Historical Impact for Black Women

In Dane County and across the nation, Black women—especially mothers—have carried the unspoken weight of trauma for generations. They are expected to hold families together while not have access to the resources needed to heal themselves. The pain they carry is not only their own—it is inherited, recycled, and passed down through bloodlines that were never given time or space to rest. This trauma lives in the body, in the nervous system, in the home. It shapes how a mother parents, how a child learns to cope, how a family survives—barely. 
 

At POSSH, we see clearly what is often ignored: Black mothers are in crisis. One significant challenge they face is the lack of safe, affordable housing. It destabilizes entire households, erodes mental and emotional wellness, and hardens survival into a way of life. At POSSH, we estimate that trauma linked to unsafe, unaffordable housing has risen by over 120% in the past two years. These conditions don’t just displace families physically—they uproot generations spiritually.
 

Children raised in these unstable environments often carry invisible scars: emotional shutdown, school disconnection, explosive behavior, or complete silence. These are not symptoms of bad parenting—they are symptoms of inherited pain that’s never been tended to.
 

POSSH was created to change that. We are building what has never entirely existed for Black mothers in Dane County: a culturally-rooted infrastructure of care. Through life-skills training, therapeutic family models, school advocacy, and mother-daughter healing work, POSSH is helping Black women interrupt these generational patterns—so their daughters can grow up free from the burdens they inherited.

 

We don’t just provide services—we restore legacy. Because when a Black mother heals, she doesn’t just change her life—she shifts an entire bloodline.