Proud Ghungalu woman Noeleen Lopes has recently focused on healing her own mind, body and spirit, after dedicating her nearly 30-year career to helping others cope with generational grief, loss and trauma.
The University of Queensland Alum has been reflecting on milestones in her journey, after a rocky start when she was unable to continue with schooling and did not complete Year 9 and later became a single mother.
Noeleen’s early work experiences in short lived jobs in cafes, the Army Reserve and working in her son’s school tuckshop were not exactly a template for a perfect start to academic life.
However, after successfully lobbying the relevant Dean at UQ, she enrolled in a Bachelor of Social Work in 1988 and graduated in 1991, through what she describes as ‘sheer focus and determination’.
“I was not academically-minded and had to learn how to study, write and format assignments, however I had support from the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies Unit (ATSISU) along with tutorial support in my first and second years,” Noeleen said.
“I survived on casual work during my degree, including research work and tutoring.”
Noeleen’s qualifications led to roles with the Aboriginal and Islander Child Care Agency (AICCA), the Aboriginal and Islander Health Service (AICHS) (where she was successful in getting funding to establish the Mental Health Unit, and the Communities and Personal Histories team.
She soon realised the extent of the generational grief, loss and trauma among clients who were not able to access appropriate programs to support their social and emotional health and wellbeing needs.
“In 1993 I contacted some of my social work friends to help set up a culturally appropriate counselling service, while talking to local Elders and community leaders for support,” she said.
“We had social workers involved but needed a coordinator, so the social worker looking after recruitment asked if I was interested and I agreed.”
Gallang Place Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Corporation became Australia’s first Indigenous community-controlled counselling service in 1994 but still required plenty of lobbying to sustain itself.
Gallang Place operated with a very small amount of funding from ATSIC, until Noeleen approached the Federal Health Minister to gain funding from the Federal Health Department for ongoing operations.
“We had to keep applying for funding to keep it going in the early years and continued to seek funding to grow the programs,” she said.
Gallang Place became a pioneering Indigenous provider of the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) and was able to offer Certificate IV and Diploma qualifications as a Registered Training Organisation (RTO).
It also introduced the culturally sound AOD program ‘Straight Talk’, enabling Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander prisoners to address their use of drugs and alcohol as part of their required intervention/treatment program which supported their parole applications.
“We focused on building the capacity of Gallang Place by training our own Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in counselling skills and by supporting them with clinical supervision,” Noeleen said.
“It was important to have our own people work with our people in programs that were suited to the cultural and healing needs.”
Since stepping down as Gallang Chief Executive Officer in 2021, Noeleen has been working for EAP providers as an Accredited Mental Health Social Worker and, in 2022, conducted trauma-informed work for Queensland Native Title Services, using her skills as a Nationally Accredited Mediator. She will soon also be trained as an Accredited EMDR practitioner (Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing Therapy).
“I was burnt out in 2020 so left Gallang Place in 2021 realising I was not immune to the traumas faced by members of our community and in our organisations and the effects of this on our mental and physical health,” Noeleen said.