Mental health in the Black community is becoming less of a taboo and more of a topic of discussion. However, the use of therapy and other mental health services within the Black community continues to be low. One of the issues is the lack of representation, and another is accessibility. According to the American Psychological Association (APA), in the United States, only approximately 4% of all licensed psychologists are Black. As a doctoral student studying clinical psychology, it is my goal to become a part of the 4%, and it is my passion to be a culturally responsive and competent psychologist. Saybrook University is a hybrid graduate school that focuses on a humanistic and holistic approach to care. A humanistic and holistic approach prioritizes providing care to the whole person. Each client is a sum of experiences and beliefs, and to treat the issue at hand, oftentimes means to treat underlying issues that also need to be addressed. My education at Saybrook University has changed my path forward in life immensely, and I have already been able to start giving back to society. My education has allowed me the opportunity to give back to my community, having volunteered as a crisis counselor for a suicide prevention hotline. I have also volunteered as a crisis counselor for victims of domestic violence, worked with incarcerated adults, formerly incarcerated adults, and unhoused adults. I recently completed my clinical practicum in which I was allowed the opportunity to provide therapeutic and mental health services to conserved adults living with Serious Mental Illnesses (SMI). This fall semester, I will begin my clinical internship where I will be working with adolescents and adults in a hospital setting who are experiencing crises, resulting in the need to be placed on a psychiatric hold. It is with my education, and the experience that I have gained as a result of my education, that I intend to give back by working in community mental health settings. Community mental health settings provide greater accessibility to care. Mental health services are expensive, however, community mental health services allow for greater accessibility by providing care at free or reduced costs. Additionally, community mental health centers are oftentimes placed in communities of color–where the need is higher. As a licensed psychologist, I will have the privilege of realizing my goal of being a culturally responsive psychologist who is a system of support and resource to her community. And it is with this scholarship that I will be able to complete my education to reach that goal.

I am not a college student who is merely interested in mental health. I am a college student who knows the value and importance of mental health. I am a college student who strives to be a part of systematic changes within our society concerning mental health. I am a student whose passion and purpose is to be a system of support and a resource to my community as a mental health professional. In his TEDx Talk titled ‘Great Leaders Do What Drug Addicts Do’, Michael Brody-Waite gave three points to live by. He said to be authentic, surrender the outcome, and do the uncomfortable work. As a graduate student studying clinical psychology, these three actions are ones that I live by. I recently completed my clinical practicum at a skilled nursing facility labeled as an Institution for Mental Diseases (IMD), providing mental health services to conserved adults living with Serious Mental Illnesses (SMI). During my time as a practicum student, I was allowed to have a caseload in which, under the guidance of my supervisor, I provided therapeutic care. Being authentic was easy. I am who I am. I am in this field because I genuinely care about others. Surrendering the outcome, however, was a different story. I found myself struggling to make progress with a client. With this particular client, we bumped heads. I used a CBT-reality testing approach in our sessions. I thought that what was needed, was for my client to recognize that his thinking patterns were distorted because of his delusions. I was coming from a place of “therapist knows best”. But this approach wasn’t working. To be honest, simply being the therapist in this dynamic only meant that what I knew best, was the different theories and approaches. I did not know my client and his needs–he knew himself better than I ever would, and knew what he wanted and needed. I had to do the uncomfortable work. I had to reach out to my supervisor for guidance. I had to self-reflect. I had to take a step back. I had to combat my biases. I had to allow my client to be the captain of his ship. I not only had to take a step back, but I also had to surrender the outcome of doing this uncomfortable work. In doing the uncomfortable work, I switched from a CBT-reality testing approach to a strengths-based approach. In a strengths-based approach, the therapist listens to the client to better understand their strengths, using their strengths in therapy to provide guidance–the therapist is not there to provide the solution, the therapist is there to guide their client towards recognizing and acknowledging the solution. In a strengths-based approach, the client already has the tools to accomplish their goals and they know, sometimes unconsciously, what is needed to move forward. The outcome became an improved therapist-client relationship, and my client was discharged from the facility to a lower level of care. This experience taught me the value of doing the uncomfortable work and surrendering the outcome. It is easy for a mental health professional to see what is wrong. It is easy to pinpoint the problems. It is easy to try and fix the problems we see. But true success cannot be attained by taking the easy path. As a college student whose passion is to work in the field of mental health, the actions that I can take to create a positive impact in the lives of others are to authentically listen, do the uncomfortable work of sometimes taking a step back, and surrendering the outcome.

