Dayna Greenroyd held up a photograph of a roller coaster.

“That’s what I was feeling like,” she said as a dozen people listened intently. They are living with bipolar disorders — cycles of depression and mood elevation.

Participants nodded at Greenroyd’s account of “a very dangerous, frightening place.” The Vancouver woman described racing through the ups and downs, from an extremely elevated mood to what she called “worthless, hopeless, helpless.”

The bipolar support group is one of the offerings at Consumer Voices Are Born, a nonprofit agency that provides resources and peer support for mental-health recovery. As a guest speaker, Greenroyd knows what people in the group are going through.

That is big part of the center’s innovative approach, said Brad Berry, executive director of CVAB.

“There are no others like this,” Berry said. “We’re a self-help recovery center.”

The center has 12 paid staff members and 40 to 50 volunteers, and the majority of them are in mental-health recovery.

“I think we’re the only one in state with that in the bylaws,” Berry said.

CVAB was recently awarded a $210,000 federal grant to expand its approach to mental-health recovery across Washington.

“This is an opportunity, working with other groups, to open from three to five centers across the state. We can network together, under one umbrella, to help individuals with mental illness,” Berry said.

Like CVAB, the centers will be organized by people in mental health recovery.

It will be a big move for a local agency, but CVAB has a good track record that attracted the attention federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Berry said.

“We began here in 1995,” he said. Since then, “No programs in Southwest Washington have been able to grow or hang on except CVAB. It’s a credit to the people who have been here.

“The last four or five years, we’ve seen incredible growth,” Berry said. Part of that was establishing a new home in the county’s Center for Community Health, 1601 E. Fourth Plain Blvd. People at CVAB have gotten better at defining their mission and doing their job.

“Unfortunately, the economy tanked, and more people are looking for mental health resources,” Berry said.

“We’ve gone from a $150,000 agency to a $750,000 agency,” Berry said. County contracts fund about $697,000 of that, with those federal dollars slated to provide $70,000 a year for three years.

In the fiscal year that ended in June, almost 2,200 individuals made 18,500 visits to CVAB.

The track record shows the strength of peer-based programs, he said.

“Research shows it works,” Berry said. “It helps people stay out of jail or out of the hospital.”

Peer-based programs support recovery because “you find how other people have done it,” said Cathy Bowen, a staff member.

Bowen said she survived a pretty bad decade, when a meth addiction and a mental illness ganged up on her. The staffers and volunteers at CVAB can provide role models for people who are looking for help, Bowen said.

“You’ve been where I’ve been. You’re working your recovery. I can do that, too,” Bowen said.

It’s a great program, Brian Hahn said after the support-group session.

“When I came here 3½ years ago, I was on the street,” Hahn said. “There was a sense of caring here I could tell was genuine.”

There are other pieces to the recovery plan.

“We have volunteer opportunities here,” Bowen said. “It can be a big factor in wellness, helping you get back your sense of self-worth. I started out working a few hours a week here as a greeter.

“We have coffee sessions. It helps people get on a schedule, and you can talk to somebody. A lot of people have been isolated for so long,” Bowen said.

“We hope to create a safe, sober, welcoming environment,” Berry said. “We help with employment services, resources for housing, any tools they need for wellness and recovery.”

The office includes a computer lab. People can work on job applications and even take online college classes.

In addition to activities aiding mental health recovery, CVAB offers a diabetes support group.

“People with mental illness die 25 years earlier than other people,” Bowen said. “They’re so busy taking care of their mental illness that they don’t take care of their physical health.”

Tom Vogt: 360-735-4558; tom.vogt@columbian.com

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