Halyards for Healers

A free caregiver burnout-prevention program sets sail again in summer 2024

By Ross Boissoneau | July 13, 2024

The lure of Grand Traverse Bay entices people to do more than dip their toes in the water…for Brendan O’Donnel, it inspired him to move his entire life Up North.

“That’s what drew me to northern Michigan years ago,” he says of the region’s freshwater gem. O’Donnel had grown up sailing on Chesapeake Bay, and after college began working on a tall ship that spent summers in the Boston area and winters in Key West. He found his way to northern Michigan in 2008 when a captain on another ship told him she would hire him as a second mate, a promotion from deckhand, on the Manitou where she’d begun her career.

He later worked at Quantum Sails in Traverse City before moving to Oregon to pursue a job in experiential learning, working on programs geared towards youth. When he returned, he was hired as a captain, a role he held from 2013 to 2016.

As much as he got out of sailing, after a time O’Donnel felt a calling to do something different, something to help people. So he took a left turn—make that a turn to port—into a new career, and in 2019, O’Donnel graduated with a degree in social work.

Just in time for the pandemic.

Geeked About Our Well-being

O’Donnel says as a social work therapist he is “geeked about our well-being,” but his job became even more of a challenge when COVID-19 struck and everyone was suddenly living with fear and the unknown.

That included his fellow practitioners. As a practicing therapist, he was already aware of the challenges faced by those in the profession—his fellow therapists, psychologists, and counselors. Their work is done out of the public’s eye in a one-on-one setting, and they carry the burdens of others. Then throw in the isolation that everyone, including mental health practitioners, went through during COVID, and simply living life was difficult.

Though health workers in general were lauded for their efforts during the peak of the pandemic, that wasn’t necessarily the case for everyone. “I saw how social workers, therapists, home health aides, didn’t get the same acknowledgement as much as doctors, nurses, police, and other first responders,” O’Donnel says.

He wanted to create a public venue to allow those counselors to unburden themselves and talk about their work in a way that wouldn’t cross any ethical boundaries. It could give the listeners an opportunity to be listened to, a place to discuss their work with others who would understand.

“So I floated the idea of a program on Champion”—one of the ships belonging to the Maritime Heritage Alliance of Traverse City—“for small groups of nurses, caregivers, etc.,” he says.

A Therapeutic Environment

Thus was born Halyards for Healers, where O’Donnel serves as captain while offering an opportunity for healthcare attendees to come together. (A halyard, for the landlubbers, is a line/rope used to hoist or lower sails, flags, or ladders.)

O’Donnel works with the Maritime Heritage Alliance (MHA) to provide the complimentary cruises for those who provide healing work in the region, giving them the opportunity, as the website says, “connect, unwind, and set down the stress that comes from supporting people across the community.” After all, the MHA exists to preserve the history and a connection to the waters of the region. What better way to expand that than to provide a place for healing?

But the program is about more than just getting away from it all on the water.

“It’s not just ‘Let’s go for a boat ride,’ though recreation and play is underrated,” says O’Donnel. Social workers, counselors and therapists deal with everyone else’s problems, and it’s not always easy to step away from that. With others in the same boat—literally—it’s a chance for them to decompress in a safe space. “It’s a therapeutic environment for a short time—group therapy,” says O’Donnel.

O’Donnel says the passengers are welcome to help out with dock lines and assist the trained crew, who, like O’Donnel, are volunteers. Once out in the bay, he leads a guided meditation and guided sensory work. Attendees are free to participate as they see fit.

“It’s not ‘I’m gonna solve your problems.’ It’s an open environment,” he says, one free of typical stressors.

O’Donnel says caregiver burnout-prevention programs such as this are all too rare.

We Exist for More than Working

Of course, this isn’t the only part of O’Donnel’s professional life. He works regularly with clients in the more typical one-on-one sessions in his role as a social work therapist.

Beyond the clinical setting people are familiar with, he has also initiated a community writing group for those in the LGBTQ+ community. He says many people don’t fit neatly into gender binary roles; he himself identifies as a queer male. After two previous seasons, O’Donnel will be starting the writing group up again in the fall.

While it was the life on the water that drew him here, he says he finds his current job extremely rewarding. “It’s hands-on work,” he says, though not in the traditional sense. “We’re dealing with the nitty gritty, people’s pain, how to have relationships. That’s why I got into social work.”

One more thing that appeals to him: “It’s never boring,” he says with a laugh.

Being able to combine his two professional worlds made sense. “It’s really important to me that we remember we exist for more than working,” he says, speaking to and for the general population, but also his fellow healers.

The dates for this year’s Halyards for Healers program have not yet been set. The sails last year were typically full, so it’s wise to sign up early. For more information, go to MaritimeHeritageAlliance.org. To find out about O’Donnel’s therapy work and writing group, visit brendanodonnel.com.