Draft for Dr. Berberian’s review before publishing.
July is BIPOC Mental Health Awareness Month, observed in honor of author Bebe Moore Campbell, who spent years pushing for better mental health support in communities of color and wrote openly about mental illness at a time when few people would.
Her core point still holds: mental health struggles don’t discriminate, but access to good care often does. People in Black, Hispanic, Asian, and Indigenous communities experience mental health conditions at similar rates to everyone else, yet they’re significantly less likely to receive treatment. And when care is delayed, conditions that respond well to early treatment become harder and more disruptive to treat later.
This isn’t an abstract policy problem. It’s a neighbor who’s been white-knuckling anxiety for years, a teenager whose struggles get labeled a behavior problem instead of depression, a grandmother whose generation simply never had the option to talk to anyone.
Why the gap exists
There’s rarely one reason. Usually it’s several stacked on top of each other:
- Stigma that runs deep. In many families, the message for generations has been "we don’t talk about that" or "we handle things ourselves." Asking for help can feel like betraying that.
- Cost and coverage. Therapy is expensive without insurance, and finding an in-network provider taking new patients is its own job.
- Few providers who share your background. Most mental health professionals in the US are white. For some patients that doesn’t matter. For others, explaining the cultural context of your life before you can even get to the problem is exhausting.
- Being dismissed before. Plenty of people tried once, felt unheard or misjudged, and never went back. That experience travels fast through families and friend groups.
What actually helps
Naming the barrier is a start, but here’s what makes a practical difference when you’re looking for care:
Interview your provider. You’re allowed to ask questions before committing: How do you work with patients from my background? What does treatment usually look like? A good provider welcomes those questions. If the fit isn’t right, switching isn’t rude. It’s how this is supposed to work.
Use telehealth to widen the pool. If the right provider is 40 minutes away, a video visit removes that problem entirely.
Consider group therapy. Sitting with people working through similar things can cut through isolation in a way one-on-one sessions sometimes can’t.
Bring family in when it helps. For a lot of people, healing doesn’t happen in isolation from family. It happens with them.
Start with your kids if starting with yourself feels too big. Plenty of parents who’d never book a session for themselves will make the call for their child. That’s a door in, and it often changes how the whole family talks about mental health.
Our door is open
At North Jersey Health and Wellness, our goal is that every person who walks through our doors feels they have a true advocate for their wellbeing. That means listening first, asking instead of assuming, and building treatment around who you are, not a template.
If you’ve been putting this off, or you tried before and it didn’t go well, we’d like the chance to do better. Call (201) 588-3491 or book online. In-person at four locations, telehealth, and house calls available.