Dionne Hardiman will model on the runway for Sheldon Clubhouse’s biggest fundraiser of the year, after everything the mental health organization has given her.
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Sheldon Clubhouse is preparing for its third “Breaking the Label” fashion show fundraiser coming up on March 18. It’s an event Dionne Hardiman has modeled for in the past, and she can’t wait to hit the runway again.
“It’s very personal to walk the runway because you’re expressing how excited you feel about the cause,” she said.
Sheldon Clubhouse is one of two Clubhouse International organizations operated in West Michigan by Cherry Health. The other is Lakeside Clubhouse in Holland.
“We’re a community-based mental health support for folks living with a serious mental illness in Kent County. We serve all the whole county here and really providing what therapy and medications alone can’t, and that’s a sense of community and understanding and building a support system and having purpose where we we feel like we matter and we’re a part of something and really just filling an important, important need in our community,” said Tara VanDyke who serves as the program associate director of Clubhouse programs for Cherry Health.
Dionne came to Sheldon Clubhouse after a turbulent time in her life. She said she couldn’t parent, and that she would pass out from the stress of mental illness. After her counselor connected her to Sheldon Clubhouse, she was able to get back to work through the organization.
“I worked in every department of Clubhouse, and they valued my time. I eventually became a board member. Studied grants. I won a governor’s award. I became a peer support specialist. I got certified. I worked for Hope Network,” she said.
“Because Clubhouse believed in me and befriended me and supported me and showed me how to work again, I was able to accomplish a lot. I got into University of Michigan Ross School of Business, and I’m applying for $200,000 scholarship.”
The fashion show Dionne will be a part of is the biggest fundraiser of the year for Sheldon Clubhouse. She said she’s had a great experience on the runway in the past, and that she wants her fellow members to feel that way as well.
“I aggressively reached out to people and say, ‘You are gorgeous. You need to be in the fashion show,'” she said.
Michelle Crick Style and five local boutiques, including Gild the Lily Consignment in Rockford, are helping out with the show.
“Michelle Crick believes, like we do, that feeling good on the outside can really help you feel the value that has that you have in the inside. So the idea of dressing club members to feel and look their best and do their greatest things really appealed to us,” said Kimberly Johnson, who owns Gild the Lily.
“We were able to get ahead of time pictures of their club members. And it’s interesting to see, because in the before pictures, they were having their normal average every day days, but after we had seen them in the looks that were put together, their smiles were bigger than the pictures. I mean, it was incredible to see. It was meaningful to us, because it was meaningful to them.”
If you’d like tickets to the fashion show, you can buy them on Sheldon Clubhouse’s website. VanDyke said another good way to get involved is to stop by Sheldon Clubhouse for yourself during their monthly discovery tours and see in person the difference it makes for members.