BlkSpace Therapy has been a long time coming. At least for me, mental health is something that has always existed in my spectrum of knowledge. I grew up with a parent who studied mental health. My interest with human interaction, temperament, feelings and the why’s of it all has always been there. However, it wasn’t until I had my own blatant reconciling with mental wellbeing that I started to consider my own whys. My conscious journey with mental health started at 19 when I had my first panic attack, which triggered a string of others soon to follow. I was disoriented to say the least not just during episodes of a mental “blip” as I like to call them, but what to do next.
I turned to the Internet to research what I could on how I could solve this problem and it took years to find something that even vaguely helped. Looking up therapists, trying therapists, changing therapists…looking up chat groups, trying chat groups and changing them…prices, insurance, location, scheduling, and any other trials and errors you can think of. But as said before after years of trial and error I had pulled together some things that I knew I wanted. Yet, there was always something I was dealing with and quiet honestly didn’t even think to try to solve.
I was content for the most part but on one particular day I was over it and ready to find or make a solution and it played out something like this…
I was having somewhat of regular day and like on most days I had an influx of anxiety. Sometimes I try to figure out the cause and sometimes I just choose to empty my mind. On this day I chose the latter. I found myself diving into the deep hole mindless YouTube watching “get ready with me’s”, craft videos, top 10’s etc. I was slowly easing my mind and ready to refocus my energy. Then without warning I was hit with a weight, racism. It wasn’t blatant, it wasn’t even jarring per se but it hit hard and that little bit of contentment I had built up had suddenly been demolished.
I was shocked, confused, angry and I had this wave of hopelessness engulf me. In that moment I just wanted to express how I felt, my confusion, my anger and this immense depressive sensation. I went online to find therapy chats or anonymous forums. Where I could feel safe expressing the sensations I just experienced from something that is so often dismissed. When I realized I wasn’t finding what I was looking for I realized that was the “something” I was dealing with but never thought to address. Which lead me to create BlkSpace Therapy.
BlkSpace Therapy isn’t a place just to talk about issues with race, but it is a place that is meant to allow for race and the complexities that come with it to be understood no matter what the context. Along with opening up a free space for Black people to come and find some type of solace. To encourage mental wellbeing and support amongst the Black Community.