(upbeat rock music) (upbeat rock music continues) - Welcome to "A Shot of Ag."

My name is Rob Sharkey.

I'm a fifth generation farmer from just outside of Bradford, Illinois.

I am a farmer, so I do know the farm culture, and the farm culture is you don't complain.

If something's bothering you, whether it's anxiety or depression, suck it up buttercup is the motto, but hopefully that is starting to change.

Today's guest is Josie Rudolphi.

How you doing, Josie?

- I'm good, how are you?

- It's a great name.

- Thank you, yeah.

- First of all, Josie, of course, everybody probably thinks it's from "Josie and the Pussycats."

- Right.

- Was it?

- I don't think my dad had heard of them (Rob laughs) when they named me, but it's Josephine, actually.

- Josephine.

- Yeah.

But Josephine Rudolphi is, like, hard to get onto a business card.

- Yeah, that is.

- Yeah, so it's a mouthful.

- And then, must have some, some North Pole connection with Rudolphi.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

- Yeah.

- It's a good season for me.

I'm always on the good list.

- You are from Williamsburg, Iowa.

Where's that at?

- West of Iowa City, like 30 miles, right on I-80.

There used to be a big outlet mall there.

- Yeah.

- Small outlet mall now.

- [Rob] But is that where the big truck stop is?

- That's further east.

- [Rob] That's a little further.

- Yeah.

- Okay.

- Kinsey Manufacturing.

You either know Kinsey Manufacturing or the outlet mall.

And then I know-- - They have the tractor in a planter sticking straight up.

- Right, I know which pile to put you in, depending on what you know.

(Rob laughs) - But your job, you're an assistant professor at the University of Illinois?

- Yeah.

- [Rob] And how long you been doing that?

- I'm in my fourth year, which seems impossible, yeah.

- Okay.

So how does someone from Iowa get to be a professor at U of I?

- Yeah, it was a long and windy road, but I grew up on a farm in eastern Iowa, did degrees in like ag education, ag communications, and then I did a PhD at Iowa.

- Really?

- Yeah, so that was a weird, you know, it was a hard transition.

- [Rob] Does that make you a doctor?

- It does, yeah, but not like if you need help on an airplane, do not ask me.

- You've told us all this stuff about you and you never mentioned that you were a doctor.

If I had a PhD, within 10 seconds of talking to me, you would know that it would be Dr. Sharkey.

- Yeah.

It just, yeah, it just, like I said, I can't, people expect me to, like, give them medical advice, again, ask to, like, look at a creaky elbow.

- Well, what are you a doctor of?

- So, well, my PhD is in occupational environmental health, so we talk a lot about how the workplace and the environment contribute to, unfortunately, injury and illness, and I focus on agricultural safety and health.

So how the ag environment contributes to injury and illness.

- That's kind of a small specialty, isn't it?

- Yeah, it's very niche, I say.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- Or niche.

- Niche.

- For our Canadian viewers.

- There you go.

- There are none.

(Rob laughs) (Josie laughs) Okay, so you got your doctorate, and then you started working at U of I.

- Well, I spent two years up in central Wisconsin at a research institute and then transitioned into academia.

- Oh okay.

- So I'm on a little Midwest tour.

Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois.

- I guess I don't know the lingo.

Assistant professor.

- It means I'm like, you know, so you go from assistant to associate.

It's a rite of passage sort of thing.

You have to meet certain criteria to sort of.

- So you just, because it's four years?

- Yeah.

- Okay, I gotcha.

- Yeah.

- So I'm still in, like, my training wheels.

(Josie chuckles) (Rob chuckles) - Do you like it?

- How many people watch this show?

No, of course, I do, yeah.

(Josie chuckles) - Okay.

- I do, I really like it.

So I have the opportunity to do cool research, I have great grad students, I get to teach.

You know, so I get, like, my cup gets filled with a lot of different cool projects, and then I have an extension appointment.

So I get be out in the community, across the state, talking to farmers, thinking about programs and things that might serve them, so I get to do a bunch of really cool stuff.

I get to be here.

- Yeah.

- I mean, come on.

- Well, you grew up on a farm.

- Yeah.

- Even though you're much younger than I am, I'm assuming.

- Much, yeah.

- You're slightly younger than I am.

(Josie chuckles) (Rob chuckles) I'm assuming you still grew up in the culture, right?

- Oh, yeah.

