Nearly ten years ago, I first knew Dr. Mary Sewell as my social work student. Today, I have the privilege of sitting across from her as a fellow social worker, doctoral scholar, researcher, and creator of the R.I.C.K.Y. Framework.

In this deeply personal conversation, Dr. Sewell shares the experiences that shaped her journey from social work practitioner to Doctor of Social Work, including the loss of her son, Ricky, to suicide and her decision to make sure that his life and his name continued to count.

That commitment eventually became scholarship. Dr. Sewell's doctoral research explored culturally responsive suicide assessment among African American adolescents and led to the development of the R.I.C.K.Y. Framework: Relational Connection, Identity Affirmation, Culturally Attuned Communication, Knowledge and Awareness, and Youth Empowerment.

We talk about the limitations of relying on standardized suicide assessment tools alone, the importance of listening to the language young people actually use, and what culturally responsive practice can look like when social workers make room for culture, identity, relationships, context, and lived experience.

Mary also reflects on her work with Indigenous communities, including the Lakota Nation and the Havasupai Tribe, and what those experiences taught her about cultural humility, relationship, and the danger of assuming that we already understand another person's experience.

This is a conversation about grief, purpose, scholarship, culture, social work, and what can happen when a social worker asks, “What do I do next?”

Content note: This episode includes discussion of suicide, suicidal ideation, suicide assessment, and the death of a child by suicide. Please listen with care.

✨Contact Dr. Mary Sewell Here:

👉[email protected]

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

✨Artistic Pathways to Clarity Journal

👉https://artisticpathwaystoclarity.my.canva.site/clarity

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

What does it look like to care for the whole person, not simply respond to a diagnosis?

In Part Two of Renita's conversation with Christine Richmond, we pick up exactly where we left off: Christine said yes to an unexpected opportunity. Now we get to hear what she helped build.

Christine introduces us to the Care Collective and the world of geriatric care management, sharing how care managers help older adults and families navigate the often complicated realities of aging, healthcare, resources, and changing care needs.

The conversation moves into dementia care and some of the things families may misunderstand when a loved one is experiencing cognitive changes. Christine discusses the role social workers can play in supporting older adults and their families and explores what person-centered dementia care looks like when we see the individual beyond the disease.

Along the way, Renita and Christine talk about the knowledge, advocacy, creativity, and human connection social workers bring to this work, and why understanding the person behind the diagnosis matters.

If you haven't listened to Part One, “Say Yes: Social Work, Opportunity & the Unexpected Path with Christine Richmond,” start there to hear the story of the professional journey that brought Christine to this work.

✨ Goddesses of Social Work Podcast Conversations about social work, the people who do it, and the many ways this profession can take shape.

✨Find Christine Richmond Here:

👉[email protected]

👉https://www.carecollectivehealth.org/

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

✨Artistic Pathways to Clarity Journal

👉https://artisticpathwaystoclarity.my.canva.site/clarity

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

What happens when you stop limiting what social work is supposed to look like and start saying yes to the opportunities in front of you?

In Part One of this conversation, Renita sits down with Christine Richmond, a social worker whose career has taken her through geriatric social work, leadership, entrepreneurship, and paths she never necessarily planned for.

Christine shares how she found her way into social work, the opportunities that shaped her career, and what she learned about recognizing her own value along the way. They also talk about the limiting phrase “I’m just a social worker,” the many directions a social work career can take, and what it means to become willing to leave the security of what you know when something new is calling.

And then Christine reaches a moment that beautifully captures her journey:

Here’s the opportunity. Say yes.

That’s where we’ll leave you, for now.

Join us for Part Two, when the conversation continues with what happened after Christine said yes and the story of the Care Collective.

✨ Goddesses of Social Work Podcast Conversations about social work, the people who do it, and the many ways this profession can take shape.

✨Find Christine Richmond Here:

👉[email protected]

👉https://www.carecollectivehealth.org/

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

✨Artistic Pathways to Clarity Journal

👉https://artisticpathwaystoclarity.my.canva.site/clarity

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

In this episode of the Goddesses of Social Work Podcast, Renita sits down with Morgan Overton, MSW, a social worker and multidisciplinary visual artist whose work explores Black interiority, ancestral memory, and the fullness of Black life beyond narratives of struggle.

Their conversation began after meeting at the Harlem Fine Arts Show in the Hamptons, where Morgan was a featured artist and speaker. When Renita discovered that the artist whose work had captured her attention was also a social worker, there was immediately more to explore.

Together, they talk about the threads connecting Morgan's experiences in psychology, social work, politics, community organizing, and visual art; what Black interiority means in her work; and what becomes possible when struggle is no longer the center of how we understand Black life, or the social work profession itself.

Morgan also reflects on the social work values present in her art, the experience of bringing her identities as artist and social worker together, and what creativity and imagination can offer a profession that is often understood primarily through problems, needs, and struggle.

This is a conversation about art, social work, identity, imagination, and giving ourselves permission to recognize just how expansive this profession, and the people within it, can be.

✨Find Morgan Overton Here:

👉HOME | Morgan Overton

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

✨Artistic Pathways to Clarity Journal

👉https://artisticpathwaystoclarity.my.canva.site/clarity

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

Goddess alum Tori Helm, LICSW, returns to the Goddesses of Social Work Podcast for a conversation about growth, courage, and becoming more of yourself.

Tori reflects on what has changed since her time in supervision, what she is building in this season of her life, the risks that have stretched her, and what she knows about herself today that she couldn't have known five years ago.

