Mental Health is Real Wealth: How Black Men Prioritize Healing ‘In This White World’ | Los Angeles

Desmond Carter is on a mission to save the lives of black men.

Carter, founder Mental health is real wealthleads a bi-monthly mental health group in the Leimert Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, and on a recent Thursday, 15 black men gathered inside a conference room without pressure and without women.

When the men entered, they soaked each other and bent down to hug each other. Many of them wore Los Angeles paraphernalia – Los Angeles snapbacks, Crenshaw street sign shirts, and had different hairstyles – some had local hair, fades, others had braids. The youngest man was 19 years old. There were several men who were more than twice his age. They were all there because they realized one thing: being vulnerable and taking care of your mental health is important.

Before they began their session, Carter, 37, told them about his best friend who died by suicide after being diagnosed with schizoaffective depression. It’s a story he’s told many times.

“It happened 10 years ago, and it’s still hard,” said Carter, who remembers his friend as being funny and witty. But he often hid his diagnosis and said he was fine. “It led me to do what I do now. I see a lot of my peers and people who look like me walking around, flying, feeling great, with the weight of the world on their shoulders, acting like they’re okay.”

The group is just one of the few safe spaces founded by black males for men to completely let their guard down, and it exists at a time when suicide rates among black boys and men are rising. more By 25.3% in recent years. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that suicide is the third leading cause of death among black male teens and young adults. Black boys and men make up the overwhelming majority of suicides among the black population.

Now, black men are between a rock and a hard place.

Before and after the height of the COVID era, healthy spaces were limited for Black men to fully express themselves emotionally. Black men are Less likely To seek mental health support. And even when they do, they are likely to receive substandard, culturally incompetent care that is rooted in racist practices. Health disparities According to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Research shows that the COVID-19 pandemic has led to increased feelings of loneliness and isolation among the general population. While there are general debates about the validity ofThe epidemic of male loneliness“And the impact of online misogyny on the ‘social envelope’ In general, there is one thing that has not been researched and ignored: Black men and their mental health.

Lance Linford, a psychologist, said he noticed a shift in society during and after Covid. Generation This is especially true for black men.

“I think there’s this space where we’re figuring out how to be and how to exist in this — to be honest — in this white world that we’re in as we try to spread our wings and be who we feel we’re supposed to be, or who we could be…,” Linford said. “But you hit this wall, and you get to a point where I don’t really know what I’m doing anymore.”

For older black men, there is also an identity crisis where they begin to think more about what retirement might look like for them and the ideal image of what they want, rather than adding up. These issues are exacerbated when Black men from Generation X and Millennials become fathers due to the financial pressures of fatherhood.

While black millennial men are now Spend more time “With their children more than other groups and more than previous generations, when they feel stressed, they may not have the time or money to go to therapy,” Linford said. There’s also the aspect of not having the opportunity to discover your own identity before having a child.

“You have this duality of: ‘I have to be the provider,’” Linford said. “I have to be this person that I want to be, and I think I am, and I put myself out there to be that, but I also feel like I’m falling apart because I don’t really know where I’m going or how to really do this.”

Black men Big challenges These include economic, health and educational disparities as well as systemic racism and social injustice, according to the American Psychological Association. Deaths of despair – such as deaths from suicide, alcohol abuse and drug overdoses – are now higher among blacks than whites.

Beyond the harms of living in a patriarchal society and having to subscribe to provider roles as men in general, the black men in Carter’s group said they faced specific pressures—to act tough, to actually know how to do certain tasks, to be strong and not show emotion.

Some men were moved to come to the meeting because another man asked them to come. Others expressed feeling stressed, depressed, or feeling like the world was falling apart. They expressed the adjustment that comes from feeling like they are losing their masculinity or their lifestyle and friendships due to the responsibilities of family life and fatherhood.

“If I could do anything, if I looked back and looked at their lives and I see that they didn’t do it, that they didn’t express themselves,” said one man, whose father and grandfather had a history of bipolar disorder. “They were crazy, and it took years, and then they got crazier. Then something happened in their lives, something flipped.”

Wayne Bennett, president of Mental Health is Wealth and a corporate health consultant and men’s life coach in Los Angeles, helps men build healthy ways to express their feelings whether it’s in a professional or personal sense. He said the group serves as a safe space for men where they don’t have to wear a mask. Its specific goal is to help men break generational cycles and enhance emotional expression.

“A lot of guys talk about being depressed or not having any kind of leadership growing up, and having to figure things out on their own,” Bennett, 41, said. “A lot of men may not have been to therapy before, so this is a great gateway to going into therapy.”

In Los Angeles, an area with a unique history of police brutality, gangs and mass incarceration — all of which disproportionately affect black men, they are required to wear a guard. Bennett said he spoke to black men and that they expected their interactions to be transactional, professionally motivated or aggressive. He added that there is a lack of trust that men have to build within each other in Los Angeles.

Carter created the group in 2022 as a preventative measure to get Black men like him to consider seeking counseling and treatment. He said talking with other black men was healing for him as well.

“I just wanted this to be a place where they could get rid of the trash, not only get rid of it, but celebrate the wins as well,” he said. “I want this space for people and our brothers to get their flowers.”