The Foundation for Black Women’s Wellness is an outgrowth of work began by Founder Lisa M. Peyton, who after losing her mother Roberta Peyton at the age of 64 to heart disease on May 22, 2006, launched Black Women’s Wellness Day (BWWDAY) on May 22, 2008.  Black Women’s Wellness Day is an annual health summit dedicated to informing, inspiring, and empowering women and girls to build and sustain healthy, thriving, wellness-centered lives, and brings together women, health partners, wellness practitioners, community leaders, and organizations in support and solidarity for Black women’s health.  In her own words, Ms. Peyton explains:

“I realized that what happened to my mother was not the exception, but the norm for far too many women in my family and extended community. Yet, I didn’t hear any alarm bells going off. Black women all around me were dying young in the prime of their lives form largely preventable illnesses, and no one was making a sound about it. We wept, we planned and attended their funerals, and went on with life accepting this as their fate…our fate. At that point, I knew I had to do and say something to change this course. Black Women’s Wellness Day was what I dreamed up as my contribution to saving our lives”.

‍The day-long event began as a small gathering of 40 women in a public library in Bowie, Maryland on May 22, 2009 and has successively grown in support and attendance each year. Upon returning to Wisconsin in 2011, Ms. Peyton began work immediately to garner local support to grow and expand BWWDAY in the Greater Madison area, recognizing the great need to address alarming health and social disparities impacting Black women and their families. The overwhelming response and support of BWWDAY demonstrated the need to expand the work beyond a single event to include year round education and advocacy.

The Foundation was established in June 2012 by Ms. Peyton and a founding Board of Directors to serve as a necessary and vital vehicle to elevate and advance Black women’s health as a community and public health priority and to engage Black women in health promotion and leadership efforts to drive the change we seek.