'I don't have the energy': Racial stress, young Black motherhood, and Canadian social policies

Significant socio-economic, health, and mental health disparities due to highly entrenched and systemic anti-Black racism in Canadian institutions, policies, and practices are now well documented in research and policy reports. Yet, few in-depth studies have addressed the mental health impacts of anti-Black racism on Canadian populations. This article is rooted in a community-based, qualitative research project with young first and second-generation Black Caribbean-Canadian mothers and is informed by Black Feminist epistemologies and intersectional theories and methodologies. Our research demonstrates how participants' childhood experiences with xenophobic and racist immigration policies and educational, child welfare, and childcare systems caused their future mental health challenges as young Black mothers, and how these struggles were exacerbated by their encounters with the racist, ageist, xenophobic medical, social, and mental health services they had to access as young mothers. Based on these findings, we recommend enhancements to current social policies to minimize the differential mental health impacts on young Black Canadian mothers. Les rapports de recherche et de politique documentent d'importantes disparites socio-economiques, sanitaires et mentales dues au racisme anti-Noir systemique et fortement enracine dans les institutions, les politiques et les pratiques canadiennes. Pourtant, peu d'etudes approfondies se sont penchees sur les effets du racisme antiNoirs sur la sante mentale des populations canadiennes. Cet article s'appuie sur un projet de recherche qualitative communautaire mene aupres de jeunes meres canadiennes noires des Caraibes de premiere et de deuxieme generation, et s'inspire des epistemologies feministes noires ainsi que des theories et methodologies intersectionnelles. Notre recherche demontre comment les experiences de l'enfance des participantes avec les politiques d'immigration xenophobes et racistes et les systemes d'education, de protection de l'enfance et de garde d'enfants ont cause leurs futurs problemes de sante mentale en tant que jeunes meres noires, et comment ces luttes ont ete exacerbees par leurs rencontres avec les services medicaux, sociaux et de sante mentale racistes, agistes et xenophobes auxquels elles ont du avoir acces en tant que jeunes meres. Sur la base de ces resultats, nous recommandons d'ameliorer les politiques sociales actuelles afin de minimiser les impacts differentiels sur la sante mentale des jeunes meres noires canadiennes.
INTRODUCTION Black people (defined as those of African and Caribbean descent) now account for 3.5% of the Canadian population, with more than half of Canada's Black residents (52.4%) living in [...]