- It's where it's there are no problems.

- None.

- If you're worried about getting the corn planted, you're never gonna say it out loud.

- Right.

You'll just walk around the house at all hours of the night.

- Yeah, exactly.

Does that have anything to do with why you went into this?

- You know, I think it certainly does.

So I started out in agricultural safety and health, thinking I was gonna focus on tractor rollovers, you know, PTO injuries.

It is the most hazardous occupation.

You're seven times, not to be dramatic, but you're seven times more likely to die in agriculture than any other occupation, and that includes our classically hazardous, like, construction and mining.

So I thought I was gonna focus much more on injury.

When I had finished my PhD, there was a lot of attention around a news article about farm suicide, and a lot of people were scratching their head like, why is this happening?

And those of us who grew up in farm communities were like, I can offer some opinions about why this might be happening.

But it really sort of informed this need to have good research done and start really talking about farm stress and mental health.

Yeah.

- I do a podcast too, and I'll never forget when we started talking about mental health in agriculture, this was before people talked about it, and at that time, they were starting Do More.

It was up in Canada, Leslie Kelly and Kim Keller and some others, and they were openly talking about, hey, you know, if you're anxious, if you're depression, you need to talk to people.

And the pushback was unreal.

You don't talk about that in farming.

- No.

- It's just a big no-no.

- It's a big no-no.

We think back, I think we all probably know people in our community who we wouldn't have used words like depression and anxiety to describe them, but they were maybe chronically angry.

They were very isolated, avoided people, avoided things.

And it's really unfortunate that we pride ourselves on being these really tight-knit supportive communities who would come out of the woodwork if somebody had cancer or if somebody's, you know, barn fell down in a storm, but where are we when our community is in, when people in our community are in pain and suffering emotionally?

- I mean, that's a great point, and it's one we definitely need to talk about more.

What do you see when you go out and you talk about this with actual farmers and the farming community?

Is there still as much pushback?

- Not as much.

We have a lot of industry support, so it's fantastic to see commodity groups, farm organizations, farm bureaus, having people like me and my colleagues at conferences talking about what the research is showing, what sorts of resources and programs we have available.

So to have that sort of organizational support, I think helps to reduce the stigma, and so then farmers, I think if they see, okay, commodity groups are talking about this, firm bureau's talking about this, we can talk about this.

So we talk a lot about what, you know, the research shows and we know that farmers and ranchers and people in agriculture have worse mental health than people that are not.

We did a survey of farmers in Illinois a few years ago, and we found like 50 to 60% meet the criteria for at least mild depression and anxiety separately.

And in the general population, that's closer to like 20%.

So, you know, when the data suggests we have a problem, I think it's really hard to argue with that.

We know anecdotally what's happening, but when we can put data behind that, it sort of really, like, pulls the cover over some things.

- You took the next question right from me because, you know, I've been a farming my whole life.

I'm biased.

You know, I think what we do is amazing and that, and then when you look at what other people do, you know, and the importance of the guy bringing electricity to the house and water.

I mean, farming is not the only end all be all.

We do get a lot of credit because what we do is Americana, but I always wondered, because they say that mental health and agriculture is worse because of the isolation, whatever, and you've got proof now that it is.

Why do you think ag is different?

- Really good question.

So again, we've also asked a lot about stressors at farmers' experience, and when we look at the occupation, I think the stressors are so unique and there are a lot of things that we have absolutely no control over.

So commodity prices, right?

We don't get to decide what to sell a product for.

We also don't get to decide what we buy fertilizer for, but we can't increase the price of our product because we're getting pushed on the other end.

So it's a ton of just financial circumstances that are totally out of our control, and then we have the weather, like who else's life is dictated by, again, something we have almost no control over?

And so, we were just talking before this, like, who's in the field?

We're all getting a little anxious to be out there.

We know we have this great week ahead of us, but what's gonna happen next?

It's an incredibly important time of year, so there's just a ton of pressure.

And that's the other thing we hear a lot about, time pressure, is people say, I have so much to do and so little time to get it done.

We acknowledge that planting windows are perhaps getting more narrow, harvest windows are getting more narrow, so there's just a lot of, again, experiences and stressors that farmers have no control over.

- Yeah.

- I think a lot of times people see farmers and they're out there driving a half a million dollar tractor.

I mean, hell, it's what people do like on a farm simulator, right?

- Yeah.

