A Message of Gratitude from Strength in Service to Coronado Gives

"Receiving this gift from the Coronado Gives campaign means the world to our team and to the military families we serve. At Strength in Service, we believe no one should have to choose between finding a clinician who truly gets them and one they can actually afford. This community's generosity allows us to keep showing up for military families right here in Coronado — and to create pathways for military spouses who, like me, have spent years trying to build a career between deployments, overseas tours, and the beautiful chaos of military life. We are so grateful."

-Crystal Bettenhausen-Bubulka, LCSW, MSG, Founder and Executive Director 

At Strength in Service, our work is rooted in the Coronado community and shaped by the military families who call it home — and this gift from the Coronado Community Foundation allows us to keep showing up for those families in ways that truly matter.Coronado is a special place to live, but military life can still be isolating. Deployments, transitions, and the pressure to stay resilient can leave people feeling disconnected and unsure where to turn. We believe strong mental health starts with strong social connection, and we work every day to ensure military families feel seen, supported, and understood by people who genuinely get this life.

We are also solving two interconnected problems: a growing shortage of mental health providers and a lack of meaningful career opportunities for military spouses in the clinical field. We know this journey firsthand — it took our founder nearly seven years to accumulate the supervised hours required for licensure, navigating two overseas tours, a global pandemic, and an expanding family while completing additional licensing requirements in several states before calling Coronado home in 2021.

It was hard. But it wasn't impossible. And that's exactly what Strength in Service was built to prove — for the families we serve and the clinicians we're helping build careers alongside us. This gift helps us expand access to care through sliding scale fees and insurance partnerships, and deepens our community programming — from our Boots & Belonging hiking series to peer support spaces and our social health ambassador program— all designed to reduce loneliness and build social health for Coronado families.

Strength in Service Team

Quotes from our Staff: 

"Working as an Associate Social Worker with Strength in Service is especially meaningful because I can grow professionally in a way that still prioritizes my own family while providing compassionate, culturally responsive mental health services to a community that has supported and given so much to us as a military family"

-Kari deLongpre, ASW, MSW

"Working for Strength In Service is meaningful to me because it allows me to support our community with compassionate, culturally informed care that strengthens resilience, deepens connection, and honors the importance of social health every day. As a military spouse, Strength In Service has given me the opportunity to continue building my clinical hours, grow professionally, and pursue my passion for expanding access to mental health services—even as my own family navigates deployments, cross-country relocations, and the many uncertainties of military life.

-Peyton Fisher, ASW, MSW

"Internering with Strength In Service gives me a strong foundation for my social work journey by surrounding me with mentorship and a community that supports my growth"

-Grateful MSW Intern, University of Nevada Reno