Since the 8th grade, Nick lost over 40 pounds, had become moody and despondent, and neither his mother Peggy, a registered nurse, nor her husband John, an emergency room physician, could identify what was troubling Nick.

“I had nobody I could talk to about this,” explains Peggy. “We knew that he was not feeling right, and was exhibiting dangerous behaviors. I am very close with all of my kids and have great relationships with them, but we did not know where to go or how to help him. If my husband and I could not identify Nick’s problems, then who could?”

When Nick brought home a parent consent form to participate in a mental health checkup through his school to his mother Peggy, she signed and returned it directly. At school, Nick agreed to participate in the screening.

After completing the short questionnaire, Nick was interviewed by a mental health professional who asked him to talk about some of his answers. The program, as promised, contacted Nick’s parents to tell them that they might want to have a complete evaluation done by a mental health professional. The local screening program also offered to answer their questions and provide help in connecting their family to the type of professional they’d be most comfortable with.

“TeenScreen got the ball rolling for us, allowed us to have that first conversation, and let us get our son the help he needed,” says Peggy. Today, Nick is a freshman in college, majoring in psychology and neuroscience, excelling in his school work and hopeful that someday, he can help others suffering from mental illness.