Peer-to-peer feminist mentoring: Women in academic medicine and advocacy for the rights of those with serious mental illness

Abstract

Feminist mentoring is invaluable in navigating academic medicine and the faculty ladder track while in leadership in mental health in the public sector setting, whether that is mentor-to-mentee or peer-to-peer feminist mentorship. From a feminist mentoring perspective, sociopolitical oppression is examined, and issues of power and privilege are explored, which strikingly play a leading role in the experiences of those who live with serious mental illness. People who live with serious mental illness are more likely to endure trauma, stigma, disparities in health care (a shorter life span), poverty, sexual assault, homelessness, and unemployment; and these intersecting events make a more fused and distressing experience than mental health symptoms alone. Relatedly, in a parallel process, working as women in academic medicine in structures that have been built on patriarchal foundations comes with many challenges and barriers, which feminist and social justice frameworks help to conceptualize and process. This short piece will share first-person experiences of peer-to-peer feminist mentoring in the context of working in academic medicine with those with serious mental illness, and will shed light on the valuable constructs that feminist mentoring offers as a guide to effective culturally responsive and socially just action when collaborating with those who have serious mental illness.