Black women's help‐seeking and self‐care strategies: A phenomenological exploration.

Within counseling and other mental health disciplines, Black women are underserved, psychologically misdiagnosed, and one of the least researched minoritized cultural populations. We used a hermeneutic phenomenological study to understand the lived experiences of 16 Black women who experienced mental health stress to understand their mental health needs, barriers to mental health care, and help‐seeking and self‐care practices. Findings included the following four themes: perspectives on oppression on mental health, socio‐cultural messages about self‐care and help‐seeking, perspectives about self‐care, and perspectives about professional counseling. Implications for counselors are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Counseling & Development is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)