. I think that's said, you know, just remembering that, that they could be that one caring and all in the life of a child. Right. And, and if, and if given the option of choosing escalation or choosing humility and compassion, that, that I hope that they extend that compassion, to children. Another good thing. I'm going back to SB165. In that bill. There, was an appropriation for a, ah, micro credential. And that micro credential will be available to school personnel. And it's based on a micro credential that's being offered at the Balmer Institute at the University of Oregon. And what it is, is it's specifically designed to give teachers additional resources around navigating the social, emotional health of their classes. And so it talks about, you know, healing center practices, it talks about, the impact of trauma. It talks about developmental, developmental milestones and what's developmentally appropriate. You know, I talk to folks all the time and I say, look, if a 14 year old rolls their eyes at you, take it as a sign of endorsement. Right? Like that's what their eyeballs do is they roll. Right. It's not a personal attack. You know, it's not disrespect. It's them being 14. Right. Like you get to go home and live your life. so, so, so that was one good thing that really came out of the session is it's a mechanism for teachers to get a few more tools so that they can, they can have the space to offer the compassion that the kids need.

Bianca McCall: Yeah, space. Space and safety. Right. I mean psychological, safety and also the physical safety, I think, has created somewhat of a barrier, and disconnected educators, from students. Right. When you are concerned, just much like we say with the students, if they're concerned about housing security, financial security, food, securities. Right. if they're concerned about that, then education, you know, becomes less and less of a priority and more and more of a pain point for a lot of our youth. The same could be said with our educators. Right. If they're concerned with psychological safety, with physical safety and all of the above, then the task or the ask and the call to action. Doc, that, that we're, you know, we're, we're coming to educators with. There's some barriers with that.

Dr. Tara Raines: No, absolutely, I agree. And that's why I'm excited about this micro credential piece because I think it will offer, you know, some additional tools that can be used immediately. You know, we spoke with some folks who did the micro credential in Oregon, and they came out and said immediately, like it was helpful. There were things we could apply in our classrooms right off the bat, like, we see our students, you know, more as the we versus the us, versus the them, which happens sometimes when people don't have the resource. Right. Like, you protect yourself. Right. And it's hard to see everyone as connected and everyone as community, even though the reality is, you know, we're all connected. We're all community.

Bianca McCall: Right. No, absolutely. So, Dr. Raines you. You gave us so much to think about during the listening session. And. And, we didn't want to put you in a position where, you know, flight attendants, they're. They're jumping you to, turn off your devices and things like that, so we couldn't get to all of the questions. But now that you've landed back with us, I love to circle back and dive into a few of those threads that we didn't get to pull, you know, so to speak. So, the next questions kind of speak to the heart of the institutional barriers that you brought up. the opportunities that we have to shift these systems, from schools, with their discipline policies. We also, you know, brought up the M word. Medicaid.

Dr. Tara Raines: Medicaid.

Bianca McCall: regulations. But, in looking at how we can better support youth before. Before they're in crisis and before they're experiencing an opioid use disorder. Crisis. Right. One of the questions that we'd love to ask you is if you could redesign the first 48 hours of intervention within your space, within looking at the school's, environment. So in the first 48 hours of intervention from someone newly identified, with being at risk of opioid misuse or opioid use disorder, what would that, immediate support system look like clinically, culturally and relationally?

Dr. Tara Raines: Yeah, I'm going to go back and I'm going to start with compassion. Right. So I would. I would go back and in that first 48 hours as a clinician, it would be conveying that no one chooses to have an opioid use disorder. Right. Like, no one is, like, wakes up and says, you know, what I want to do today? Right. Like, I want a lifelong addiction and just to something that makes me make choices that I wouldn't typically make. Right. and so I think I would approach the entire thing with compassion. I would also go back to the why. Right. And better understand what is the student's story? What, what has brought them to having this high risk? And how can we find resources and strategies and supports to offer healing for that so that the student has tools to fall back on when that trauma, when that experience, when that whatever exposure comes up for them that makes them want to make the choice to use. Right. and so for me, the first 48 hours again would be. Be rooted in compassion, empathy and wondering instead of, you know, like judgment and, you know, telling, you know, all the things that we, we tend to come, come across when we find ourselves. And punitive. Like suspension, right? Like exactly. Instead of all those things kind of bringing in, instead of pushing out, it would just criminalize.

Bianca McCall: We criminalize the experience, you know, from, from the beginning. so I love what you're saying about starting with the why, better understanding the story. and story, you know, to me, that's in the same family of context and conversation as lived experience. Right? It's, it's, allowing somebody to tell you, the why, is, is, is trauma informed. It's healing centered, you know, really. And, and so how, how, how do you define the value of said lived experience as data, as data points? And what, what, what a data system that honors those narratives alongside the clinical metrics. And what would that look like in practice?