- It's awesome, it's fun.

I'd tell ya, I don't enjoy it.

When I'm out, like, planting or that, I don't enjoy it because the stress of every little thing is going crazy 'cause that's my one shot to get a crop in, and if I turn too sharp or hit a fence post, I mean, tens of thousands of dollars in repair if I'm lucky.

So I mean, stuff like that, I know what we do is very cool and I know it looks awesome with all that fun stuff we get to run, but I don't think maybe everybody understands the pressure of actually farming itself.

- Yeah, I think from the interstate, farming looks like a lot of fun.

Like, from somebody who's not in it, but for those of us that are in it, we know that it is, like, as soon as you wake up in the morning, you're thinking like, right.

What am I gonna do?

Is the wind blowing, right?

Because the wind is gonna change whether or not someone can spray for a day.

So there's so many things we're constantly thinking about, the moving parts, it's chaos.

I grew up on our farm, and we have, at this point, we have, you know, like six people who can help, and it feels like we could always just use one more person, right?

'Cause there's, like, someone's got a haul water over here, and so there's a sprayer over here, and there's a planter over here, you know, like, where's fertilizer, and can someone go get seed?

And yeah, you just need, like, one more vehicle.

- So do you help on your family's farm?

- Yeah.

Yeah, so I have a situation where I'm able to be on campus when I need to be and then back in Iowa to help as much as I can, and so I've really enjoyed, I mean, I've always been pretty involved, but this last year I think I've kind of stepped up my game some, and so yeah, helping to get this crop in, we got the crop out, and.

- Did they make fun of you on your family farm because you work at Illinois?

- So, well, not really, because my dad's from Illinois, so I have like - [Rob] At least he's gonna stand up.

- A team member.

Yeah, yeah, and he, like, kinda like, pulls some weight around there, so.

You know, he and I are like on the same team kind of, and yeah.

- Yeah.

Okay, so tell me what you guys are, what you're trying to do.

Tell me some things.

- So, with the Illinois Extension, we have a lot of what I think are cool initiatives to, again, start reducing stigma when we talk about farm stress and mental health, and get resources and services out to people who need them.

So USDA has also made this a huge priority, and they have funded four regional Farm and Ranch Stress Assistance networks is what they call them.

- [Rob] What's that?

- So, well, in the Midwest or the North Central region, we are 12 states, and at the University of Illinois, we house the North Central Farm and Ranch Stress Assistance Center.

So we again, collaborate with the 12 states in our region, cooperative extension in every one of those states and a few others, and we are, like, this 15 member collaborative that's really focused on getting, again, resources and services to farmers and farm families.

So we have a website, farmstress.org, and we have like 115 resources specifically for farmers, farm families, ranchers on that website.

We support a number of hotlines, we know some people are really interested in having someone to talk to on the phone.

And we also offer a lot of low or no-cost mental health literacy programs.

So we're putting bankers and lenders and seed dealers and other people who are in that agricultural space through training so that they might better react and serve somebody who they acknowledge is in a mental health crisis.

- So is this just like counseling?

Would you guys actually prescribe something?

- So we won't do any sort of prescribing, we would definitely leave that to a medical provider, but one thing Illinois is doing is we do have a voucher program that we're getting ready to launch, and that is gonna offer farmers, farm families, farm workers, three free professional behavioral health sessions with one of our providers.

So we have like over 80 providers who, you know, heard about our program and said, yes, put me on a list, I want to serve farmers.

So we are really excited about that.

- [Rob] How many?

- Like almost 80 from across the state.

These are licensed professionals-- - Like hospitals and?

- Licensed professional counselors, social workers, other professionals who have a mental health license of some kind.

- I wouldn't know there was 80 in the state.

- I know, I know.

So we're really, I mean, we're really motivated by that and encouraged to think that there's that many people who say, yeah, I wanna serve farmers.

- [Rob] That's good 'cause we're cheap.

- I know, right?

- Oh yeah.

- Yeah.

- Like the worst.

- So, and that's what we acknowledge.

We know that people do, we have great outcomes when people get professional services, therapy and counseling and those sorts of sessions, but it's hard to get in 'em.

It's hard to find somebody, it's hard to like pay somebody in some cases, and so what we're doing is we're saying, like, we found people, here's a list.

We're gonna pay for those sessions for you and all you have to do is make the appointment and go as you're able to.

