An Interview with Addelle Diedesch, PERC Program Manager -Skagit County

We spoke with our Skagit County Parent Resilience Program Manager about what sets the program apart, goals, and recent expansion.

How is Skagit PERC serving the local community in Skagit County, and how does it differ from King County’s services?

Skagit County’s PERC program is an expansion of the King County based PERC program. It has taken the model of culturally-matched perinatal peer support and altered it to support the needs of our community. In Skagit, we are serving Latinx/Spanish-speaking families and have an emphasis on supporting our rural families. In person and in-home resources are unique for Skagit as we are a larger county with very few parenting/child-focused resources and none of which are providing the in-home support that we do. We also have strong community ties and outreach efforts. The team is very involved with community organizations and task forces, focusing on increasing awareness of perinatal mental health at the local level. 

Can you describe the program’s expansion and what led to it?

Recognizing the limited duration of our initial grant, we collaborated with Skagit County Public Health to present our program’s success to the Population Health Trust, a group of community leaders and philanthropists. Their support helped attract funding from the North Sound Behavioral Health Administrative Service Organization (NS BH-ASO), enabling us to expand services beyond Skagit County to other areas in the North Sound region. NS BH-ASO is excited to endeavor to expand its services beyond crisis to more supportive and prevention-oriented programs like our peer-driven perinatal mental health intervention. We are very excited to expand in 2025 to serve even more families in our region with the support of NS BH-ASO!

What are your goals for future expansion?

We aim to reach more isolated communities in underserved counties while continuing to advocate for perinatal mental health on a regional level. We hope to increase access for Latinx/Spanish-speaking communities who may not have otherwise received support for perinatal mental health issues, and to educate community partners in the North Sound Region on the importance of supporting families.

What is the importance of culturally-matched peer support in the Skagit community?

Culturally-matched care has been crucial for Latinx families, many of whom have been hesitant to engage with traditional mental health services. These families have found it easier to connect with peer-based support specifically focused on perinatal mental health because there is a shared language and understanding around lived experience. Similarly, living in a rural community and getting support only virtually (like many of the therapy appointments available to our families) providers don’t understand the unique challenges that come with the dual isolation of living in a rural community and also the inherent isolation that accompanies new parenthood. Having peers who are neighbors and community members fast tracks the ability for trust to be built and connections to be forged.