About This Training
Peer specialists bring lived experience, empathy, and deep emotional presence to their work. Without clear boundaries, supportive supervision, and shared responsibility for workplace wellness, that work can become difficult to sustain.
This training examines workplace wellness and return to use through the lens of peer supervision. Participants will explore the personal, supervisory, and organizational conditions that support sustainable peer work and consider how emotional labor, role drift, recovery maintenance, boundaries, and workplace culture affect staff wellness.
The training also introduces a structured, dignity-centered approach to responding to return to use. Participants will practice addressing safety, policy, accountability, support, and follow-up without abandoning recovery-oriented values.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this training, participants will be able to:
- Define workplace wellness within a peer support setting.
- Identify personal, supervisory, and organizational strategies that support peer specialist wellness.
- Describe the characteristics of a trauma-informed and recovery-oriented work culture.
- Apply supportive supervision practices that promote wellness, role clarity, boundaries, and sustainable peer work.
- Develop a plan for addressing return to use through a conversation grounded in dignity, safety, policy, and continued support.
Event Information
Location: Online via Zoom
Cost: Free
Continuing Education: 3 General Education CE hours
Language: English
Registration: Each participant must register separately using their own email address and join the training using that same email address. Two participants cannot register under one email address.
After registering, participants will receive a confirmation email with instructions for joining the training. If you do not receive a confirmation email within 15 minutes, contact lori.mellinger@recoverypeople.org.
Attendance: Participants must attend the full three-hour training and complete the post-training evaluation to receive continuing education credit. CE certificates will be issued only to the person registered under the email address used to join the training. Registration and login information should not be shared.
Accessibility and Accommodations: For questions, cancellations, or accommodation requests, contact lori.mellinger@recoverypeople.org.
Instructor Bios
Gloria Uridel, Peer-to-Career Specialist, RecoveryPeople, PSS, RSPS, PRSS, IC&RC
Gloria Uridel is a Peer-to-Career Specialist with RecoveryPeople and holds PSS, RSPS, PRSS, and IC&RC credentials. She is a training coordinator and instructor with over eight years of experience in the recovery support and wellness field. Gloria has extensive experience providing peer support, mentoring, and facilitating Texas state curriculum trainings for Recovery Support Peer Specialists.
As a person in long-term recovery, Gloria brings lived experience, compassion, and professional expertise to her work. She developed and implemented a wellness program based on SAMHSA’s Eight Dimensions of Wellness. Gloria has also provided technical assistance, project management, curriculum development, trainer instruction, and program delivery for recovery organizations at the state and national levels.
Christine Zimmerly, RecoveryPeople Peer-to-Career Director, RSPS, JI-RPS, MHPS, PRS IC&RC, PSS
Christine Zimmerly is the Peer-to-Career Director at RecoveryPeople and holds RSPS, JI-RPS, MHPS, PRS IC&RC, and PSS credentials. Christine leads the Peer-to-Career Program, supporting the growth and professional development of Texas’ peer workforce. Drawing from her lived experience in recovery and justice involvement, she mentors emerging peer specialists and supervisors as they pursue training, certification, and meaningful careers.
Christine works alongside a statewide team to create supportive workforce pathways that honor lived experience while strengthening retention, professional growth, and sustainability across Texas.
Lori Mellinger, Learning Management System Specialist, RecoveryPeople, RSPS
Lori Mellinger is the Learning Management System Specialist at RecoveryPeople and a certified Recovery Support Peer Specialist. Lori brings over a decade of experience in reentry, recovery, and nonprofit operations, along with lived experience of incarceration and long-term recovery.
She leads learning management system development at RecoveryPeople and supports the design of training and technical assistance that is practical, accessible, and grounded in real-world experience. Her work focuses on building clear systems, strengthening organizational capacity, and improving how information is shared across teams and communities.