By Megan Sayles
AFRO Staff Writer
msayles@afro.com
The Greater Washington Urban League (GWUL) is working to ensure Black fathers have the support they need to navigate mental health conditions. On June 17 and 18, the civil rights organization will host a two-day training for birth professionals and clinicians to learn the fundamentals of paternal perinatal mental health.
The event is part of GWUL’s broader “Birthing Black: One Healthy Mind at a Time”
program, which centers on perinatal mood disorders this year. Organizers say birth workers are often among the first professionals to observe emotional and behavioral changes in new parents.
“When we think about programs related to birthing, they are almost always centered around the birthing person, or mother and fathers are often left out of the story, ignored or not even in the room,” said Hanna Tessema, director of health and wellness for GWUL.
In conversations with fathers, she said the organization learned that many fathers felt invisible, ignored or excluded. These experiences have also been compounded by deep-rooted stereotypes portraying Black fathers as absent, according to Tessema.
“There are so many harmful narratives that are out there about Black fathers around them being absent or just not being around, and we know both anecdotally and through the data, that that’s not true,” said Tessema. “Those narratives are harmful and very pervasive within our community. Through our paternal mental health program, we really want to center the father in this experience because they, too, experience depression, anxiety and mood disorders around that perinatal period.”
According to the Maternal Mental Health Leadership Alliance, one in 10 fathers will experience depression or anxiety during their partner’s pregnancy or within the first year after birth. Depression and anxiety are also twice as common in expectant new fathers.
GWUL’s two-day training will address these challenges head-on, with a special focus on how to detect mood disorders in fathers and how they may manifest differently in the Black community. It is being led by Postpartum Support International, a leading nonprofit organization addressing perinatal mood and anxiety disorders in families.
Through the workshop, birth professionals and clinicians will receive access to interactive learning, resource materials and continuing education credits.
More broadly, the training is intended to drive GWUL’s mission of preserving Black lives and futures.
“We know that when we help a father become whole again, take agency over his life, believe in himself and his brilliance, then he becomes a healing force in the family,” said Kimberly Corbin, chief administrative financial officer for GWUL. “Children are not lost to the street or to depression, and mothers are not lost to exhaustion or stress. We have to focus on the Black father and help him heal from that which has been done to him.”
