DBM Ep 67: Noncustodial Parenting & Black Motherhood with Erica M. Freeman
Release Date: 05/02/2025
DBM Ep 68: All About Annie, Sinners & Black Motherhood
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mamas & Magic Makers, Lissen yall Sinners was all about Annie for us! We ain’t gon hold you with our normal intro. In this episode we dive into: Annie, power, and Black motherhood Loss, longing, and sex Black humanity, spirituality, and grief in Ryan Coogler’s films Black migration & the resurgence of Southern Roots PLUS - we have social proof that a Black mama would have made a COMPLETELY different decision than Grace. And we’re excited to have some listeners on The Muthaship, live inside the Black Mama Magic room for this episode. We welcome: , doula and...
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DBM Ep 67: Noncustodial Parenting & Black Motherhood with Erica M. Freeman
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, What if I told you Black mamas aren’t superheroes, that the cape is choking us, and our backs are brittle? What if I told you motherhood ain’t killing us, though, but the narratives we buy into hook, line, and sinker are? What if you had the option not to be the primary custodial parent? Would you decline out of obligation to the belief that a good Black mama would never choose to leave their children in the care of others, even the other parent? How does a Black mother respond when what’s best for her or her destiny clashes with cultural norms? ...
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DBM Ep 66: The 92%, Boundaries & Black Motherhood
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, How do we resist the urge to rescue when we’ve been taught our whole lives to be saviors? How do we set boundaries when the world is burning? What do we do when we’ve been deemed the backbone of the community, but our backbones are brittle and breaking? Since the election, these are the questions and conversations black women have been having online and, especially, in group chats. So, we decided to explore what this line in the sand means for Black mothers in the midst of state-sanctioned brutality. In this episode, Thea and I explore the parallels...
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DBM Ep 65: Marriage, Hot Topics & Black Motherhood
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, What do Telvin Osborne, Black marriage, generational wealth, Altadena, data as currency, the TV show Paradise, and white women in Idaho have in common? We cover them all in this episode. Yup, it’s hot topics, and we got hot takes well, not hot takes. We got Black Mama takes on all the above. In this episode, we talk: ✨How Telvin Osborne is relevant to Black women resting ✨The real problem when it comes to marriage & Black folx ✨Why Paradise gets kudos & white women in Idaho don’t PLUS - we talk all things Black Maternal Health, ...
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DBM Ep 64: LA Fires & Black Motherhood w/ Staci Mitchell
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, What does it mean to make it home, to create a place of rest and reprieve, joy and sanctuary, an archive of your children’s treasures? What happens when you can’t make it home, return to your place of rest and reprieve, joy and sanctuary, a reflection of your taste and intention? What happens when the archive of your children’s treasure, what they left behind to be kept safe, is incinerated, covered in ash and your community physically fractured? In this episode, Staci Mitchell, a mother of 3 who was born and raised in Altadena, CA, and our very own Thea Monyee...
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DBM Ep 63: Entrepreneurship & Black Motherhood
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, What if I told you I didn’t start a business because I wanted to be a boss? I started my business because I wanted to be free, because I saw no other path to fully realizing my dreams, and according to a 2022 article, I’m not alone in finding entrepreneurship on my liberation journey. In the article entitled , Erica Thompson writes, “As the fastest-growing group of entrepreneurs, Black women say they are seeking more freedom, opportunity, fulfillment and stability. They also are escaping from discrimination and other barriers in the workplace.” In this episode, we have...
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DBM Ep 62: Grief & Black Motherhood with Akilah Richards
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, What if I told you to offer grief a seat at the table? What if I told you grief has no other duties except to be with you? It has nowhere to be and is not bound by time. Grief is patient. Grief is relentless, and as Akilah S. Richards, our guest for this episode and a DBM fave, says, “Grief is not something to be fixed but something for you to learn to be more skilled at processing.” Akilah is a mother, partner, liberationist and author of Raising Free People: Unschooling as Liberation and Healing. She is now diving deep into grief work and in this...
