Dr. Jenn Speaks About Mental Health and Mixed-Race Parenting

Mixed Asian Media - May 30, 2023

By Naturally MonaLisa

May is Asian American Pacific Islander Native Hawaiian Heritage Month and Mental Health Awareness Month. Who would be better to interview than a mixed-Asian psychologist? I had the pleasure of speaking to Dr. Jennifer Noble, a multicultural community psychologist who has a private practice in Los Angeles and has a big following on social media. In this interview, she talks about her experience with coaching parents of mixed-race children and shares her insight on overcoming the stigma around mental health. She even gives a short history lesson on the Tamils and the repercussions of the civil war in Sri Lanka.

Please introduce yourself to everyone! What do you do, and what organizations or projects are you part of?

My name is Jennifer Noble, but I go by Dr. Jenn online. All of my clients call me that as well. I'm a clinical psychologist based out of Los Angeles, California. I have a private practice here where I see predominantly women of color, mixed-race people, and people from marginalized groups like LGBTQ. Another specialty area for my private practice is working with teens. When I work with teens I also work with the family. I'm a parent coach and I work specifically with parents of mixed-race kids. I provide them education and guidance on important issues for raising mixed-race kids. I also teach psychology at a local college out here, and I'm on the advisory board for a nonprofit organization called Multiracial Americans of Southern California.

I didn't know that the field of psychology has a specialty area called "multicultural community clinical psychology" until I started following your Instagram page. Can you explain more about this specialty area, and why this specialty area is much needed?

There is a field of psychology called community psychology. Many community psychologists work on the research side, and they look at the mental health functioning of a community and what do we need to do to better the community so that the health of the community can improve. Along those lines, multicultural community psychology focuses on the different things that affect culture, such as race, ethnicity, religion, income level, immigrant status, sexual orientation, and gender identity. This was my emphasis area in graduate school. I've always been interested in people and cultures all around the world, probably because I’m mixed race myself and have been exposed to so many cultures. It was very important for me to learn how to apply psychological principles and understanding into my practice, and make sure that I can tweak them for different cultural groups that I work with.

We can't have a universal approach to psychology. Many years ago, that was the approach unfortunately. European psychologists wrote about what worked well with their European clients, and they thought they could do the same with everybody else. But as more and more cultures entered the field of psychology, people realized they cannot use one approach for all cultures. Let’s take depression for example. You have to understand what depression looks like in Asian communities, African American communities, and Latino communities. You also have to understand how men handle depression versus how women handle depression. It has become nuanced, but that’s important because in health care and mental health care, you just can't take a cookie cutter approach.

You have more than 12,000 followers on Instagram, which is very impressive because there aren’t a lot of influencers that work in the mental health field. When did your Instagram page blow up, and why do you think people are attracted to your page?

I did notice in the last year or so, more people are finding me on Instagram. I think it’s because I have a really specific focus on my Instagram page. A lot of other psychologists may talk about general mental health experiences, children, being Black in America, and mental health for Asians and LGBTQ. But I rarely find someone with my educational background that talks about parenting of mixed-race kids or the mixed-race experience itself. So that’s why I started talking about it over and over and over again on Instagram. People started to realize that’s what I’m about, and they started to tag their friends and share my content with others. It’s really important for me to be found by the right people. I don't want a million people following me. I want to make sure that I'm speaking to the people that need the information.

The only reason I have that page and do this work is because I feel very strongly that mixed-race kids can have a very different trajectory around identity and confidence, but their parents may not know how to support them. Parents of mixed-race kids often don't talk about these issues at all, or they really don't know what to say, or they're saying the wrong things. This has an impact on their children. These are the mixed-race people that come to me years later asking for therapy. I’m thinking, how can I avoid you coming to me for therapy? Let me talk to your parents!

African Americans and Asian Americans have one thing in common — they have a stigma for mental illness and seeking therapy. What do you think about this?

Many families within the African American community and Asian community don’t understand the purpose of mental health. Therapy feels so foreign they feel like they don’t need it and it’s wrong. In the African American community, there is definitely mental health care, but that comes from religion or mentors within the religious circles. So instead of going to see a therapist, you would go to the pastor, or speak to a mother or sister at the church. They are supposed to pray for you. It’s not that this is wrong, it’s just a different way of addressing mental health. However, many pastors are not equipped to handle many mental health issues. And prayer may not be enough to solve the issues, so you need an extra layer.

