Introduction

July is Purposeful Parenting Month, a time to reflect on how parenting is more than a role. It’s a relationship, a journey, and at times, a profound expression of resilience. This month also recognizes Bereaved Parents Awareness Month and BIPOC Mental Health Month, all of which occurring simultaneously remind us that caregiver well-being cannot be separated from identity, loss, and the complex systems surrounding families.

A Broader View of Parenting

Purposeful parenting involves intentional efforts to support a child’s emotional, physical, and developmental needs. But these efforts can only be sustained when caregivers (parents, kin, or foster providers) have the support and tools to care for themselves.

In the child welfare system, many caregivers are parenting through trauma, systemic oppression, and generational grief. Parenting with purpose, especially in these contexts, means acknowledging those realities and building resilience while also advocating for change.

Grief and Bereavement

Grief is a central experience for many families involved in child welfare. Parents may grieve the temporary or permanent loss of their children, while foster parents may experience ambiguous grief when reunification occurs. Bereaved Parent Awareness Month offers space to recognize these invisible wounds and validate their complexity.

Honoring grief in parenting means creating space for loss whether it’s the loss of a child, a role, a cultural connection, or a sense of stability. It also means providing caregivers with trauma-informed supports that affirm the legitimacy of that pain.

Centering BIPOC Mental Health

The mental health of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) caregivers is shaped by lived experiences with racism, generational trauma, and systemic inequity. Purposeful parenting in these communities includes cultural pride, resistance, and ancestral wisdom but also the burden of navigating a system that often misunderstands or penalizes those same strengths.

BIPOC Mental Health Month urges us to address the disparities in access to care, the mistrust of institutions, and the importance of culturally rooted healing practices.

Supporting Caregivers: What Professionals Can Do

Child welfare professionals can play a vital role in supporting caregivers by:

  • offering grief-informed resources to families at every stage of the process
  • normalizing conversations about caregiver well-being in training and support programs
  • connecting BIPOC families with culturally competent mental health services
  • validating the emotional labor of parenting amid instability, trauma, or systemic barriers
  • recognizing diverse parenting practices rooted in culture and tradition as strengths—not risks

Parenting with purpose means more than making good choices; it means surviving grief, holding joy, and resisting injustice. As we move through July, let us honor the caregivers who show up with love in systems that don’t always show up for them. And let us commit to showing up better for their well-being, their healing, and their right to parent with dignity.

Further Resources

For additional reading, here are suggested resource links for each section of the blog, aligned with the themes of purposeful parenting, bereaved parent awareness, BIPOC mental health, and caregiver well-being for child welfare workforce.

Grief and Bereavement (Bereaved Parent Awareness)

Centering BIPOC Mental Health

Supporting Caregiver Mental Health and Purposeful Parenting

MNCWTA Trauma-Informed Resources
https://mnchildwelfaretraining.com/blog/?search_term=trauma