ST. LOUIS — After her night shift as a dispatcher at a rental car agency, Nyla Higgins woke up at 2:36 p.m. on May 16 to her phone vibrating with weather alerts.

It began to storm, and she put her dog in a crate.

Suddenly, the wind shattered her bedroom windows. Debris swirled everywhere. Higgins, 34, could barely open the door and get to her sister, 27. As Higgins saw her bedroom pull away from the house, she and her sister were flung into the bathroom and into the tub.

Their brick house, in the 3100 block of North Newstead Avenue, crumbled around them. Somehow, the bathroom and bedroom door frames fell across them and protected them. Neighbors dug them out from the rubble.

The sisters suffered only cuts and bruises. But Higgins said she’s suffering in ways others can’t see.

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She lost her grandparents’ home — her place of comfort and love. Just months earlier, she had lost her grandmother. Her mind can’t grasp how it was all taken so quickly. How she survived. How her neighborhood looks like a war zone.

Her knees buckle when it starts to rain. Her sense of normalcy and safety is shaken. She struggles to describe how she’s grateful to be alive, but also angry.

“I still haven’t processed, really, what’s going on,” Higgins said. “I know I don’t have a home anymore, but it’s still mind-boggling. I feel like I’m in a movie, like I’m living somebody else’s life.”

Janese C. Banks gets a massage from Hattie Svoboda, a licensed massage therapist volunteering with The Bullet Recovery Injury Clinic at their wellness tent in the Fountain Park neighborhood of St. Louis on Friday, May 23, 2025. Banks, a resident of The Ville, lost power to her home for a few days and a fallen tree is in her front yard after damage caused by the May 16, 2025 tornado.

Experts say last week’s tornado, which ripped through densely populated areas in Clayton and St. Louis and killed five people, will likely damage the mental health of many residents.

They may have trouble sleeping or focusing. And up to 40% can develop mental disorders, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, research shows. Depression is another frequent outcome.

The effects come from the trauma of a disaster and the stress after.

Brittany Graham, chief operating officer for Mental Health America of Eastern Missouri, anticipates a heavy mental health burden across St. Louis. She points to the extent of the devastation and the fact that hardest-hit areas included some of the poorest neighborhoods of the city.

She expects feelings of anxiety and sadness to hit even harder once adrenaline drops and people are no longer putting all their energy into meeting basic needs.

“That doesn’t leave a lot of room for your brain to really process what is taking place, or to make sense of what is taking place or to even think about what comes in a week or two,” Graham said. “Right now, it’s survival.”

Higgins knows she’s going to need therapy as she stays in the homes of a friend and a family member.

“I honestly need some type of mental help because I don’t really know what to do or where to put my emotions, because I’ve never been in the situation where I lost everything,” she said.

A natural disaster affects an entire community, not just individuals, Higgins said. But that can bring about the most powerful way to heal. And St. Louis is doing that, she said, with volunteers and neighbors coming together.

“Connectedness, togetherness, humans helping humans is what gets people through trauma,” Higgins said. “It really is a human sitting in the pain with you, acknowledging the pain. Seeing you at your lowest point, seeing you vulnerable and saying, ‘I’m here with you.’”

At MADE Makerspace, a community space for artists on Delmar Boulevard that withstood tornado damage, a volunteer led free guided art sessions this past week to help local residents.

One woman left behind a painting of dark swirls strewn with words such as “betrayal,” “heartbreak” and “uprooted.”

“Our goal is to provide solace through creating,” said the volunteer, Michelle Ross, 48, of St. Charles. “We want to give the community that space to process that trauma in a way that makes sense to them.”

Pat Miller, right, and Afua Bromley, a licensed acupuncturist volunteering with The Bullet Recovery Injury Clinic (BRIC), chat while Miller receives acupuncture treatment at The BRIC’s wellness tent in the Fountain Park neighborhood of St. Louis on Friday, May 23, 2025. Miller’s house in Fountain Park was damaged by the May 16, 2025, tornado.

At Fountain Park, surrounded by damaged homes and churches, people relaxed in zero-gravity chairs under a tent as instrumental music played and aromatherapy filled the air.

The trauma recovery organizations The T and the Bullet Related Injury Clinic (BRIC) provided the space every day this past week, with plans to continue until at least June 1.

Amid the free food, hygiene items and charging stations, the staff provided therapists, health supplements, art activities for children and acupuncture in the ear to help with stress and sleep.

Staff members wore shirts that said, “Are you OK?”

“For some people, they’re not at a place where they even have the words to describe their trauma, but their body is well aware,” Dr. LJ Punch, a former trauma surgeon who founded the BRIC to help families cope with gun violence.

Veronica Woodson, 49, came Tuesday and Wednesday to relax and get acupuncture because she wasn’t sleeping well.

She trembled and cried as she recalled hiding in a closet at Legacy Books and Café on Delmar Boulevard when the tornado barreled through.

She came out of the cafe to see overturned cars and gaping holes in homes. She tried to call but couldn’t get through to her 10-year-old daughter’s nearby school, Washington Montessori.

She couldn’t believe what happened in an instant to the neighborhood she has lived in her whole life. Her home in the Academy/Sherman Park neighborhood lost its roof.

“I’m traumatized. I will never be the same,” Woodson said. “What I know will never be the same. What is normal here will never be the same.”

Woodson knows others are worse off than she is. But the encouragement from BRIC volunteers meant a lot.

“It was a calm place to take a deep breath for a second before I get back to reality,” Woodson said. “It was a mental hug.”

Selma Abdalla, assistant professor in the School of Public Health at Washington University, has studied the impact of Hurricane Harvey on the mental health of Houston residents.

More than three years after the disaster, nearly 13% of affected residents had PTSD and 6% still suffered from depression, Abdalla said.

People most susceptible, she said, were those already struggling financially, facing barriers to health care, experiencing health problems or lacking support systems.

What concerns Abdalla about the St. Louis tornado is it struck a huge swath of north city, where many residents face those struggles.

“I can’t even imagine what this will be like going forward,” she said.

What helps reduce the burden, Abdalla said, is “psychological First Aid.” Government and social service agencies need to immediately provide basic necessities, such as food, medical care and shelter.

And more importantly, they need to communicate a clear plan on how they will do so.

“Trust that government and other entities will come through and support you is correlated with whether you will have worse or better outcomes,” Abdalla said.

For residents, she suggests getting back into a routine as soon as possible, avoiding images of the destruction and seeking health services right away. She also suggests they help others.

“That actually then links you to having more social support,” she said. “And people who have more social support are usually ones who are more capable of tackling the mental health burden.”

Punch said the BRIC, at 5501 Delmar Blvd., will open its doors to tornado victims, not just those recovering from gun violence. But he worries that volunteer support will dwindle.

“Come out and support. Be here for the long run,” Punch suggested. “Be here in the summer. Be here in the fall. Be here in the winter, because this is a long road to recovery.”

For now, Higgins is coping by sleeping, playing with her pit bull Seven (who was protected by his crate and survived), talking with friends and family and avoiding images of the damage.

But she still finds herself circling back to those last moments in her house.

“All I can do is pray,” Higgins said. “I got to pray for understanding. I got to pray for guidance, because this is not led by me. I have to try to be patient, try to keep a smile on my face.”

In a press conference Thursday, May 22, 2025, Mayor Cara Spencer tells residents to document damage to their homes for FEMA officials. She also noted for volunteers and residents to practice self-care. Video courtesy of the City of St. Louis.

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