The Loose Crew is joined by Daniel Cardenas (and our frequent recurring guest Cisco) to discuss mental health, particularly in black and brown communities. Daniel Cardenas is a licensed clinical professional counselor in Maryland, Virginia, Arizona and Texas. He currently provides mental health services to unaccompanied minors at the border and also to people suffering from natural disasters. As a young Latino man who grew up in the DMV, his insight is uniquely relatable to the members of the Loose Crew and we anticipate that our listeners will feel the same after listening to him.

In this podcast you'll hear references to the following books:

• Lori Gottlieb- Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed
• Russ- It's All In Your Head

Danny also briefly describes how mental health services can be affordable for almost anyone. You can watch his more in-depth video on the subject here.

The song at the beginning of the episode is Do It Myself by Russ.


00:00:00 Intro Music
00:00:23 Do It Myself by Russ
00:02:11 Introductions and shoutouts
00:02:42 What are we drinking?
00:05:05 Who were our role models growing up?
00:08:40 Introducing Danny Cardenas
00:10:25 What is mental health?
00:11:00 Danny's college background, what made him specialize in mental health?
00:15:34 Danny's experience as a latino mental health professional
00:18:14 How can we normalize mental health services for black and brown people?
00:21:19 How has therapy helped the members of the Loose Crew?
00:26:20 How could we overcome the stigma around mental health?
00:27:38 Danny describes his current position
00:30:33 Depression
00:37:50 How to help a friend in need
00:43:06 Who should seek mental health services?
00:45:40 Neurodivergency
00:48:38 Protecting your mental health in this chaotic world
00:52:20 Self-care
00:54:00 Affordability of mental health services
00:56:27 Connection between physical and mental health
01:02:30 How can someone become a mental health professional?
01:04:50 Anxiety and depression in teenagers today/social media
01:10:57 Imposter syndrome
01:14:20 Final thoughts