Research on women’s midlife health reveals that midlife women, more than any other age group, frequently experience multiple co-occurring stressors while coping with losses and transitions, often within the context of limited resources. For women of color, this often includes the added element of race in navigating multiple roles and responsibilities. Unified Wholeness Lifestyle is an approach to combining separate, but essential life pieces to create a coherent whole. It involves the process of consolidating (through community holistic practices) the separate selves created by trauma to realize the path toward one’s full potential. The approach allows women to release stress by sharing their stories in a culturally affirming safe space as they work to heal various areas of brokenness within a loving community. This idea is reflected in opportunities for women to genuinely bond and feel part of a healthy group motivated by the common desire to be “wholefully” well in middle age.
The unified wholeness approach uses a proprietary process to reset the body’s natural rhythms and rewire mental processes disrupted by stress and trauma to help transform hardship into growth.
What qualifies me to do this work is my personal experience as a mid-life crisis and trauma survivor, my professional training and experience as a Licensed Professional Counselor, my work as a Certified Clinical Trauma Professional, and my ability to create connection and safety with my clients. In my late 30’s I experienced an alarming awakening as a Black woman “unfreezing” from intergenerational trauma that taught me that hypervigilance and playing small was the only way to survive in a patriarchal and race-conscious society that has prioritized very little room for me. Changing this experience in my mind and body took time, but through measured and consistent confrontation and rest, I began to create a new way of life in an affirming community that helped me find balance amid co-occurring stressors as I coped with personal and intergenerational losses and transitions. Research on chronic stress in adults ages 18 to 64 found that Black women have a larger allostatic load compared to either Black men or White women, suggesting that race is a key factor in the impact of chronic stress on health. As a result of my own experience combined with women’s midlife health research, I codified a system that I could share with other women of color who might derive some benefit.
One of the clearest signs that you are recovering is that you are connecting (finding relationships that foster mutual growth) and flowing (not stuck or immobilized by stressors). You can also tell you’re recovering when you notice that your compassionate voice has become louder than your inner critical voice. You recognize that the negative messages from your inner critic have lost their potency and you feel much more compassionate toward yourself. Another indicator is that you are figuring out what is worth your time and what you can let go, which frees you to focus on self-care and the people and things that really matter.
Currently, our offerings only include community and group services that align with the purpose of the brand, which is to bring historically marginalized mid-life women together in community to share tools and strategies that prioritize and promote wholeness.
We offer group and community pricing options based on larger community mental health and resource needs. Many of our clients present with stressors of limited resources, so group donations and sliding scale alternatives are calculated in the price of 4 or more attendees at any group or community event. This approach helps to serve those who may not have the resources to pay for subsequent services.