Also, for both African American and Asian communities, there’s a lot of protection around your information. If “bad” things get out, that brings shame on the whole family. You don’t want everybody to know your business because they are going to look down on you and judge you. This is especially true for Asian communities. If everyone finds out about your issues, it’s not just you that is affected. Your mom would be embarrassed, and your auntie or grandma in another country would also feel embarrassed. So all of this ties into why there’s such a stigma for mental health, and why a lot of older Asians and African Americans may be hesitant to seek therapy.

Let's learn more about you. Can you share about your background and cultures, and how you identify yourself?

I identify myself as African American and Sri Lankan Tamil. I would have to throw in California culture too because I'm born and raised here, and the way I think and value this world is very Californian. I grew up in a very Sri Lankan household, because my mother doesn't know anything different. We would take off our shoes before entering the house and have rice and curry most days of the week.

I'm not sure how many people are aware, but there was a civil war in Sri Lanka, and Tamils in Sri Lanka were oppressed during the civil war. This is why a lot of Tamils flee the country. If you have a friend that is Sri Lankan and their family happens to be Tamil, it is very likely that they have family in Canada, England, or Australia, because those are the places that Tamils went to seek asylum or immigration. I have a lot of family members in Canada because Canada was a safe place for people to move to during the civil war. Growing up, I would travel to different countries to visit my family, and I got to be exposed to British culture, Australian culture, and Canadian culture.

It is rare for African Americans and Asian Americans to pursue a mental health career. Why did you decide to become a psychologist, and how did your family react when you told them you wanted to pursue this career?

I chose this field at a very young age. I first wanted to be a medical doctor and that was probably influenced by having an Asian parent, who typically says things like, “You have to be a doctor or a lawyer.” I actually wanted to be a pediatrician because I have always liked working with kids. But later on I switched to psychology. When I was young, I had a lot of peers that would tell me their dark stories. Their stories wouldn’t shock me, but instead I wanted to learn more about what happened. I was very interested in the impact on traumatic events and how people survive them. So people tend to come to me to talk about their experiences. Also, as a kid I would read a lot of books that were geared toward teenagers. I would read Sweet Valley High novels and crime books. I tend to read books that focus on psychological topics. Anyway, I decided to switch from being a pediatrician to a psychologist. I told my mom I wanted to switch, and she said, “That’s still a doctorate? OK, I like it!” My family was very proud of my choice. There was no real pushback.

Have you created any programs or resources to help multicultural people and families become more confident and resilient?

I have created the Mixed Life Academy, which is where I coach parents of mixed-race kids. I created a phone app, where it houses lessons for parents to watch and worksheets they can fill out. One of the key pieces of the Mixed Life Academy is live coaching that they get from me. Every week, parents would sign onto Zoom and ask me questions about certain challenges or issues they are facing when raising their mixed-race kids. It’s a place for us to talk, problem solve, and teach parents how to have conversations with their kids about what’s happening in their life.

The Mixed Life Journal is a journal for parents with 31 days of prompts. It’s a journal for parents to build some empathy for the mixed-race experience. A lot of times, parents are monoracial and they may not realize a lot of things about their mixed-race children. The journal would prompt parents to write down their thoughts about certain things about their children that they may not realize. They may not realize their children will have a completely different life experience than they do. I would help parents realize their children are more than one culture and teach them how to address multiple cultures and not just push their culture onto their children.

Do you have any words of encouragement to mixed-race kids or parents of mixed-race kids?

You don’t have to do what society tells you to do, because society doesn’t have all the answers. Multicultural families are ahead of the game because society is still behind in understanding how to handle being in more than one group at the same time. You don’t have to follow society because you are ahead of the game compared to monoracial people. Embrace your cultures and know that you don’t just have to pick one. You have the freedom to be yourself!

To learn more about Dr. Jenn and the programs she created for parents of mixed-race children, visit her website, www.drjennpsych.com. You can also follow her on Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, and Facebook @drjennpsych.