The Matrons of Mayhem will host their monthly Third Friday Bingo on Friday, Aug. 21, with this month’s proceeds going to MenHealing, a national nonprofit dedicated to supporting male survivors of sexual harm — a population organizers say is too often left out of the conversation around sexual violence and recovery.

Doors open at 6 p.m., and bingo begins at 7 p.m. at First Baptist Church, 777 S. 1300 East. Cards are $5 for a seven-game set, with prizes donated by local businesses. The bingo night is part of the Matrons’ long-running Third Friday tradition, a decades-old community fixture that rotates its monthly beneficiary among local causes — but this month, the spotlight is squarely on MenHealing’s mission.

MenHealing was founded on the belief that “community changes everything,” and for 25 years the organization has built programs around exactly that principle. Since 2001, it has conducted healing workshops for male survivors, serving more than 2,000 men through 103 Weekend of Recovery and Day of Recovery events — intensive, multi-day retreats designed to help survivors process trauma in the company of other men who understand it firsthand.

An ongoing peer support network backs that in-person work. MenHealing runs three distinct types of peer support groups — WOR Alumni, Partner, and Community — built specifically to remove the barriers of geography and access that have historically kept male survivors isolated from care. A man in a small town with no local therapist or support group can still find connection through MenHealing’s network.

The organization also invests heavily in storytelling as a healing and awareness tool. Its “Beyond Survival: Voices of Healing” video series features short, first-person accounts from survivors describing life after trauma, while the companion “Skills for Healing” series centers on practical coping strategies. The “Just Healing” podcast extends that same work into longer-form conversations about how trauma intersects with race, culture, gender identity, and masculinity. In 2021, the Men’s Story Project brought that storytelling mission to the stage, featuring men and masculine-identified people speaking publicly about healthier masculinity and gender justice.

MenHealing’s reach extends into some of the hardest-to-access corners of survivor care as well. Its H.O.M.E. (Healing Outreach for Men Everywhere) initiative — developed with Weekend of Recovery alumni and the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections — created an interactive workbook, complete with embedded video and audio content, specifically for incarcerated survivors and the families trying to understand what they’ve been through.

Importantly, MenHealing’s work has not been narrowly defined by gender or identity. A 2022 collaboration with FORGE, called “Voices of Healing: Trans & Nonbinary Survivors SPEAK OUT,” centered the experiences of trans and nonbinary survivors of sexual victimization — a signal of the organization’s inclusive framing of who counts as a “male survivor” and who deserves support.

For a community like Salt Lake City’s, where LGBTQ men are statistically at greater risk of sexual violence and where survivors commonly face compounded stigma, MenHealing’s work fills a vital gap. Organizers hope Third Friday Bingo will not just raise money, but raise visibility for a cause that rarely gets a night in the spotlight.

More information on MenHealing’s programs, workshops and support groups is available at menhealing.org. Details on the Aug. 21 bingo fundraiser can be found at facebook.com/matronsofmayhem.