So we're really hoping to reduce some of those barriers that often preclude people from getting the help they deserve.

- Okay, here's a big deal with farmers is confidentiality.

Because if I admit that I have mental issues, then my fear is my neighbor's gonna go after my landlords.

- Yeah, isn't that like... - Unfortunately, there's truth to it.

- I know, I know, oh, absolutely, and that's what we hear a lot of, we know people don't want their truck seen outside of a building where you know a counselor works.

So this is totally confidential.

We have it set up so that most of our providers do teletherapy.

So if it's more convenient for you to sit in the Walmart parking lot and use the wifi and talk to somebody in your truck, that's an acceptable way to get this sort of care now.

- And does that work well?

I've always wondered.

- Yeah, we have had I think, I don't know what the research would suggest, but we have had people say that it works because they're able to do it now.

Before they weren't able to drive an hour, sit for an hour, and drive back for an hour.

You can't afford that from a time perspective.

So, you know, now I can do it from home, I can do it in my car.

We know there's, like, that human face-to-face component.

I mean, we're having it now.

Like, it's so much more powerful than having a screen between you, but again, if you're not gonna do it at all, a screen is better than nothing.

- Yeah.

It is difficult.

I'm a farmer and I know how difficult it is, and part of it is I don't even know if farmers realize when things are happening.

You know, I lost my son and I never knew what a panic attack was before, and all the sudden, you know, I'm feeling like I'm having a heart attack.

You know, I can't breathe.

When I don't know where my other kids are and I can't get ahold of them immediately, you know, I kinda go there and I never really knew what that was until I was describing it to other people and they're like you're having a panic attack.

I don't know if farmers really even know what depression, what anxiety, what all that stuff is.

- I think you're absolutely right.

I think we, for a lot of people, they've sat with their feelings for decades maybe.

And so it doesn't feel like anxiety, it feels like spring, and it doesn't feel like depression, it feels like a drought.

- There's a lot of truth to that, yeah.

- Right, so we've come to accept that this is the way it is, and the truth is, is like, it doesn't have to be like this.

You know, everybody deserves to feel as healthy and happy as they can, and so that's where we're just trying, again, to bring awareness and make people realize that there are resources and services out there.

Yeah, because it doesn't have to keep being like this.

But you're absolutely right.

We have people who go to hospitals thinking they're having a heart attack and somebody tells 'em you're having an anxiety attack.

And it takes something momentous like that to then realize, like, oh, maybe for, you know, 10 years, I've been suppressing some, you know, anxiety and depression.

- But a farmer really shouldn't wait.

Anybody shouldn't wait till it gets to that point.

What are some, like, precursor, what are the things that people should look forward to, like, all right, maybe I need to talk to somebody.

- Yeah, good question.

So we know that anxiety and depression can manifest, like, physically, so if you start to notice aches and pains, you know, that they're chronic.

Those are physical symptoms.

And then we know that there's a lot of emotional and behavioral changes I should say.

So if you notice that you're not sleeping anymore or you're sleeping too much, if you're not eating like you used to, or you're eating too much, changes in, you know, substance use of any kind, over a period of two weeks, that was when we would say it's problematic.

And we really, this is one reason we really try to train, you know, partners and spouses and family members and other people in the community, because sometimes we're not able to recognize the changes in ourselves, but somebody else can say, you know, you seem a lot more agitated than usual.

Or, you know, you seem very agitated, or I've noticed that you're not eating or I've noticed you're not sleeping.

And so, if we have people who care about us, who are able to say, you know, I've noticed these things, and my first recommendation is to always see your primary care provider because they can-- - [Rob] Just your regular doctor?

- Yeah, just go to your regular doctor and tell 'em what's up.

They're trained, they have-- - Oh, I don't trust that guy.

- Yeah, I know, but they do, despite being very expensive, hard to get into, they do have at least some mental health training.

They can prescribe medications.

There are so many medication options out there anymore.

I know some people are really resistant to that, but we wouldn't, like, live with high blood pressure because we're resistant to medication, right?

And the same way you shouldn't live with depression because, you know, 'cause someone's not interested in medication.

There are options.

- You make a good example.

I mean, yeah, if you have a broken arm, you're gonna go get it set.

People don't look at this as, I don't know, like a cancer or a broken bone or something.

This is something different.

This is you being nutty.

- No, this is your health.

