Crossroads Mental Wellness Services

12/19/2025

This month can be loud for a lot of people. Too many plans, too many expectations, not enough quiet.
If you need a slower pace, that choice is valid.

📞 404-369-3136 | 🌐 atlantamentalhealthcounseling.com

12/18/2025

Across stories like Karrie’s triage ordeal, Mercedes giving birth on the side of the road, The Retrievals, and the Guardian’s investigation into the Free Birth Society, a pattern is impossible to ignore: women say they are in pain, say something is wrong, and are minimized, pathologized, or left to navigate danger alone. For Black women, all of this unfolds in a context of racism, stereotypes about pain tolerance, and a long history of medical exploitation, making both avoidance and engagement with the medical system emotionally and physically high stakes. it is not enough to feel outrage or grief. Mental health professionals are uniquely positioned to help Black birthing people process these events as trauma, name the role of racism in their care, and rebuild a sense of safety, agency, and support in future medical encounters. This post is about what therapists can actually do in the therapy room in response to medical mistreatment and obstetric racism in Black maternal health.

What mental health therapists can do:
• Center and validate the trauma
Name events like being turned away in labor, delivering roadside, or being ignored in triage as potentially life threatening and traumatic, not “just a bad birth” or a “close call.” Normalize fear, rage, grief, mistrust, and shame as understandable responses to an unsafe system rather than individual overreaction.
• Screen and treat birth-related mental health conditions
Routinely screen Black perinatal and TTC clients for birth-related PTSD, depression, and anxiety after any traumatic or discriminatory care. Use trauma-focused approaches (e.g., TF CBT, EMDR, narrative work) adapted to perinatal needs and medical trauma context.
• Address racism and medical mistrust directly
Name obstetric racism and systemic neglect as part of the trauma narrative instead of keeping the focus only on “coping skills.”
Explore how these incidents shape willingness to seek care, safety expectations, and decisions about future pregnancies.
• Build advocacy and safety plans
Co-create scripts for future appointments (what to say if symptoms are dismissed, how to request another provider, how to escalate concerns). Develop concrete safety plans around triggers like going back to the same hospital, interacting with staff in triage, or driving past the site of the trauma.
• Involve partners and loved ones when appropriate
Include partners or family who witnessed or participated in emergent births, recognizing that they may carry their own trauma and guilt. Support the family in talking about the event in a way that centers survival, care, and shared meaning rather than blame.
• Connect to culturally responsive and community care
Refer to Black-led or culturally responsive doulas, midwives, perinatal therapists, and peer groups familiar with reproductive justice and Black maternal health.

Offer information on advocacy and legal resources when clients are considering complaints or legal action as part of their healing.

12/17/2025

There’s something powerful about hearing someone say, “I get it.”
If you’ve been holding everything inside, connection might help more than you think.
Tell us one thing you wish people understood about your experience.

📞 404-369-3136 | 🌐 atlantamentalhealthcounseling.com

12/16/2025

When “never again” leads women into new danger

The Guardian recently published on a year-long investigation into the organization Free Birth Society that encourages women to give birth without any medical professionals present and to avoid contact with doctors and midwives altogether. Reporters found that FBS promotes unassisted births as not only safe but safer than medically attended births, while sharing advice that independent clinicians described as medically unsound or dangerous.

One of the most striking parts of the reporting is why some women end up here. Many are in countries like the U.S., where maternal mortality is high for a wealthy nation and where they previously experienced obstetric violence, racism, or profoundly traumatic hospital births that left them feeling dehumanized and unsafe. If you’ve listened to season two of The Retrievals, you will remember hearing about women who delayed medically necessary surgeries for their children, opted for sterilization, or termination of subsequent pregnancies following severely traumatizing c-sections where their pain was poorly managed. Even this feels like an understatement when literally talking about women whose cries and pleas for help were not attended to in any meaningful way during major surgery where they felt every part of the surgery. I understand women reaching for anything no matter how extreme it may sound to avoid going through something like that again. Out of a yearning for a pregnancy and birth that feel safer, more respectful, and more honoring of their dignity and humanity, they are drawn into spaces that promise control and “liberation” from the system that harmed them.

