Reconceptualizing Self-Care through Narratives of Black Women Social Workers: Organizational Contexts, Racialized Labor, and Professional Sustainability

Background and Purpose: Social work is a human service profession grounded in care work, labor that is often invisible, undervalued, and disproportionately performed by women (Rosenbaum & Talmor, 2022). In the United States, approximately 90% of social workers are women (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2024b). The demanding nature of this work, including high caseloads, exposure to client trauma, and emotionally intensive interactions, contributes to significant work-related stress and burnout. Over time, chronic exposure to these conditions can erode workers’ ability to maintain effective coping strategies and sustain professional functioning (Newell & Nelson-Gardell, 2014). Approximately half of social workers experience burnout during their careers, with many ultimately leaving the profession (Gimenez-Bertomeu et al., 2024). In response, professional organizations such as the National Association of Social Workers (NASW) and scholars have increasingly emphasized self-care as an ethical and professional responsibility, including its addition to the NASW Code of Ethics in 2021. However, research suggests that women often experience tension between self-care and social expectations to prioritize others’ needs. Black women, in particular, may face pressures to embody strength, suppress vulnerability, and absorb disproportionate emotional labor within organizations (Carroll et al., 1999; Cooke & Hastings, 2023). Within the social work literature, Lee and Miller’s (2013) self-care framework is widely cited, yet it largely positions self-care as an individual responsibility and gives limited attention to gender, race, and organizational context. These limitations are especially consequential for Black women social workers, who comprise nearly 20% of the workforce and navigate the profession at the intersection of racialized and gendered expectations.

This study expands the conceptualization of self-care in social work by examining how gendered, racialized, and organizational contexts shape the self-care experiences of Black women social workers. The research questions are: (1) How do Black women social workers describe their experiences with self-care across personal and professional contexts? (2) What influences their ability to engage in self-care? (3) How do they describe their organizational experiences in relation to their intersecting identities? and (4) How do these organizational experiences influence their self-care practices?

Methods: This study draws on in-depth qualitative interviews with 20 Black women social workers across the United States working in diverse organizational settings. Data were analyzed using narrative inquiry and reflexive thematic analysis to examine both participants’ stories and shared patterns across accounts.

Results: Findings indicate that Black women social workers define self-care holistically, encompassing multiple domains of their lives. Their experiences are shaped by cultural expectations, workplace dynamics of hypervisibility and invisibility, and internalized expectations around productivity and rest. Participants described limited organizational support and frequently shared experiences of racial harm and trauma that constrain their ability to engage in self-care within professional settings.

Conclusions and Implications: By centering the experiences of Black women social workers, this study offers insights relevant to other marginalized workers in helping professions who face similar pressures to absorb emotional labor while receiving limited institutional support. These findings contribute to ongoing efforts to strengthen organizational responsibility, improve worker well-being, and reduce burnout-related consequences.