The fear of failing. As a graduate student studying clinical psychology, I often feel as though I am not doing enough. I fear that my focus on my studies may be impeding how active I can be within my community. I fear that the knowledge I am obtaining is not being cycled throughout my community in the form of support and resources. I fear that I am failing not only my community, but my ancestors because, without the tireless hard work and dedication of my community and ancestors, I would not be where I am today. According to the American Psychological Association (APA), only approximately 4% of all licensed psychologists are Black. I oftentimes wonder if the work that I am doing, to join that 4%, is enough. Am I enough? I have volunteered as a crisis counselor for a suicide prevention hotline. I have volunteered as a crisis counselor for victims of domestic violence. I have worked with incarcerated adults and formerly incarcerated adults. I have worked with unhoused adults. I recently completed my clinical practicum where I worked in a skilled nursing facility labeled as an Institution for Mental Diseases (IMD), providing mental health services to conserved adults living with Serious Mental Illnesses (SMI). This month, I will begin my clinical internship working in a hospital, providing services to adolescents and adults experiencing a crisis that requires them to be placed on a 5150 hold. My topic of interest for my dissertation–a continuation of my master’s project–is to find a connection between the Strong Black Woman schema and eating disorders–because there is a gap in the literature that focuses on understanding, from a cultural lens, the whys, and hows of eating disorders in Black women. I was allowed the opportunity to present how anime can be incorporated into Existential-Humanistic therapy at the APA Division 32: Society for Humanistic Psychology 17th Annual Conference. Near the end of this month, I will present my master’s project, which was a literature review on the available research concerning how it is likely that the Strong Black Woman schema develops in adolescent Black girls–around the same time eating disorders develop. But the question remains: am I doing enough? I don’t know. I don’t know if I am doing enough. There is always more that can be done. To continue to be placed in positions of opportunity, allowing me to be of service to my community as a mental health professional, I must accomplish my goal of becoming a licensed psychologist. To accomplish my goal of becoming a licensed psychologist, to be a system of support, providing culturally relevant and competent care, I must complete my education. To complete my education, I have been and will continue to be required to take out student loans. Receiving this scholarship would be a blessing. The money that I would save by paying down my student loans, would not only go toward living expenses, such as groceries, transportation to and from my internship, and rent, but it would also go towards assisting those in need. Ethically, I cannot and do not provide gifts to clients, however, I can improve their direct environment. I can create a welcoming environment through visual, auditory, and tactile tools. More importantly, with the weight of my educational financial burdens lessened, I will be able to be fully present in my work. The fear of failing will always push me to do and be better. I will forever strive for greatness. I will forever strive to make my community and ancestors proud. Am I doing enough? I don’t know. Am I enough? Absolutely.

I failed to protect my grandma. I failed to protect her from her son and his wife while they physically, verbally, and psychologically abused her as she struggled with dementia. I tried. I advocated on her behalf. I participated in her care. I filed reports. And none of it was enough. I failed her in life, but I will not fail her in death. My grandmother instilled in me a fire that only in death, can be extinguished. The fire: if I don’t like something, then I need to do something about it. When I was 6, I was told by the boys in class that I could not play kickball with them during recess because I was a girl. I complained to my teacher and she was dismissive of the atrocities occurring in room 17! When I told my grandma after school, she listened to me and validated my feelings, then asked, “what are you going to do about it?” I automatically thought my grandma was suggesting I beat up Allen, the ring leader in all of this. Get rid of the leader, get rid of the problem. My grandma issued a solid no to that plan. She also taught me that getting rid of the leader doesn’t mean that the problem is gone, because the rest of the boys might do the same thing. And then what, I fight them all? “What happens when you beat them all and you have no one to play with”, my grandma asked. She was right. If I went around beating up kids, even the kids I had no quarrels with would avoid me. So, for the rest of my first-grade year, I trained with my best friend. I worked on kicking, catching, and running. By second grade, I was ready to prove myself–but now all the girls in my class wanted me to use this chance for them as well. Annoyed, I consulted with my grandma after school. She taught me that sometimes you have to stick up for others because you’re in a better position to do so. Not to make this into a 2000s Disney Channel original movie ending, but I did win the right for the girls in my class to play kickball with the boys at recess, and I did embarrass every boy on that blacktop. The mental healthcare system in the US is subpar. I currently work in it, and it could be better. My grandmother would ask, so what are you going to do about it? How will you enact change? I’m in school to become a licensed clinical psychologist at Saybrook University, and it is my dream to create community programs that will provide resources and generate systems of support in the Black community. I want to aid in the process of healing from intergenerational trauma caused by systemic racism. I want to be a part of the mental health journey many people in the Black community don’t experience due to structural and institutional inequality. I want to decrease the mistrust in my community surrounding mental health professionals and care by being a representative. And each day, I want to quit. Working full-time, being involved in my community, taking on a full course load, and struggling financially take a daily toll. But if I quit now, I will never see to completion my dream of being a part of change. If I quit now, I will truly fail my grandmother.