VIRTUAL RETREAT: HEALING THE MOTHER WOUND

Black Women Virtual Healing The Mother Wound Retreat

April 2 – 23, 2025

This 4-week immersive virtual retreat for Black women, “Healing the Mother Wound,” will explore what the mother wound is and how it impacts women today. If you’ve had a complex or challenging relationship with your mother, you understand how a bond that should be filled with love can become laden with tension, pain, and betrayal. This virtual retreat provides a safe space for healing and understanding, helping you navigate and heal from these deep emotional wounds. Participants will be able to identify the manifestations of cultural trauma carried by a mother, as well as the maladaptive coping mechanisms that have been used to mask pain, and that are then passed on to their daughters, and learn paths to healing. In this virtual retreat, not only will you learn the root of the Black mother wound, but you’ll also learn ways to heal your heart so you can release the pain and learn to love and trust again. In a sanctuary of community and healing, you’ll be able to discuss your hardships and challenges with your mother, and you will learn how to begin healing the mother’s wound.

Healing The Mother Wound Virtual Retreat Schedule

Week 1

Understanding the Mother Wound: Specifics of the Black Mother Wound

Being able to identify the manifestations of cultural trauma carried by a mother, as well as the maladaptive coping mechanisms that have been used to mask pain and that are then passed on to their daughters, Exploring the concept of the mother wound.

Week 2

Manifestations of the Mother Wound in Sisterhood

Exploring how the unhealed wounds from our mothers contribute to broken sisterhood with other women. You’ll be able to see how the mother wound and sisterhood are intertwined and learn to counteract this phenomenon. You will learn to effectively grieve the loss of the mother you wish you had. You’ll also get to explore and understand how your mother’s wound has been impacting the way you show up in relationships with other women, and you’ll learn to create behavior modification.

Week 3

Understanding the Strong Black Woman Schema (SBWS), as defined by scholars as well as by popular culture. Linking To The Mother Wound

Being able to identify manifestations of the Strong Black Woman Schema. Specifically, the three key characteristics are emotional restraint, independence, and self-sacrifice.
Becoming versed at dissecting, re-evaluating, and reframing the SBWS, and the ways in which it is harmful.
Be able to identify and address the ways in which your own actions are reinforcing the SBWS.

Week 4

The role of Forgiveness and Attribution in the healing of the Black Mother Wound

Exploring forgiveness as a process, not just an act.
Understanding the pivotal role of attribution in the forgiveness process.
Understanding the link between forgiveness and healing and support in possibly needing to detach from your mother to heal the wound.
Actionable steps toward acceptance that your mother’s traumatic entanglement with systems of oppression and inability to do her own mother wound work made her unable to mother you in a healthy way.
Practice being open to receiving maternal energy from sources other than your mother.
Practicing advocating for your inner child.
Learning healthy ways to regularly process grief, guilt and anger.

Terese Millet Joseph

Family Therapist & Workshop Facilitator

Terese Millet Joseph is a Psychotherapist originally from Antigua in the Eastern Caribbean. She has been working in this field for the past 18 years and is currently a practicing Psychotherapist in Central New York, providing Individual and Couple Counseling. Terese holds a Master of Science in Counseling Psychology specializing in Family Counseling from the University of the Southern Caribbean in Trinidad. She is currently a Doctoral Candidate at Syracuse University in Syracuse, NY, where she is pursuing a PhD in Human Development & Family Science. Her research interests include Parental Ethnic-Racial Socialization, Ethnic-Racial Identity, Minority Stress, Africana Studies, Latin American, Caribbean Studies, and Trauma. She is also very passionate about empowering Black Women and advocates for education around femininity and womanhood.