But the investigation links FBS-influenced births to dozens of later-term stillbirths, neonatal deaths, and severe injuries around the world, with at least 48 cases identified where mothers or mothers or birth attendants connected FBS experienced catastrophic outcomes. In some of these cases, experts believe earlier medical assessment or timely transfer might have changed the trajectory, underscoring that trauma-driven avoidance of healthcare can expose women and babies to different, devastating risks.

As a Black woman/mother and trauma psychologist, this lands on multiple levels for me. The U.S. has persistent racial disparities in maternal mortality and morbidity, and Black women disproportionately report feeling dismissed, unsafe, and traumatized in medical settings. It is not irrational to want to flee spaces that feel violent. In my own TTC and pregnancies, I was intentional about researching options and building a team – medical providers, a doula, and mental health support – that helped me feel more empowered, better able to advocate for myself, and equipped to process experiences that were very difficult. This proved especially invaluable, in the TTC journey, pregnancy, and birth of my second child where there were many complications. This helped keep painful (emotionally and physically) experiences from becoming lasting traumas in my journey.

From a mental health standpoint, this raises critical questions: How do we validate the very real trauma so many women experience in hospitals, including Black women, without romanticizing organizations like FBS or minimizing the real risks of preventable harm? And what would it look like to build systems of care – medical, midwifery, doula, and psychological – that are genuinely safer, more respectful, and more collaborative, so that “never again” does not have to mean “never any care”?

Some links to explore:
• Guardian’s key findings: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/nov/23/five-key-findings-from-our-investigation-into-the-free-birth-society
• Guardian briefing/overview: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/nov/24/monday-briefing-what-a-new-guardian-investigation-reveals-a-group-radicalising-women-into-unassisted-birth
• Background newsletter summary: https://uk.news.yahoo.com/monday-briefing-guardian-investigation-reveals-070124405.html

In today’s newsletter: A report dives into the disturbing story of a ‘wild’ pregnancy and freebirth business that ‘radicalises’ women, with tragic consequences

12/15/2025

Burnout isn’t always dramatic.
Sometimes it’s forgetting simple things, zoning out, or feeling disconnected from yourself.
You don’t need to crash to get help.

📞 404-369-3136 | 🌐 atlantamentalhealthcounseling.com

12/13/2025

Sometimes stress sneaks up slow in college-days memories, cultural expectations, or the small daily pressures no one sees.
Here at Crossroads Mental Wellness Services we offer culturally aware therapy, consultation, and stress-management guidance for women, couples, and multicultural families.
If you’re carrying weight quietly, you deserve a listen not judgment.

📞 404-369-3136 | 🌐 atlantamentalhealthcounseling.com

12/11/2025

The Retrievals and the dismissal of women’s pain

These stories in my recent posts connect directly to the themes in The Retrievals, a Peabody-winning podcast from Serial Productions and The New York Times.

• Season 1 follows women undergoing IVF whose fentanyl was secretly replaced with saline by a nurse; despite reporting excruciating pain, many were told what they were feeling was “normal” or minimized by clinicians.
• Season 2– The C-Sections looks at the tens of thousands of women each year who experience significant, poorly controlled pain during c-sections – pain that is often attributed to anxiety rather than treated as real.

Across both seasons, a pattern emerges: women’s reports of pain are discounted, their distress pathologized, and systems are slow to respond even when multiple people say “something is wrong.” For Black women, these dynamics intersect with racism, stereotypes about pain tolerance, and a long history of medical exploitation, compounding risk for both physical harm and psychological trauma.

Suggested listening links:
• Season 1 info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Retrievals
• Season 2 announcement: https://www.nytco.com/press/serial-productions-peabody-award-winning-podcast-the-retrievals-returns-with-new-season-on-july-10/
• A brief review of Season 2: https://podcastreview.org/review/the-retrievals-season-2/
If you work in health or mental health, I highly recommend listening with an eye toward how we respond when patients say they are in pain.

12/10/2025

Women get told to “push through” so often that slowing down feels wrong.
You’re allowed to pause without proving anything first.

📞 404-369-3136 | 🌐 atlantamentalhealthcounseling.com

12/09/2025

December hits different when you’ve been carrying more than you say out loud.
It’s okay if you’re not in a “festive” mood — rest is still valid even in a loud month.

📞 404-369-3136 | 🌐 atlantamentalhealthcounseling.com

12/09/2025

Turned away in labor, delivering on the side of the road

Days later (after Karrie Jones’ experience), Mercedes Wells and her husband went to Franciscan Health Crown Point in Indiana while she was in labor. Despite calling ahead and reporting significant pain, they say she was discharged and told to leave. Within 8 minutes of driving away, she gave birth to their daughter Alene on the side of the highway with her husband’s help.

The family believes race played a role in how their concerns were dismissed and has retained legal counsel, describing the experience as traumatic and discriminatory. From a mental health perspective, giving birth in a car after being turned away – while fearing death or harm to oneself or one’s baby – meets many of the criteria for a potentially traumatic event and can contribute to postpartum depression, anxiety, and birth-related PTSD.

Links for more information on the Wells family’s experience:
• Local news coverage: https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/chicago-mother-says-she-gave-birth-highway-after-hospital-sent-her-home
• Additional reporting: https://www.cbsnews.com/chicago/news/baby-born-car-indiana-crown-point-munster/

If this can happen after calling ahead, what does that say about how seriously Black women’s symptoms are taken while they labor?

A mother says she gave birth to her baby in a car minutes after being turned away from a hospital over the weekend in Crown Point, Indiana. Video shows her being wheeled out by hospital staff, and she's clearly in pain.

12/04/2025

The Black Mother Left in Triage

In Texas, a Black mother named Karrie Jones arrived at Dallas Regional Medical Center clearly in active labor, crying out in pain as her mother recorded video. Instead of urgent transfer to labor and delivery, she was kept in triage answering intake questions while visibly writhing and screaming and her family reports they were left waiting over 30 minutes before she was admitted.

Clinicians and advocates have called this a glaring example of delayed care that reflects broader, well-documented disparities in how Black women are treated in medical settings. For Karrie Jones and her family, this is not just “poor service” – it is an experience that can create fear of future medical care, hypervigilance, intrusive memories, and a sense that one’s life and baby’s life are not valued. I want to say one thing more clearly, these incidences traumatize not just the patient, but also the loved ones of the patient. In moments like this that go viral, this has the potential to traumatize those who bear witness as well, especially if they are expecting.

As a trauma therapist, I have thoughts for mental health professionals working with Black women in perinatal or TTC windows of life, key take aways to integrate into practice:

• Validate trauma narratives without minimizing: when a client describes being dismissed in medical settings, acknowledge the experience as potentially traumatic to build trust and normalize processing grief or anger.
• Screen for birth-related PTSD early: ask targeted questions about intrusive thoughts, avoidance of medical care, or hypervigilance post-incident. Reach out to Perinatal therapy specialists for guidance on helpful screening tools and scales that can help identify symptoms quickly.
• Empower advocacy skills: co-create simple scripts or safety plans for future appointments (e.g., “if my pain is dismissed, I will request a supervisor or second opinion”) to reduce anxiety and foster a sense of agency.
• Refer to culturally responsive perinatal support: connect clients to doulas, midwives, or therapists specializing in reproductive justice to address bot medical and emotional layers of these experiences.

For those who want to see the reporting/video, here it is (Sensitive content notice, distressing birth footage).
• Instagram reel of the triage incident (Sensitive content notice, distressing medical racism): https://www.instagram.com/reel/DRDZiejALEu/

• News coverage for context: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/black-mothers-texas-indiana-say-hospital-staff-ignored-cries-care-labo-rcna245068

12/02/2025

When Black women say “something is wrong” in pregnancy

Across TTC, fertility treatment, pregnancy, birth, and postpartum, Black women are more likely to have their pain minimized, their symptoms dismissed, and their outcomes worsened 0 even when they are doing “everything right.” This pattern is not about individual “bad apples”; it reflects a system that was not built with Black women’s safety and dignity at the center.

Recent viral stories of Black women being ignored in active labor are not outliers, they are symptoms of the broader crisis of maternal health disparities in the United States. As a psychologist who specializes in the mental health of Black women, these stories are not just “medical errors” to me; they are potentially traumatic events with deep emotional, relational, and intergenerational impact.

Over the next few posts, I’ll share real stories, connect them to what we know from research, from the podcast The Retrievals, and the recent year long investigation by The Guardian on the Free Birth Society. I will also talk about what this means for mental health.