Along the way, Renita discovers an unexpected part of Tori's journey: she's now a CrossFit coach. With encouragement from the medical director at the substance use treatment center where she works, who is also a coach, Tori pursued coaching herself and now has the opportunity to incorporate it into her professional work by providing CrossFit coaching to outpatient clients as part of their programming.

It's a conversation about social work, movement, personal evolution, and what becomes possible when we allow our lives and our careers to expand beyond the boxes we once imagined for them.

Find Tori Here:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists/tori-helm-salt-lake-city-ut/1576995

https://care.headway.co/providers/tori-helm?utm_source=pem&utm_medium=direct_link&utm_campaign=147958

https://mrhmoab.org/recovery-center/

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

✨Artistic Pathways to Clarity Journal

👉https://artisticpathwaystoclarity.my.canva.site/clarity

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

This conversation marks the beginning of a new Goddesses of Social Work series: Black Men in Social Work.

In this episode, I sit down with Dr. Andre J.C. Stokes for a thoughtful conversation about his journey into social work, leadership, mental health in the Black community, representation, and his experience navigating the profession as a Black man.

Our conversation also opened the door to something bigger: creating more space on the podcast for Black men in social work to tell their own stories, share their wisdom, and talk about the profession through the lens of their lived and professional experiences.

Find Dr. Stokes Here:

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

✨Artistic Pathways to Clarity Journal

👉https://artisticpathwaystoclarity.my.canva.site/clarity

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

In a profession where doing more is often praised, even when it costs us our health, clarity, and sense of self, what happens when we stop pushing and start listening?

In this returning conversation, host Renita Ray Davis sits down with Regina Lacking, LCSW, also known as the Plant-Based BAWSE, to explore radical rest not as retreat, but as reorientation.

Regina reflects on the season that forced her to ask the question so many helpers quietly avoid: at what cost? Together, they unpack the emotional, physical, and spiritual toll of over-functioning, the moment everything came to a pause, and what emerged when stillness was finally allowed to do its work.

Find Regina Here:

✨IG: https://www.instagram.com/reginallacking/

✨Website: https://www.reginallacking.com/

✨Black Women DO Heal:

👉https://blackwomendoheal.org/

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

In this episode of the Goddesses of Social Work Podcast, host Renita Ray Davis sits down with Erika Perry (Coach Perry) for a powerful conversation about what it really means to move from good intentions to real impact.

Erika is the owner of EP Enterprises, the founder of Youth Talk United, and the voice behind the YouTube channel Behind the Doer. Her work centers on helping youth-serving organizations, coaches, and community leaders build trauma-aware, emotionally intelligent environments that don’t just say they are youth-centered, but actually live it out in practice.

This conversation is honest, reflective, and grounded in lived experience—a reminder that meaningful change always begins with the person behind the work.

🎧 Listen in and reflect on how you are showing up as a doer in your own leadership and practice.

🔗 Connect with Erika Perry on YouTube: Behind the Doer https://www.youtube.com/@BehindTheDoer

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

Host Renita Ray Davis welcomes back LICSW Renee Ingram for an honest conversation about shedding old selves, navigating perfectionism, and embracing therapist humanity. Renee shares the story behind earning her clinical license, the emotional work that surfaced along the way, and what she’s learned about grace, trauma, and transformation — both in herself and the children she serves. A grounding, deeply human episode for social workers in every season of their journey.

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings

In this milestone 100th episode of the Goddesses of Social Work Podcast, I am honored to welcome Ta’lor L. Pinkston, LSW — widely known as The Heart Advocate. A licensed self-love social worker, creator of Self-Care Matters and Healing Over Everything, and Clinical Practice Program Manager at Healthy Start, Inc. in Pittsburgh, Ta’lor is devoted to helping people choose self-love as a coping skill for mental health and healing.

In this deeply moving and liberatory conversation, Ta’lor reminds us that self-love is a practice, not a feeling, and that perfectionism is a learned survival strategy rooted in systems that teach us we are never enough. Together, we talk about:

💗 Why self-love is an action — a verb — not a feeling 💗 How perfectionism, internalized judgment, and “staying small” shape our relationships 💗 Seeing diagnoses through a strengths-based and compassionate lens 💗 Ta’lor’s journey from creative writer to social worker to self-love practitioner 💗 How becoming a mother transformed her relationship with herself 💗 The origins of The Heart Advocate and what it means to practice self-love as community care

Ta’lor’s honesty about shrinking, choosing the wrong relationships, navigating anxiety and prenatal depression, and finally finding her way back to herself is a masterclass in truth-telling. Her story is a reminder that we are born enough — that nothing we do can separate us from worthiness, love, or the possibility of transformation.

As we celebrate 100 conversations, 100 stories, and 100 reminders that social work is sacred work, this episode stands as a testament to heart, healing, and legacy.

🌟 Connect with The Heart Advocate

Follow Ta’lor and her work here:

• Instagram: @theheartadvocate
• Facebook: @theheartadvocate
• Twitter: @heartadvocate_
• Self-Care Matters & More: https://theheartadvocate.com

If Ta’lor’s words moved you, inspired you, or invited you deeper into your own self-love practice, share this episode with another social worker who needs it.

✨Find more of Renita's offerings here:

👉 https://linktr.ee/illuminatedexpressions

Interested in Mastering Your Therapeutic Techniques for Dementia Caregivers?

👉 https://gamma.app/docs/Interested-in-Mastering-Your-Therapeutic-Techniques-for-Dementia--7fnyf5ydeq70qd5

✨ Goddess of Social Work Earrings – Etsy:

👉 https://www.etsy.com/listing/1183285270/goddess-of-social-work-earrings