Dr. Tara Raines: Oh, man, Bianca, these are great questions. I, what would the data system look like? I mean, it would look like a focus on the story, right? Like the story having as much weight as, as the checklist. And you know, I always say, like, I am an expert in terror reigns, right? And I am the only expert in terror reigns. And I think recognizing that folks are experts in themselves, and honoring that folks are experts in themselves and not making. Because we. And I'm gonna back up because I'm gonna ramble as humans, right? Like putting things into buckets, putting things into categories helps us. It's easy, right? Like it's, it's, it's hardwired, right? Like we needed to know, you know, millennia ago, we needed to know that big cat with stripes and big teeth was dangerous. We need to know that this particular berry was poisonous, right? And so we could glance put things into categories and keep moving and survive. And we have more resources than that now, so we don't have to glance, see the risk factor, see the substance use, and put it in a category and in a bucket in the same way that we once did. We can take a step back and say, okay, what would be the most effective way to, to Change this behavior or to change this thought, pattern. Right. And. And take the time, but we have to make the time, and we have to prioritize the resources for that. Right. And a lot of that comes with not getting into the blame game, not getting into the criminalization and the punishment aspects of it, not getting into the. The judgment of the whole thing. And I think as long as we continue to approach things from, punitive judgment perspective, again, that's separated. That's the us versus them separation. Right. And it doesn't keep in mind that it's really a we, y'. All. Right. Like, it's really. We're all connected. And so, you know, the person down the street doing this thing that maybe doesn't align with your values is an extension of you. Right? And if you, you. You shudder them, you push them off, like there are ways in which you're harming yourself and your resources and what's available.

Bianca McCall: Yeah. And I just. That was, that was beautifully, beautifully put, Doc. I go back to, you know, you saying, hey, I'm. I'm an expert in terror reigns, and I'm the only expert in terror reigns. And I wonder, how do you become an expert in self? Because this isn't inherent, you know? And how does the storytelling, the language that you use to tell the story, right. and who you share your story with, and when you share your story, all of those things, I would presume, lend to you becoming an expert of yourself, right? I mean, you can't not, tell your story. You can't silence your story. Right. And still understand yourself. If you avoid these opportunities to embrace, life's ups and downs and twists and turns, and also avoid these opportunities to process your experiences, then it makes it that much more difficult to become an expert of yourself. And then I was also going to mention you say you're the only expert of yourself, Dr. Terry Raines. And I would argue that. I believe your children are probably experts of you as well. Because in thinking about our youth and thinking about our students, our kids, that they, they know everything, they notice everything, therefore they know everything, Right. they know when the adults around them are not okay or in crisis, and that is projected onto them. Right? So we can look at students all day and say, our students, our youth, are in crisis, Right? We could say there's a national state of emergency. Our, youth are in crisis. But. But are they in crisis as much as they are reflecting that the adults around them are in crisis?

Dr. Tara Raines: No, I agree wholly. And I want to Go back and offer clarification. My kids are definitely experts in their experience. Experience of me. Right.

Bianca McCall: Yeah.

Dr. Tara Raines: I'm the expert in me. They're their experts in my. And, and you are spot on because I, When I got back from my trip, I was a little tired, a little cranky, and my 7 year old said, did you sleep well? I was like, well, kind of. Know why? She's like, because you don't usually yell about the socks.

Bianca McCall: Right.

Dr. Tara Raines: And so, so yeah, so they, they, they have their own experience. But I think, I also think that there's. I'm gonna go back to something else. She said, I think not being open to learning about yourself is what leads to the expertise, the self expertise. Right. Like, like there are lots of blind spots that I have and that everyone has, and I think that's okay. But I think being open to learning about and recognizing those are also important. And I forget what else you were talking about.

Bianca McCall: All right. Something about expertise. in self avoiding. Sometimes we avoid these opportunities to embrace the ups and downs and twists and turns out. Yeah.

Dr. Tara Raines: You have to sit with it. I am. And this is not a no endorsement. This is just what I happen to be reading. I happen to be reading the Altar within right now by Juliet Diaz. And it is a book just about that, about knowing the self and taking the time to reflect and like making the space and, and drawing yourself in. Because you, you know, you may have folks who are like, I love being alone. You know, I'm perfectly fine being alone. But they're on their phone the whole time or they're like engaging, you know, and like finding that time to pull yourself back and to be present and to be okay. Like getting to know yourself and all of your thoughts and all of your sensations, you know, sure. Task now.

Bianca McCall: But, but it's important because I, I think the message is consistent.

Dr. Tara Raines: Ah.

