When COVID hit in 2020, I was pregnant with my son and chasing around a very energetic two-year-old daughter. Like many families at the time, the life we had built began quietly dissolving almost overnight.

We were living in the Bay Area then, surrounded by friends, familiar routines, and the small networks that make motherhood feel possible. But as remote work took hold, many of those friends began leaving. At first it was subtle — a moving truck here, a goodbye text there. Then suddenly it became clear that the community we had built was not coming back.

One week after my son was born, my husband and I made a decision that felt both dramatic and oddly practical. We packed what we could into two cars and drove to Southern California to stay with his mother so we could have help with our children. When you have a newborn and a toddler, logistical support suddenly becomes the most valuable currency in the world.

As the world began reopening in 2021, we started venturing out to playgrounds, grocery stores, and libraries around Orange County. And that’s when something became immediately obvious.

This place was far less diverse than I had imagined.

Coming from the Bay Area, the shift was noticeable in a way that felt quiet but persistent. I started looking for other mothers who might share similar experiences. I downloaded apps like Meetup and Peanut. I joined several Facebook groups that seemed promising.

Let’s just say my search was… unsuccessful.

Eventually I had what I thought was a very modest idea:
What if I started a Facebook group specifically for Black mothers in Orange County?

My goal was not ambitious. I was hoping to find maybe thirty mothers. Ideally a few of them would have children close in age to mine. That seemed like a reasonable dream.

I started sending the group link to a few women I had spotted in other online communities and simply said, “Come join my group.”

A handful agreed.

Within a short time we had around fifty mothers.

And already — the drama.

One of the first things I learned about running a community is that groups need rules. Clear ones. Firm ones. Preferably written before the first disagreement.

The first major decision that shaped the group came quickly: whether mothers who were not Black but were raising Black children could join.

As a pediatric nurse, I have spent my career thinking about children and the environments that shape them. So I approached this decision the way I approach many difficult ones — by imagining myself in the position of the child.

What I knew with certainty was this: the group needed to be a place where mothers did not have to explain why race and racism would be part of their children’s lives. Those conversations are real and necessary, but they are also exhausting. The group needed to be a space where that understanding was already present.

If someone did not understand that reality, the responsibility to learn did not belong to the mothers inside the group.

Once those boundaries were established, the group began to grow.

By the time we reached one hundred members, I realized I had signed up for something much larger than I originally intended.

The group quickly attracted attention — not just from mothers, but from businesses. Suddenly hairdressers, photographers, and anyone offering services to families with Black children were eager to introduce themselves.

At that point it became clear that running a community required more than enthusiasm. It required structure. Rules. Moderation. