About Keya

“All these well-meaning White lady therapists try to tell me how to parent my Black son, and they just don’t get it.” -Single Black mom & former client parent


I found myself at work as a school-based therapist one day, and one of my clients was an 11-year-old Black boy. His mom said those paraphrased words to me, when she realized that I would be her son’s first Black mental health counselor.

While this did not strike me as odd, it did light a fire in me to be intentional about getting to a place in my career that I would never have to hear those words from a client (or their parents) again.

WHY BLACK PEOPLE NEED BLACK THERAPISTS

There are many services that we can pay for that culture and race has little to do with. If we want our car washed, our lawns mowed, or our packages delivered the race of the service provider does not matter one bit.  However, in a country that is (if I’m being honest) built on racism, it matters A LOT when we as Black people, seek mental health services from a counselor. 

We need someone who can understand the additional stressors we face not only being brown-skinned Americans, but the load we carry in raising brown-skinned kids in this country. And so, I created this blog, to “spill the tea” for Black parents and the therapists that serve them.

ASPIRING BLACK FAMILY THERAPIST

Hi! I’m Keya Williams and I am earning my PhD in counseling psychology, specializing in race-based stress and its impact on Black parents and the Black family.  I am a mother of three beautiful not-so-little Black children, and a wife to the best (I might be biased here) Black man I know.

As a therapist who works with children and families, I believe the systems (school, family, community) that surround a child have the biggest impact on that child’s well-being and sense of Self. Unfortunately, many of those systems, built on racist ways of understanding the world, leave our children feeling judged, misunderstood, and left out! And so healthy kids, healthy families, and healthy communities start with us, the grown-ups coming together in healthy community.

BULDING COMMUNITY

This little cyber-space is not intended to give advice (although I will drop the latest information and research on Black parenting and Black families) but is instead a space to build community among Black therapists and parents.

My plan (as of Summer 2022) is to add posts monthly. Feel free to subscribe to the feeds on the left or  you can leave your contact information to get an email from me monthly with all the latest blog posts. Also, please do comment and share your thoughts on the topics I bring to this space. All constructive voices are welcome here.

Keya


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