This is health and this is, we still separate mental health, physical health, dental health, like it's health.

And so, we have to start, again, like we'd see somebody for a broken arm, we'd see somebody if we had cancer, we'd see somebody for high blood pressure, like, let's see somebody for our mental health too.

And one thing, you know, I talked to farmers about is like, you wouldn't let your, if your livestock were sick, you wouldn't just let them sit in their sickness.

If your crop is, you know, infested, you're not just gonna let that pest have its way.

- [Rob] Pester.

- Pester.

- That's what pests do.

- Yeah, you're not gonna let that pest pester.

You're gonna do something about it.

You're gonna call your agronomist, you're gonna call a veterinarian.

Like, you also deserve that sort of attention and care, so call your provider, call somebody, and make yourself a priority.

- Is your job a tough job?

'Cause you're dealing with people that are struggling.

- Well, I think, I mean, actually, when I was in, at my previous job, I told my supervisor at that time, I said, you know, I really think I wanna make, I was still young and you have to figure out, you know, what you're gonna focus on.

And I said, I think I'm gonna focus on farm stress and mental health for a while.

And this is a woman who is focused on child ag injury and fatality for like 40 years.

- Oh man.

- Right?

- That would be like, I can't think of much worse.

- Yeah, and she goes, "Really?

You're gonna do farm stress?

That's so sad."

And I was like, and I guess there is, I mean, and like her, you know, she focused on, I could have said the same thing.

Like, how could you talk about child ag fatality for 40 years?

But our goal is that if we do this work, hopefully it's gonna improve lives.

- [Rob] Okay.

- And that makes it worth it.

- All right, so.

- And I get to talk to cool farmers all day.

- Well.

(Rob laughs) Speaking of cool farmers, I mean, there's hopefully someone out there watching and they're like, you know, what?

It's ringing a bell.

Maybe I should at least look into that.

Where do they start here?

- Farmsstress.org.

www.farmsstress.org.

We have, if you're in our 12 state region, we have state pages, so information for people from each state.

We have a ton of resources, we have links to every type of phone line or help line on there, and then we have a description of a lot of the different types of programs we're offering.

- Okay.

And they don't have to worry about money.

- Nope.

- And as far as, like, time, because most of 'em are probably an hour away from like a Peoria or whatever, this can be done.

- Yeah, so with our voucher program, our goal is to get three vouchers in the hands of farmers who want them.

They'll be able to redeem those with, again, our list of providers, and we have providers all over the state and most who take telehealth appointments.

So if you want to travel, a lot of people wanna travel outside of their hometown, which is fine.

You know, again, they don't want their truck to be seen in parking lots.

So you have the option to travel, but if you'd rather do it over like Zoom or Skype, that's available with most of our providers anymore.

- Any concern, I mean, you are U of I.

Any concern if they contact you that they're gonna be on a list that can be seen by other people?

- We're not that organized to publish a list like that, but we have the system, the intake system is completely confidential.

We hand you a list of providers and your voucher numbers that you'll give to your provider, that all our provider does is tell us that they saw somebody and we reimburse 'em.

- How about you?

Where can people find you?

- You can find me on Twitter, Josie _Rudolphi, and on the Illinois website.

And you can email me josier@illinois.edu.

- You're on Twitter.

- Yeah.

- Boy, that's mental health right there, isn't it?

- You know, it really is.

It's fun.

There's a lot of like, there's a lot of research projects in Twitter, in ag Twitter, but it's interesting.

You know, you always wonder, like, do people, social media can be like the best and the worst, right?

Because it's people showing off and it's everyone's best day, but one time I was on Twitter, ag Twitter, and somebody said, this was in 2019, that planting season in 2019, that like, we're all trying to forget about.

But somebody said, describe planting in, like, a meme.

And it was everybody just like, it was a train wreck, it was people like, and there was so much camaraderie around, like, this shared miserable experience, and humor, and it was like, you know what?

We are all in the same boat.

Like, everyone's having a terrible day.

- Okay, that I get, I definitely get.

Unfortunately, we're out of time.

I could talk to you all day.

- Yeah, we'll do this again sometime.

- Yeah, Josie, thank you so much for not just coming here, but for what you do.

- Yeah, thank you.

- It's really important.

Definitely, it strikes a chord with me, so I appreciate you taking the time to come and talk with us today, so Josie, thank you.

Everybody else, we'll catch you next week.

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