Bianca McCall: And I'm a huge proponent of. It starts with self. Right. So for, for anybody that's listening, we could want to save the world, we could want to save our, our kids. We can want to save our run for office. Dr. Tara Raines. But unless we start that healing with ourselves, unless we become experts with ourselves, we cannot, learn the nuances and the unique lived experiences of those that are experiencing pain in our systems. we can't possibly do that without first starting with self. So I love the connection with knowing yourself, starting with why and asking those questions for self.

Dr. Tara Raines: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.

Bianca McCall: And I think too, you know, I think it's a, one of those trendy statements that, that, it's a little bit. I, I liken it to, the hyenas in, in Lion King when, when somebody says the name Mufasa. Say it again, right? I think self care has the Mufasa effect. When we say self care in our spaces, people are like, ooh, like, I don't have time for that. You know what, you know, what is self care? It just sounds good. but this is self care. This is an act of self love, is embracing these opportunities to discover who we really are, given our mostly recognizing this when we are challenged, right?

Dr. Tara Raines: So, yeah, 100%. 100%. And self care, I think it's. We've got this, like, wellness industry that's, you know, has its own set of. I have lots of opinions about. And you know, what the, the capitalist wellness wheel will have you believe is that you have to do a weekend at a spa or go get a 50 pedicure or do any of these, like, big expensive things with a diffuser full of lavender for it to actually be self care, right? And it's not, it's. It's the time with yourself. It's the reflection. It's the knowing your story. It's the writing down your story in a journal. It's asking why you believe what you believe. You know, like, why do you have the beliefs you believe you have about money? Why do you have the beliefs you have about friendship, about learning, about discipline and like, really kind of taking a step back and evaluating, like, why do I even have this value, right? Like, why, why do I, why did I judge that person? Like, why is their behavior, you know, give me sensations in whatever the way, shape or form? And so that's actual self care, right? Is understanding and looking and reflecting and healing, right? Because it could be that the core to some of your beliefs don't align with your stated beliefs, right? Like, there can be that values mismatch if you don't take a step back and really, like, look at it and look at yourself and think about, you know, what was the why? And I think. And I'm going to keep on this train of thought if it's okay with you. I think when you start doing those values inspections and those reflections, you may find that there are people in your life that taught you things that you no longer, no longer serve you, right? And I think it's important to extend grace and compassion to those folks because often they've taught us those things from a place of protection, right? And, from a place of care. And it just may no longer serve. It may no longer be appropriate. It may no longer, you know, extend the compassion that you want to extend as a part of who you are.

Bianca McCall: Yeah, yeah. And I love, again, it's synonymous, the care, the compassion. it's synonymous with the telling of the story, with sharing of the story. And I think back to just a simple example of, you know, in, in my youth, right. Relationships that, that you care about, that you're, that you have compassion, that there's love there. You're talking about it, right? In shame, by contrast, things that you're ashamed of, you're embarrassed of. That's what you silence. Right. And so these are true acts of self care and self love to, meet. Start with compassion, right? Be met with compassion and actually sharing the stories, you know, and modeling for adults and for professionals that are listening, that are in the space of caring for our youth, for paraprofessionals in the opioid response, being able to model how we pour into ourself. That's treatment right there. That's healing right there.

Dr. Tara Raines: Well, it gives permission, right? It gives them permission to take that same time, same space, the same time, and, and to care for themselves.

Bianca McCall: Yeah. And I love how you mentioned pedicures, $50. I, I'm still, very frustrated about this. You know, I mean, back in the day, back in my day when it was only $30, right?

Dr. Tara Raines: Like 15 and 20. I know. I'm like, everyone's raging about the cost of eggs. And my toes have just. Eggs are also too expensive. And butter. I bought butter this morning. It was raging in the grocery store.

Bianca McCall: Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. Well, listen, I don'. About the cost of goods because then, as we mentioned I think before on the line, then the quality goes down if the price goes down. but anyhow, so Dr. Raines will you please tell us a little bit more about the work that you do today, the agencies that you work with, and how, you've been able to kind of maintain this mindset of let's heal, the healing centered mindset, through intentional actions, through, through that, you know, the self care, the self love, the compassion, through what has been arguably the most challenging times in recent human history.

