A Letter to My Black Clients
Pen laying on paper with the word "Dear" written.
To My Black Clients: Happy Black History Month!
I wanted to write this letter to express my immense gratitude for you all; to remind you how deeply I care about you; and to express the honour I feel in knowing that you have welcomed me into your lives to support you on your journey to Black excellence! Oh and of course, to celebrate our beautiful Black lives.
While I, for one, welcome any chance to celebrate and discover more historical Black moments and figures of all intersecting identities, Black History Month draws our attention to the past, where every event; milestone; success; is tainted by a collective trauma of injustice. One that, even in 2025, we all know too well.
I want you, us, to look to the future. To envision a version of yourself blooming in excellence; whatever that means to you. I want us to walk ahead of our traumas. Not abandoning them, but showing yourself and others that your personal Black history will not tether you to the past. You, me, we, can and will grow into our authentic and true selves. As a therapist, I am not above you. I walk alongside you, and learn as much from you as you learn from Me.
As Black folks living in Canada, we are representatives of the African diaspora. Although how we ended up here is undeniably tragic and colonial, I hope that we can bask in knowing that our ancestors were born of beautifully sophisticated tribes free from white supremacist values. Whether ourselves, our parents, grandparents, even great-grandparents hail from Africa or the Caribbean we are an aroma of shea and cocoa butter bodies, whose lives have been influenced by a scaffold of systemic racism and anti-blackness determined to root us in the ground.
I take pride in bonding with you over our shared love for oxtail and jollof rice, and debating when is the right time to fry plantain. I recognize my family history in the retelling of yours, and I love reminding you that when your parents said “I’ll give you something to cry about,” that we’ve all heard that in one way or another.
Of course, as a Black queer person, I know all too well the trifling ways of our intersectional identities. How we risk losing our family and security for the chance to live authentically.
Or how we feel excluded from communities and our experiences erased from the conversation because we are disruptive to ideas of Blackness and Queerness. The judgement, dismissal, and criticism that comes from within our queer community and our Black families targeting our identities is meant to promote conformity to certain cultural norms. Regrettably, there are folks who demand our queerness in absence of our Blackness, and vice versa. Personally, there is no modern queer culture without Blackness, and arguably the same can be said of Black culture. Remember, Pride as a resistance rests, largely in part, in the palm of one marvellous Black transwoman as she casts the first brick.
To my daring, courageous, creative, and resilient melanated clients, please know that I carry your stories with me. You are never alone. As a parting note, I want to remind you that our ancestors healed in community long before healing became optional. I am universally proud that you have taken charge of your lives and committed to protecting your peace. I am honoured to bare witness as you challenge the “therapy is for white folks” narrative. You are Black excellence. You are the dream.
With love, warmth, and solidarity,
Holly Naraine [she/her] RP (Qualifying)
Holly Naraine [she/her]
Registered Psychotherapist (Qualifying)
I am here to bridge the gaps between Blackness, queerness, and mental health care; striving to provide each of my clients with a therapeutic environment where they can be witnessed in safety.
