Our Recovery Matters: Black Joy, Authenticity & Healing with Dr. Codi Renee BlackmonOur Recovery Matters: Black Joy, Authenticity & Healing with Dr. Codi Renee Blackmon
SHE RECOVERS Podcast
Dr. Codi Renee Blackmon shares how Black joy, authenticity and anti-racist practice shape her recovery, research and leadership. The conversation highlights women of colour’s experiences in white-dominant recovery spaces and the power of community, motherhood and recovering out loud.
56:46•18 Aug 2026
Black Joy as Resistance: Dr. Codi Renee Blackmon on Recovery, Identity and Belonging
Episode Overview
- Joy, especially Black joy, is described as both resistance to oppressive norms and vital fuel that sustains long-term recovery.
- Authenticity and self-advocacy help move beyond alcohol-focused support towards trauma therapy, accurate diagnoses and broader healing tools.
- Women of colour face unique harms and barriers in white-dominant systems, making anti-racist practice essential within recovery spaces.
- Recovery can transform leadership and parenting, as shown through Dr. Codi Renee’s amends and journalling process with her son.
- Recovering out loud is framed as powerful and healing when grounded in self-work, safety, and communities that have earned the right to hear one’s story.
“I make room for joy by being me in any space. And I've never been in a space and it didn't change in some way. And I celebrate that.”
What makes a recovery story truly inspiring? This conversation between Lisa Wall and Dr. Codi Renee Blackmon centres on what happens when healing moves beyond survival into joy, resistance, and genuine selfhood. The episode speaks directly to women and non-binary people in recovery, especially women of colour who may feel unseen in white-dominant spaces. Dr.
Codi Renee introduces herself as "a Black woman celebrating recovery" and shares how her life once revolved around drinking, partying and self-medicating social anxiety, burnout and complex trauma. She talks candidly about drinking and driving, harsh legal consequences and being pushed into 12-step spaces that addressed alcohol but rarely race, trauma or systemic oppression. Everything shifts when she finds SHE RECOVERS online during lockdown and hears women talking about childhood trauma, complex PTSD, anxiety, ADHD and codependency.
That wider lens helps her seek proper diagnoses, trauma therapy and medication support. From there, authenticity becomes the heart of her recovery: "I make room for joy by being me in any space." You’ll hear Dr. Codi Renee unpack Black joy as both resistance and fuel, describing how dancing, dressing up and "celebrating the change maker in me" keep her sobriety sustainable.
She shares a powerful amends process with her son involving shared journalling, honest questions and consent around what gets voiced, showing how recovery reshapes her leadership as a mother and as a community facilitator. The episode also touches on her research into women of colour in white-dominant recovery spaces, racism in education, and her critical race trauma-informed ethic aimed at sustaining communities, not just individuals.
Throughout, there’s a clear message: all women deserve recovery, and reclaiming voice, culture and joy is part of that work. If you’ve ever wondered whether you’re allowed to take up space and recover out loud, this conversation might feel like a long-awaited permission slip. How might your own recovery change if joy, identity and belonging sat at the centre instead of the margins?
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