Dr. Tara Raines: Wow. It is something. It keeps moving. so I am with the Children's Advocacy alliance, and we are a statewide nonpartisan nonprofit. And what we do is we influence or work to influence policy and decisions that impact the well being of children and families in Nevada. specifically we focus on child welfare, we focus on health, both physical and mental health, and we focus on early childhood and school readiness. And what that looks like is we build coalitions, right? Like, we know that it's tricky. Even our most dedicated, our most incredible elected officials still can find themselves, bending to the will of folks who have the capacity to offer big donations. Right? And children, and the most impacted, most vulnerable children in particular, aren't writing checks. Right. To folks. And so, what we do is we work to build coalitions to find solutions, like I talked about earlier, that folks can agree on and that. And by folks, I mean experts to impact it. So, you know, if you think about our Children's Mental Health Action Coalition that we have, you know, faculty from unlv, we have practitioners in the field, we have folks from insurance companies, we have folks from the school district, we have parents, we have teens. Right? Like, we have. So that we can come up with solutions at CAA that align with folks who. Across the board, and then we work to move the needle and push those solutions for forward, in service of improving the outcomes for folks here in Nevada.

Bianca McCall: I love it.

Dr. Tara Raines: I love it.

Bianca McCall: Thank you for all of the work that you do. And how can professionals in this space, in education, in prevention and diversion, in the like, again, the opioid use, disorder and the response teams, how can they connect with you?

Dr. Tara Raines: Yeah, so you can go to our website, caanv.org and you can join our listserv on our, in our newsletter we will send out. We send out the meeting dates for our various coalitions. folks, you can also email me directly. Tara.reigns@caa&b.org if there's an area that you're passionate about or want to get involved with, we're happy to support and hear and help you strategize. You know, we had, someone come to us recently and say, hey, I'm having this difficulty with the state agency. And we said, hey, like, let's. Let's strategize how we can get that information in them in a way that they can receive it. Right? Because I think that's also true of our advocacy work, is maintaining the we. Right? Like, it's. It's not an us versus them in any way. Right. Like, we have to work together and we have to. To call in and bring in our partners to really have impact for children.

Bianca McCall: Absolutely. Absolutely. And I love that message. It feels, very directed, very personal. Right. and so kind of staying along this, this vibe. If you Will, speaking, to the one person out there who you hope hears this conversation and not just listens, but I always say hears the conversation. Right. That we had today. What do you want to say? What do you want to resonate with that one person who needed to hear from you today?

Dr. Tara Raines: Be kind to yourself and then take action.

Bianca McCall: Take action.

Dr. Tara Raines: Then do something, right?

Bianca McCall: Yeah. Do something about it.

Dr. Tara Raines: Do something.

Bianca McCall: Stand on business. That's what the kids are saying?

Dr. Tara Raines: Yes, that's. Is that what. I'm gonna start saying it and then they'll stop. They'll stop as soon as I start saying it.

Bianca McCall: As soon as you start saying it, I. I started saying. What is it? Riz, short for charisma. although. Although the kids will say it's not short for charisma, but I'm like, no, I'm pretty sure that it is. But anyhow, yeah, as soon as you start saying it, they'll stop saying it.

Dr. Tara Raines: Well, you've got lots of. Riz. Thank you for having me.

Bianca McCall: Thank you. Thank you so much. That's the highlight right there. Thank you so much for joining us and for sharing your wisdom, your heart, your relentless commitment to early intervention and equity, your voice. It's such a critical part of this conversation, and we're honored to have had you with us today. At this time, I'd like to ask you, do you have any final thoughts that you'd like to share?

Dr. Tara Raines: I have so many thoughts all the time. I. I guess, again, like, you know, like, take action, right? Like, you are impacted. Right. It's. It's to. To be cliche, like, you are your brother's keeper. Right? Like, it's up to you. If we're. If we're gonna really have a community where. Where we can honor each other and center kindness, it's going to take folks, starting with themselves, reflecting on their values, and then doing something so. So do both. Be kind to yourself and stand on business.

Bianca McCall: Stand on business. Do something. Love it.

Dr. Tara Raines: Yes.

Bianca McCall: Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the NOCE Dose. If this conversation sparked new ideas or gave you something to reflect on, be sure to subscribe. Share and subscribe and leave a review. We're building understanding one story at a time. And until next time, stay curious, stay connected, and be well. Thank you for listening to the NOCE Dose the Opioid Epidemic Unplugged. We hope that you found this episode compelling and informative, and we ask that you please share this episode with your friends and your colleagues. And if you want to learn more, please visit our website@nvopioidcoe.org the NOCE Dose podcast is brought to you by the Nevada Opioid center of Excellence, or NOCE NOCE is dedicated to developing and sharing evidence, informed training, and offering technical assistance to professional professionals and community members alike. Now, whether you are a care provider or a concerned community member, no provides resources to support.

Speaker 2: CASAT Podcast Network this podcast has been brought to you by the CASAT Podcast Network, located within the center for the Application of Substance Abuse Technologies, a part of the School of Public Health at the University of Nevada, Reno. For more podcast information and resources, visit casat.org.