Coming November 2026.
Stand Up, Speak Up, and Heal is a new book I’ve co-authored, offering skills for managing race-based traumatic stress, written by three licensed BIPOC clinicians.
Somewhere along the way you started believing the exhaustion was your fault. That if you just meditated more, scheduled better, cared less, you’d be fine. But the stress of navigating racism is not a time management issue. This book names it correctly and gives you tools that are actually proportional to what you’re dealing with.
E. Sofia Mendoza, LCSW
Every chapter comes from our clinical expertise and our own experiences navigating racial stress as women of color in the mental health field. It’s grounded in DBT, packed with practical tools, and built for both personal healing and community use.
Pre-order here:
Amazon: Stand Up, Speak Up and Heal Amazon link
Barnes & Noble: Stand Up, Speak Up and Heal Barnes & Noble Link
I’m co-authoring a book to educate people on racial trauma, and offer skills to emotionally ground, stand up, and speak up. Release date is November 2026!
We are ecstatic to have found a home at New Harbinger Publications among talented and heart centered therapist authors.
While this is exciting for us to use our voice to speak up via writing this book, it will also be very heavy as we wade through the literature and stories of racism, discrimination, and microaggressions. At the same time, we find comfort in being able to do it in sisterhood – grieving, honoring, holding space for each other and committing to joy together.
Stand Up, Speak Up and Heal: Overcome Race-Based Traumatic Stress isn’t just another self-help book. It’s what I wish had existed when I was navigating the daily weight of race-based stress—that exhausting reality of moving through spaces that weren’t designed with us in mind.
For Latina and Latino readers navigating the stress of being first-generation, bilingual, or bicultural, Stand Up, Speak Up, and Heal offers DBT tools that honor your cultural identity while protecting your mental health.
This book brings together DBT skills, self-compassion practices, and social justice principles in a way that actually makes sense for BIPOC folks. No academic jargon. No bypassing the reality of systemic oppression. Just practical tools rooted in cultural understanding and collective healing.
Black Americans face unique mental health challenges rooted in historical and ongoing racial trauma. Stand Up, Speak Up, and Heal provides DBT skills designed to address the specific toll of anti-Black racism on the body and mind.
Written by E. Sofia Mendoza, LCSW, Lisa Bolden, PsyD, and Lizbeth Gaona, PhD, LCSW, this guide helps BIPOC individuals manage anxiety, depression, and exhaustion caused by racial stress
Pre-orders matter more than you might think. Publishing is an industry that pays attention to early momentum, and strong pre-order numbers can mean:
When you pre-order, you’re not just getting a book. You’re amplifying a message that race-based stress is real, that our healing matters, and that culturally responsive mental health resources deserve space in mainstream conversations.
And if you’re able to take it one step further, share this with someone in your life who might benefit. Post about it. Tell a friend. Forward this page. Every single action creates ripples.
This book exists because we refused to accept that race-based stress should just be something we “deal with.” It exists because we believe our communities deserve tools that honor our lived experiences while supporting real healing.
Looking for a self-help book on racial trauma? Stand Up, Speak Up, and Heal uses DBT techniques to help you calm your body, manage intense emotions, and reclaim your peace.
Learn how to regulate your nervous system during racial stress, practice mindful self-care, and set boundaries with confidence using the DBT-based framework in Stand Up, Speak Up, and Heal.
Thank you for being part of this journey. Thank you for believing that our stories, and our healing matter.
Want to have me come speak about the book at your agency or program? Feel free to email me at sofia@sofiamendozalcsw.com.
Want to receive book updates? Sign up for my book newsletter below.
Sofia Mendoza, LCSW offers courses, workshops, and trainings for the public as well as mental health professionals online and throughout Long Beach, Los Angeles and Orange County California. All courses center mental wellness and creating a space to support individuals and professionals in collective healing.
Licensed clinical social worker (LCS28884)
I am a bilingual/bicultural therapist who has specialized in mental health and psychotherapy since 2007.
Available for psychotherapy appointments for first generation professionals, burnout, depression, anxiety, and more virtually, or in Long Beach, California.
