Chief Justice Monica M. Márquez spoke about mental health and wellness in the legal profession on Wednesday, stressing the importance of seeking help starting in law school.

“Thirty years ago when I went to law school, none of that existed. We weren’t having these conversations,” she said at the University of Colorado’s law school in Boulder. “I am not, and have not been, sort of a lifelong champion of wellbeing. But I’ve become a convert over the years.”

Márquez, who has been a member of the Colorado Supreme Court since 2010 and its chief justice since last summer, spoke about her own experience as a young lawyer when she worked hard, pulled all-nighters and stopped taking care of herself. One day, she collapsed at home and needed to go to the emergency department.

“When you are in chronic pain like that,” Márquez said, “it affects every aspect of your life. And you get to a place — if you can’t find a way to address that pain, you get to a place where you will do just about anything to escape it.”

She added that while she personally has a low tolerance for narcotics, “I learned just how easy it is for any one of us in this room — any judge, any law professor out there, I don’t care how educated you are — it is so easy to tip over into addiction when you are in a state like that.”

Prior to becoming chief justice, Márquez chaired the Colorado Supreme Court Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being. The effort was modeled after a national project by the American Bar Association, co-chaired by Colorado’s top attorney regulator.

Among other things, the 2017 national report suggested civility has declined in the legal profession, high job demands and lack of control are associated with psychological issues and alcohol abuse, and law students felt deterred from seeking help for their own depression or drug use.

The Colorado task force, which released its findings in 2021, presented a list of recommendations aimed at publicizing resources that help lawyers address mental health and wellness challenges.

“We learned that looking across those cohorts, the cohorts experiencing the greatest degree of challenges were our young lawyers,” Márquez said. “That doesn’t bode well for the profession when your youngest lawyers are battling those things so early in their careers.”

She emphasized the importance of judicial and legal leaders speaking about wellness beginning in law school.

“We realized that many of the bad habits, if you will, that we see among lawyers start here in law school. That workaholism. That glorification of how many all-nighters did you pull,” she said. “There is a prideful stoicism, perhaps, about how we function as attorneys. We don’t talk about it.”

One audience member offered comments about the “tension” between the current generation of lawyers that wants to set boundaries between personal and professional life, and the “old guard” that is not used to prioritizing wellness. Another attendee suggested the increased reliance on remote interactions, a product of the COVID-19 pandemic, was unhealthy.

Márquez responded that the scope of virtual work is being debated in the Denver legal community.

“There’s a lot of freedom for lawyers who appreciate that freedom,” she said. “But what you’re pointing to is that one-to-one mentorship piece and that camaraderie. I’m concerned about exactly that. And the fact that our newest lawyers coming into the fold are missing out on those casual interactions from bumping into somebody in the hall. You can get real mentorship from that.”

She added that her own staff works in person, but some other justices and the Court of Appeals accommodate remote work to a greater extent.

Also participating in the discussion were Danielle Ansted, CU’s counseling and psychiatric services therapist, and Emily Horowitz, the assistant dean of student services. Horowitz observed that the number of counselors in law schools is “huge compared to what it was” when she was graduating.

She added that more students have been seeking disability-related accommodations, likely due to decreased stigmatization of such requests.

Currently, the Supreme Court is evaluating a rule change that would make it easier for applicants to request disability accommodations for the bar exam. However, several law students told the justices last year that the proposed change would still impose a far higher burden than necessary on applicants to justify their disability. The proposal is still under consideration.