Credit: Nappy Stock / Adedoyin

For generations, Black women have been lauded for “pushing through” what should have never existed: blatant unequal pay, caregiving without support, and workplaces that demand excellence while withholding protection and respect.

But being praised as “strong” or “resilient” can obscure, or erase altogether, the costs of enduring such stressors. Maybe even more so for Black women in leadership roles.

“That is not leadership,” said Dr. Jade Singleton, rejecting the idea that working through sickness, trauma or crisis proves commitment. “You don’t have to push through it.” 

Singleton founded the IKONI Collective to research the challenges Black women face while navigating “career, identity, caregiving, and physical and mental health,” and advocates for Black women’s rest and economic dignity.

One body of research describes a version of expectations for Black women to be “strong” as the Superwoman Schema. Nursing scholar Cheryl Woods-Giscombé created the framework, which says “superwomen” have an obligation to show strength, suppress their emotions, resist vulnerability, and a succeed-no-matter-what attitude even when resources and support are limited or absent. Superwomen also prioritize caregiving over their care needs, according to the schema.

When “superwomen” need help

And these behaviors have been associated with postponed self-care, disrupted sleep, strained relationships and stress. It also shows up as depression, migraines, panic attacks, and increased risk for chronic illnesses.

Yet Black women remain essential to the economy. Federal data have long shown high labor-force participation among Black women, and, according to Center for American Progress, nearly two-thirds of Black mothers are breadwinners. In corporate America, however, only 54 Black women were promoted to manager for every 100 men in 2024, according to McKinsey and LeanIn.Org Women in the Workplace data.

Recent job losses sharpen the contradiction. An Institute for Women’s Policy Research analysis found Black women represented about 55 percent of women’s net job losses in 2025 and experienced a steep contraction in federal employment. Wendy Todd has experienced being pushed out of employment more than once.

“My workplace experiences in general have been very challenging. I’ve experienced blatant discrimination and more covert racism,” said Todd, who lives in St. Louis.

Beyond ordinary fatigue

“I don’t feel I’ve ever been treated with value in my full-time roles by those in leadership, and it’s disheartening. I just want to do good work and be treated with respect. That’s not an outrageous ask,” Todd said.

And the health stakes of experiences like Todds’ extend beyond ordinary fatigue. Chronic exposure to racism, sexism and economic strain can accumulate as “weathering,” or accelerated wear on the body.

Yet, the rest that Black women need is racialized because safe housing, paid leave, predictable schedules, child care, money, and freedom from surveillance determine who can disconnect without risking survival.

Racialized rest stems from systemic inequality according to Tricia Hershey, founder of the Nap Ministry framework and author of “Rest Is Resistance.” The racial undertones that make rest a reward for some and a risk for others align with the racist overtones of the U.S. labor system. That system has long devalued Black women’s labor or erased it altogether.

Black women’s labor is often invisible and therefore, unpaid: mentoring without credit, managing colleagues’ emotions, translating culture, caring for children or elders, and anticipating what everyone needs next. Yet that labor does not necessarily translate into economic security. There are also the burdens of their competence being doubted or being mistrusted because of race. Together, rest and financial security become more difficult to access.

But rest is also broader than sleep, which Saundra Dalton-Smith, M.D. discusses in her book “Sacred Rest.”

Limited access to rest

Dalton-Smith, a board-certified internal medicine doctor, created a proprietary framework that identifies seven forms of rest: physical rest for the body; mental rest from sustained concentration; emotional rest from masking feelings; social rest from draining relationships; sensory rest from noise and screens; creative rest that restores wonder; and spiritual rest that reconnects people with meaning and belonging.

The categories clarify why a night in bed cannot repair every kind of depletion.

Singleton’s forthcoming Global State of Black Women’s Labor Study asks what work, well-being, and economic dignity look like across the diaspora. She said the continuing, self-selected survey had received about 7,800 digital responses by Sept. 15, plus roughly 1,000 handwritten responses from Côte d’Ivoire awaiting processing. Women from the United States, United Kingdom, Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa, Barbados, and Trinidad and Tobago have submitted responses, too. Preliminary findings will be released in October 2026.

Across countries, Singleton said, the barriers differ but the pattern repeats: invisible labor and limited access to rest. “Access to even just being able to conceive of that was central,” Singleton said.

Singleton also sees women healing by reassessing what is truly theirs—reconnecting with people who knew them before workplace harm, seeking therapy and community, noticing the body’s stress signals, and rebuilding careers or businesses on more sustainable terms.

But recovery is prescribed to women whose labor has made recovery inaccessible. Enduring healing requires living wages, paid leave, affordable care, manageable workloads, and institutions that are willing to stop treating Black women’s endurance as an unlimited resource.

Black women’s labor and rest resources

IKONI Collective
 Article: The Power of Rest: How Prioritizing Rest Helps Communities Thrive
Take the Seven Types of Rest quiz
 Participate in the Global State of Black Women’s Labor Study

MORE FROM URL MEDIA