Utah Valley University’s (UVU) Orem Campus became a hub for mental health advocacy as hundreds of Utah’s top mental health professionals gathered in the Grand Ballroom for the 2025 UVU Conference on Mental Health from Oct. 23-24.
Utah Valley University’s (UVU) Orem Campus became a hub for mental health advocacy as hundreds of Utah’s top mental health professionals gathered in the Grand Ballroom for the 2025 UVU Conference on Mental Health from Oct. 23-24.
The two-day event featured keynote speakers, expert panels, and interactive workshops aimed at addressing pressing mental health challenges and fostering collaboration among clinicians, educators, and community leaders. The conference was hosted by the UVU College of Humanities and Social Sciences (CHSS).
At the heart of the conference were two compelling keynote presentations that set the tone for the entire event. Desmond Lomax, CMHC, spoke on Thursday about the impact of grief and the healing process, and Delaney Ruston, M.D., addressed how storytelling can foster human connection.
Desmond Lomax, CMHC | Love, Loss, and Laughter: The Three Things That Bring Us All Together
Lomax, whose therapy career spans over 15 years, began his remarks by recalling the impact of losing his 19-year-old son, Mateen, to suicide in 2019.
“Something broke inside of me, and I think in a really good way… There’s a lot of uncertainty in loss, what is this loss thing, and how does it impact us?”
Lomax went on to describe the symptoms humans can feel when experiencing grief and loss, and posited that laughter is a positive way to effectively “burn the fuel” of loss.
“Sadness being felt is a gateway to laughter. Laughter being felt is a gateway to sadness,” he said. “They’re not opposites of each other. I have noticed that people who are experiencing real hardships have lost the capacity to laugh, and as a result, they've become emotionally hijacked… Some of the common misconceptions are that people sometimes see laughter as a result of denial. The reality is, laughter is a beautiful remedy, and it does wonders.”
Lomax further emphasized the power of love — both in terms of self-regard and empathy — in the pursuit of overcoming loss.
“In my private practice, it's amazing to see how people are really struggling with the capacity to love other people,” he shared. “We've been educated in being empathetic towards everyone else, and we're typically the last person to have empathy towards ourselves after we've struggled with loss. The secret to having love, the capacity to love and have that continuous love and energy for others is to find it within yourself.”
Lomax concluded his remarks by encouraging clinicians in the audience to be a cheerleader to those experiencing loss and reminded them to take time for themselves as they helped others navigate their own mental health.
“The best thing you can be is a cheerleader in this ongoing process, he said. “I want to challenge all of you to take that 15-20 minutes a day and take care of yourself so that you can have the capacity to take care of others.”
Read Desmond Lomax’s bio on the UVU Conference on Mental Health website.
Delaney Ruston, M.D. Healing Through Story: Lessons From Around the World on Mental Health and Connection
Dr. Delaney Ruston, a Stanford-trained physician, filmmaker, and global mental health advocate, began her keynote by emphasizing the transformative power of storytelling in addressing global mental health.
“I want to focus today on the benefits in terms of dismantling unwarranted shame [and] unhelpful myths. And really important, that hard to describe human to human connection, positive feelings, conscious and subconscious. I want to pay a tribute to that.”
Over the course of her remarks, Dr. Ruston showed clips of documentaries she worked on throughout the world that have addressed mental health — from India to South Africa to her very own home. Dr. Ruston shared a personal documentary cataloguing her father’s schizophrenia. Her conversation underscored the importance of community support, traditional healing, and reducing unwarranted shame through education and training.
Read Dr. Ruston’s bio on the UVU Conference on Mental Health website.
The UVU Conference on Mental Health is an annual conference hosted by the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. The event features keynote speakers, breakout sessions, and poster presentations that discuss critical mental health topics such as addiction, depression, loss, interpersonal violence, and suicide prevention.
