{"id":733968,"date":"2026-06-13T10:12:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-13T10:12:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/733968\/"},"modified":"2026-06-13T10:12:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-13T10:12:12","slug":"black-women-in-canada-are-facing-a-mental-health-crisis-this-clinic-is-trying-to-help","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/733968\/","title":{"rendered":"Black women in Canada are facing a mental health crisis. This clinic is trying to help"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lesley Fraser says she lost eight months of her life after suffering a serious concussion from being struck by a ball in gym class at work.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The injury left Fraser, an education program assistant in Nova Scotia, with debilitating headaches, and she fell into the depths of depression.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was listless, I didn\u2019t have any energy, I didn\u2019t want to go out. The thought of even showering was exhausting,” Fraser told White Coat, Black Art’s host Dr. Brian Goldman.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the broader health-care system, Fraser says she likely would not have been taken seriously because her symptoms would not have been viewed \u201cas an emergency.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cUnless, you know, God forbid \u2014 which I didn\u2019t go there \u2014 wanted to commit suicide, is literally what I would have to do for the medical community to help me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ALesley Fraser from Nova Scotia says she received life-saving care through the Nova Scotia Sisterhood. (Brian Goldman\/CBC)<\/p>\n

The number of mental health challenges faced by Black women in Canada is growing steadily, clinicians say, as recent data and front-line experience point to persistent gaps in care that\u2019s caused by racism, inequality and limited access to culturally safe services.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In a recent health survey of 1,966 Black women, girls and gender non-conforming people nationwide, 76.6 per cent said they felt \u201cunheard or disbelieved\u201d by health-care providers when accessing services. The data was published last November in a report by the Toronto-based advocacy group Black Women\u2019s Institute for Health (BWIH).\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"ANearly 77 per cent of the close to 2,000 Black women, girls and gender non-conforming people surveyed across Canada said they felt \u201cunheard or disbelieved\u201d by health-care providers when accessing services. (Prostock-studio\/Shutterstock)Mental health distresses linked to systemic racism<\/p>\n

The minimization or dismissal of Black women\u2019s mental health symptoms in the health-care system is rooted in racist and historical narratives, says Roberta Timothy, an associate professor at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto.<\/p>\n

To legitimize the enslavement of Black women, white colonial systems disseminated the trope of the \u201cstrong Black woman,\u201d framing Black women as inherently resilient and suited for forced, \u201creally hard\u201d labour, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you are strong [like] an ox and you don\u2019t break \u2026 that means we don\u2019t have to see you, right,\u201d said Timothy.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don’t suffer, you\u2019re not in pain \u2026 we were not considered human.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

She says those harmful tropes continue to shape how Black women are perceived and treated in health care today.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re [thought to be able to] take anything on and still survive, which means that we don\u2019t have any mental health stresses,\u201d said Timothy. \u201cThere\u2019s no room for that kind of softness within our life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mental health, in the same report, was found to be the most commonly diagnosed chronic condition among Black women in Canada, affecting 15.8 per cent of respondents.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Self-harm ideation was reported by 27.4 per cent of respondents. That is more than six times the 2021 national average of suicide ideation at 4.2 per cent, according to Statistics Canada.<\/p>\n

\"ARoberta Timothy is an associate professor in the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto. She has worked in community health for over 30 years focusing on Black health. (Submitted by Roberta Timothy)Ways to support Black women\u00a0<\/p>\n

But having access to culturally relevant care can make a critical difference.<\/p>\n

The Nova Scotia Sisterhood in Dartmouth, N.S., is a primary care program that’s dedicated to serving Black women and gender-diverse individuals<\/a>, says Crystal John, a clinical therapist at the practice.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy current caseload is quite full \u2026 and those numbers are consistently growing.” She says she sees about 15 clients each week and has a waitlist of 40 people with referrals coming in on a regular basis.\u00a0<\/p>\n

John says she takes a trauma-informed approach to her therapy, which looks at how traumatic events impact all facets of a person. The mental health issues experienced by Black women, she says, can often stem from overlapping pressures, including workplace racism, exposure to violence in the home, grief, or wider community trauma.<\/p>\n

For example, John says many of her clients talk about being heavily scrutinized at work with heavy oversight, higher expectations, and more discipline than others.<\/p>\n

That kind of pressure can lead to \u201cburnout and emotional fatigue\u201d \u2014 especially in workplaces where they may be one of only a few Black employees and don\u2019t always feel safe speaking up, she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"ACrystal John is a clinical therapist for the Nova Scotia Sisterhood and the Nova Scotia Brotherhood. John says the lack of culturally safe resources to support Black women’s health and well-being is a “critical crisis.” (Submitted by Crystal John)<\/p>\n

\u201cI think the reason we\u2019re seeing the increase in numbers [at our clinic] is because it\u2019s spreading word of mouth that there is a safe space that you can come to,\u201d said John.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For Fraser, who sought care at Nova Scotia Sisterhood after describing feeling exhausted and unable to leave the house, she says a nurse practitioner immediately discussed medication options and quickly determined the best fit for her, with no wait times.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel comfortable coming here and seeing someone that looks like me and asking all the right questions,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Affordable mental health care needed<\/p>\n

John says she hopes more support will be put in place to encourage and guide Black children into fields where they are significantly underrepresented \u2014 such as medicine and teaching \u2014 because real change is about more than just hiring \u201cone more Black clinician.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Timothy, that work includes training practitioners to take an anti-oppression approach to care for Black women \u2014 including in psychotherapy \u2014 that centres the impact of anti-Black violence on mental health and community well-being.\u00a0<\/p>\n

WATCH | How Nova Scotia Sisterhood is transforming health care for Black women in Canada:\"\"<\/p>\n

Team transforming health care for African Nova Scotian women<\/p>\n

For many Black women in Canada, a trip to the doctor can often mean feeling overlooked or unheard. But as the CBC’s Celina Aalders reports, a group of female health-care providers in Dartmouth is working to change that.<\/p>\n

But she says training on its own isn\u2019t enough. Timothy says the report\u2019s findings need to be turned into real, long-term programs with sustained funding behind them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That, she says, means more free or affordable mental-health care, and more spaces where Black people can access support from providers who understand their lived experiences.<\/p>\n

In 2018, the federal government dedicated $19 million over five years to support mental wellness in Black communities. The funding has since evolved into several initiatives, including the Mental Health of Black Canadians Fund (MHBC), which supports Black-led, community-based projects that promote mental health.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

John says taking action won\u2019t just help Black women, it\u2019ll impact every person in the country.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to keep it moving if we are going to ensure that all Canadians are healthy, because when you miss a big portion of one specific group, it doesn’t bode well for all Canadians,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are all in this big melting pot, and as we all do better, the whole country is better.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lesley Fraser says she lost eight months of her life after suffering a serious concussion from being struck…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":733969,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[49,48,84,393,394],"class_list":["post-733968","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-health","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733968","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=733968"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733968\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/733969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=733968"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=733968"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=733968"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}