Abolitionist Provider Peer Support Group

Bere will be facilitating a monthly 90 min abolitionist peer support group for 6 consecutive months.This space is open to therapists across the country. This is a space to explore the different contradictions and challenges that come with being mental health practitioners. This space offers an opportunity for self reflection, curiosity, community conversation and resource sharing that can generate more radical imagination on what it can look like to be a mental health worker pushing back on surveillance and on our community/clients. Each month 2 people will present on a case or topic that they want support with and the group will work to provide their feedback. There will also be opportunities for reflective questions and resource sharing amongst the group. The group will take place every last Tuesday of the month starting August 26, 2025 from 7:00-8:30pm Eastern time and will be held via Zoom . This will be a closed group in order to build rapport and community.

By purchasing a package you RSVP to all 6 sessions of the group to provide said support. As radical providers we know it is vital that we create radical spaces to discuss our clients that are not based in pathologizing them, hence the creation of this group.

Who This Space Is For: Abolitionist mental health practitioners 

What This Space Offers: Peer support, community, resources 

What this group is not: This space is not a therapeutic support group. It is not a space that allows racism, homophobia, transphobia, anti-blackness, xenophobia, ableism or perfectionism to be perpetuated amongst each other.

Date/Time/Frequency/Duration:

Meets monthly on the last Tuesday starting August 26 from 6:00-7:30pm Central Time (7:00-8:30pm Eastern) for 6 months

• August 26
• September 30
• October 28
• November 25
• December 30
• January 27
• February 24

Group Structure: 

• Intros–names, pronouns,where you’re based, icebreaker/grounding, what are you wanting from this space?
• 2 presenters each session: They present and share what they need support with
• Other group members provide support 
• Opportunities for resource sharing and reflective questions at closing

Group Agreements: 

1. Take Space, Make Space:We come as humans first, ready to unlearn, learn, and be held with humility. No one is the expert in this space. Contribute to the collective, not from a place of extraction. Practice Take Space, Make Space to balance voices in the room.
2. Honor Lived Experience:Lived experience is sacred knowledge and holds equal, if not greater, value than degrees, certifications, or titles. Ancestral, somatic, spiritual, collective, or individual—every path to healing is valid. There is no “one right way” to care for ourselves or others.
3. Acknowledge Power and Privilege:Recognize how power, privilege, and access show up in the room. Decenter yourself when needed and amplify voices often silenced or overlooked.
4. Address Harm with Care:Mistakes will happen. When harm occurs, approach it with care and accountability as acts of love and repair, without shame or punishment.
5. Be Real and Human:Show up imperfect, messy, and authentic. This is not a space for performative healing or professionalism. Show up as you are, honoring your needs—eat, drink, or turn off your camera as needed. Assume others are coming from a place of good intentions.
6. Align with Liberation: This space is rooted in radical values like liberation, disability justice, abolition, and anti-Zionism. Respect these principles.
7. Maintain Confidentiality: Protect the confidentiality of any clients or personal stories shared in this space.

Accessibility: Zoom offers live captioning. If further accessibility tools are needed please let us know.

Meet The Facilitator: Bere Cruz

Bere Cruz (they/them) is a trans nonbinary, queer & neurodiverse disabled Mexican immigrant, living in Kiikaapoi Land (Southwest Chicago). They are a covid conscious healer, therapist,and educator whose community work is deeply rooted in disability justice, abolition, collective care and liberation.

Bere brings over a decade of experience as trauma therapist and community healer, who also deeply honors ancestral legacy, lineages and wisdom. 

When Bere isn’t immersed in healing work and disrupting the status quo, you can find them making plantita medicine, snacking on prickly pears and dancing their little heart away, to all the cumbias and nortenas they can find.