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Just Folks: Palmyra man helps others cope with mental illness

Lebanon Daily News (PA) - 11/17/2014

Nov. 17--Dan Reese is using the struggles in his life to help others who suffer with mental illness through his job and his volunteer work.

Reese, a peer support counselor at Philhaven, was in and out of hospitals 42 times since about 1988. At one hospital, they told him that he would never lead a normal life, hold down a job or have normal relationships with people.

Today, he has many friends, is engaged to be married in a few weeks and holds a steady job. He was recently recognized for his volunteer work with the United Way of Lebanon County.

When he was a child, Reese was sexually and verbally abused by a man who was his baby sitter. The man, who was not a relative, played Santa Claus at Christmas, he said.

"Back in my day when I was young, we didn't talk about it. It wasn't really discussed," the 48-year-old Reese said.

As a result of those traumatic experiences, he began hearing voices when he was 12 years old. He thought the voices were aliens.

Reese was diagnosed with schizophrenia.

"I held a lot of ill feelings for the man who abused me for many, many years, but it's made me into the man I am today. Maybe if all that wouldn't have happened, I wouldn't have become so sensitive, and I couldn't hold the job I do. To listen to people's problems, you have to have a sensitive side," he said.

His life began to turn around in 1998 when he met a minister in Chambersburg while he lived there, he said. Reese said the minister, George Pogue Sr., had a drug problem in his past. Reese said he, too, was involved in drugs when he lived in Chambersburg.

Reese was arrested on a drug possession charge and ended up in a psychiatric unit of a hospital. When he was released, Reese's second wife introduced him to Pogue. His ex-wife had been attending his church.

"I blew smoke in his face," he said, adding he has since given up smoking.

He said the minister asked Reese to pray with him, but Reese did not believe much of it.

Reese said Pogue told him: "You're now saved," and invited Reese to church that night. Reese took him up on the offer and immediately fell in love with the people at the church.

He started going to church, reading the Bible and worked for the church. He said the minister made him work hard, mowing and weeding the church's two acres of land.

"That's what turned the corner," he said.

He said his faith in God has kept him out of mental hospitals.

"He got me in touch with my higher power," Reese said of the minister. Reese now attends Grace Point Church in Palmyra.

Through the years, Reese said, a number of people tried to help him with the voices in his head. After he moved back to Lebanon County in 2002, he got involved with the Halcyon Activities Center and finally got the help that he needed to turn his life around.

Two staff members at the center taught him techniques to cope with the voices, Reese said.

"I haven't heard anything in five years," he said, crediting the staff at Halcyon and the right medication.

"They gave me coping skills and life skills," he said about the Halcyon Center.

"They gave me a place where I felt like I fit in because there are other people (there) struggling with the same issues." Reese said.

He volunteered there answering telephones, and then the center offered him a part-time job.

Besides the staff at the Halcyon Center, he credits the staff at Philhaven in helping him manage his mental illness.

He began volunteering at Philhaven, running their bingo games for patients. Philhaven offered him a part-time job, and he worked in the extended care unit for about a year.

Philhaven then offered him a full-time job and paid for his training to become a peer counselor.

In that position, he leads a support group for people who hear voices. He also leads a support group in which members talk about how to resolve conflicts and problem solving.

He met his fiance, Samantha Ruiz of Lebanon, while she was working at the American House Personal Care Home in Lebanon. Reese said he has clients at the American House.

Reese began volunteering for the United Way in the fall of 2013, visiting businesses in the county and telling their employees how United Way agencies helped his life.

Earlier this month, Reese was one of seven central Pennsylvania recipients of the Jefferson Award for public service.

In the last year, Reese has put in more than 500 hours of volunteer service with the United Way, the Halcyon Activity Center, Philhaven and several other community projects.

Reese is a member of Lebanon County's Community Support Program Committee and is assisting in the start-up of a "Hearing Voices Network Support Group" for Lebanon County. He said the support group will begin meeting Dec. 1.

"Just because you are mentally ill doesn't mean you'll always be mentally ill," he said.

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