A Raucous Respite for Weeks Wrecked with Rigor

Every Sunday night, a group of Loyola students travel to Northshore Avenue Pier to join fellow Chicagoans for an evening of stress relief. Three Loyola students are just one group of many who meet at 7 p.m. to walk to Lake Michigan and scream together at Chicago’s Scream Club.

Men’s Transformational Coach and Breath Practitioner Manny Hernandez and Personal Brand Expert Elena Soboleva said they co-founded Scream Club to offer the community a cathartic outlet for releasing stress and anxiety.

The club began in 2025 after romantic partners Hernandez and Soboleva engaged in a personal scream session at North Avenue Beach Pier after a stressful week of work. As they bellowed, they encountered other lakefront passerbys and asked if they’d like to join. 

“We saw the need in the community, how they came together and how much they were looking forward to each scream,” Soboleva said.

A group of Loyola students and alumni said they began attending Scream Club over the summer as a way to maintain their friendship, with some members of the friend group having graduated and the rest still in school. Fourth-year classical civilizations and anthropology major, Naomi Lyon, first heard about Scream Club over the summer and asked if her friends wanted to go with her.

The first time attending Scream Club, Lyon, 2025 graduate Ale Rodriguez and another Loyola alumnus, Abbi Bannheim, arrived late due to timing issues, and saw Scream Club do the group scream just as they got there. They said since they missed the main event, they decided to scream by themselves instead.

“I think you have to be a certain degree, somewhat vulnerable to just, like, scream out in front of total strangers,” Rodriguez said.

The heart of Scream Club’s mission is to provide a space to improve mental health and find community. When people arrive, Soboleva and Hernandez hand out biodegradable pieces of paper and ask people to write down anything they want to let go of. 

“We don’t care what you look like, what you believe in, how old you are, what your ethnicity is,” Hernandez said.

By 7:15 p.m., Hernandez and Soboleva led participants down the pier. Hernandez took people through a breathing exercise and instructed attendees to throw the pieces of paper into the water. He walked them through one last breathing exercise, followed by three rounds of screams.

“I think it’s really impressive how many people would come together,” Lyon said.

Lyon, Rodriguez and Bannheim said they’ve found Scream Club to be a great way to stay in contact after graduation. Lyon also said it has been a good way to balance coursework while she’s applying to graduate school. 

“When you’re doing the scream, it’s so beautiful,” Bannheim said. “It’s a really grounding experience.”

Bannheim said she believes Scream Club is a great outlet for stress and pairs well with Loyola resources such as the Wellness Center.