Food insecurity is not just an economic issue; it’s a mental health issue. With the delay and cuts to SNAP for November, millions of individuals and families are facing hunger and uncertainty.
Therapists are on the frontlines of this crisis, whether we realize it or not. It’s hard to focus in session when you’re hungry. Parents navigating food insecurity are under constant stress, shame, and survival pressure. Children who go to bed hungry show symptoms that look like anxiety, hypervigilance, or depression. Hunger is not just about empty stomachs, it’s about bodyminds in survival mode. And what we’re seeing right now is a manufactured hunger that is being weaponized against our communities. Food and hunger are being used as a control tactic.
This is why food justice is mental health.
Why Food Justice Belongs in Therapy Spaces
Therapists are trained to address trauma, depression, and anxiety, but we aren’t always trained to recognize the material conditions that cause them. Food insecurity is one of those conditions.
When our clients are navigating hunger, no amount of mindfulness or CBT will meet their needs. Deep breathing cannot fill an empty stomach. Grounding exercises do not replace groceries.
Food justice demands that we expand our understanding of care. It asks us to remember that liberation work begins with meeting basic needs, and that nourishment, safety, and dignity are all part of healing.
Mutual aid is one way to practice this. It’s not about everyone giving the same amount; it’s about everyone sharing what they can. Time, space, money, or skills are all forms of care.
Tangible Ways Therapists Can Support Food Justice
Below are some creative, accessible ways therapists, healers, and care providers can show up for their clients and communities:
1. First Session Food Bag
Prepare sturdy, reusable bags with 3–4 non-perishable, nourishing meals (canned goods, pasta, oatmeal packets, tuna kits, peanut butter, rice). Offer one to each new client during their intake session. This small act removes stigma and meets a fundamental need.
2. In-Session Snacks and Drinks
Keep your office stocked with shelf-stable snacks: protein bars, dried fruit, instant oatmeal, trail mix, jerky, bottled water, and electrolyte packets. Offering food in session can be both grounding and care-centered.
3. Create a Free Shelf
Designate a space in your waiting room for a “Take What You Need / Leave What You Can” shelf. Include non-perishable food, menstrual products, hygiene items, and warm socks. Partner with nearby clinics or therapists to help restock regularly.
4. No-Questions-Asked Gift Cards
Consider setting aside a small recurring fund to purchase grocery store or general use gift cards ($20-$50). For example, if you’re in a group practice, a pooled amount could be $250, which then provides 10 gift cards. If someone is struggling, you offer it, no questions asked.
5. Host a Therapeutic Cooking Group
Instead of a traditional process group, host a monthly group focused on cooking a simple, low-cost, nutritious meal together in a community kitchen (some community centers have kitchens you can use) or your office kitchenette, if possible. The group eats the meal they prepare together. There can even be a theme, such as “cooking in community.”
6. Post a Skill Swap Board
Install a physical bulletin board in your office (or a digital one for a client portal) where clients can post offers and requests. E.g., “I can teach you how to bake bread,” in exchange for “I need help getting groceries this week.” You are basically facilitating the initial connection, fostering reciprocal community care.
7. Provide Food Vouchers
Partner with a local, accessible cafe or restaurant. Pre-purchase 5-10 meal vouchers. A client can then be given a voucher for a hot meal, no payment needed. Once again, this doesn’t have to be too expensive, especially if you collaborate with local restaurants.
8. Offer Sliding Scale or Pro-Bono Sessions
If you have the means, temporarily reduce session fees or waive co-pays for clients directly impacted by food insecurity. Even a few free sessions a month can provide financial breathing room for someone choosing between therapy and dinner.
9. Organize with Other Providers
Create a collective such as “Therapists for Food Sovereignty.” Share food resources, host donation drives, or sponsor community fridges together. Collaboration amplifies impact and reminds us that healing is collective work.
10. Integrate Food Questions into Intake Forms
Add simple, compassionate questions about food access into your intake process, such as: “Do you currently have consistent access to food that feels nourishing and enough for you?” or “Would you like support connecting with local food resources?”
This normalizes conversations about food insecurity and helps identify unmet needs early on. It also communicates that nourishment is part of care, not separate from it.
Why This Work Matters
When we treat food insecurity as outside the scope of therapy, we reinforce capitalism’s illusion that wellness can be separated from survival. But mental health doesn’t exist in a vacuum; it exists in a context that includes poverty, hunger, and state violence.
By integrating food justice into our practices, we move beyond individual solutions and begin addressing the systemic harm that produces our clients’ suffering.
Each act of care, bag of food, and resource shared is an interruption to a system that profits from scarcity and violence.
When we feed people, we are practicing abolition. We are refusing to let hunger be a weapon.
Reflection Prompts
- What assumptions have I made about “wellness” that ignore material needs like food and housing?
- How can I incorporate nourishment (literal and figurative) into my practice?
- Who in my community is already organizing around food access, and how can I support them?
- What resources can I redistribute right now?
In Solidarity
Food justice is mental health.
To care for one another is to resist the systems that thrive on exploitation and scarcity. Let’s continue to imagine care that feeds, liberates, and connects.
At the Liberatory Wellness Network, we’re reimaging care that goes beyond capitalism and centers community, nourishment, and justice.
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