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DBM Ep 61: Black Motherhood & Joy
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, What if I told you I didn’t think I had the words for the intro of this episode because we recorded it before the election, and after November 5th, joy was THE LAST THING I wanted to talk about? I wish I could say thinking of our ancestors pulled me through, but the truth is reaching forward in time helped me more than reaching back, and now more than ever, we are going to need joy not to feel happy but because, as Thea Monyee, one of the cohost of this podcast, who will be guiding us through the , says "Joy makes things clear," and we, particularly Black mothers, need to...
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DBM Ep 60: All Cried Out, Election 2024 & Morris Chestnut
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, There’s no deep intro for this episode. In this episode, we talk: ✨Which version of "All Cried Out" is best, Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam or Allure & 112 ✨Election 2024 ✨How God blessed us with Morris Chesnut's rise from Ricky to Cory Cash WE HAVE RANGE! The way we move from levity to depth, Thea breaking down Joe Biden's scorpio tendencies to NeKisha connecting COVID to Zoom organizing to Crystal invoking Stokely Carimicheal’s definition of a revolutionary, is DEFINITELY a reflection of the times we are living in. And the truth is we were with more questions than...
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DBM Ep 59: Black Motherhood, Myths & Matrescence w/ Stepha LaFond
Dem Black Mamas Podcast
Dear Mama, What if I told you there’s no such thing as snapping back after giving birth, only expanding into? What if I asked you to imagine Black motherhood without suffering? Could you do it? Have we made suffering a rite of passage in Black motherhood? Have we shrouded Black motherhood in self-sacrifice as opposed to sacred sacrifice? These are the questions we explore in this episode about matrescence. Coined by reproductive psychologist Dana Raphael, matrescence is the process of becoming a mother, including the physical, psychological, and emotional...
info_outlineDear Mama,
What if I told you Black mamas aren’t superheroes, that the cape is choking us, and our backs are brittle? What if I told you motherhood ain’t killing us, though, but the narratives we buy into hook, line, and sinker are? What if you had the option not to be the primary custodial parent? Would you decline out of obligation to the belief that a good Black mama would never choose to leave their children in the care of others, even the other parent? How does a Black mother respond when what’s best for her or her destiny clashes with cultural norms?
In this Mother's Day episode, we speak with Erica Michelle Freeman of Sisters In Loss Podcast about the complexities and challenges of non-custodial parenting and Black motherhood. When Erica and her husband decided to divorce, they also agreed to shared custody. Each parent would have primary custody for 3 years of their son Maxwell who was diagnosed with spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy 10 years ago.
We dive into:
✨Confronting societal norms and cultural stigmas
✨Navigating health and care decisions for children with special needs as a noncustodial parent
✨Historical trauma and Black motherhood
✨Renegotiating Black motherhood
PLUS - Crystal and perimenopause are NOT friends, especially under the current administration, and Thea is in search of Jill Stein. In our Black Mama Say segment for this episode, where we put our twist on sayings from Black mamas, and the saying we're twisting this episode is “Oh, you got time for dat.”
ABOUT ERICA M. FREEMAN
Erica M. Freeman is the Founder and CEO of Sisters in Loss, is a savvy, creative engineer, known for her results-based, no-fluff approach as a podcaster, grief educator, and motivational speaker. Sisters in Loss provides pregnancy, birth, postpartum, bereavement doula, and grief services to help women step beyond anxiety and fear and into trust and peace after loss. Its self-titled award-winning podcast spotlights resilient Black mothers who share
intimate details of their journey to motherhood through painful, but inspirational loss and infertility stories. Sisters in Loss has been featured in Forbes, BBC News, Black Enterprise, Women's Health, The Today Show, NBC Nightly News, and The White House.
Connect with Erica M. Freeman: Instagram | Website
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EPISODES MENTIONS/RELEVANT TO THIS EPISODE:
🎙️DBM Ep 56: Menopause, Black Women & Spiritual Ritual with Omisade Burney Scott
🎙️DBM Ep 33: Haitian American Mama w/ Stepha LaFond
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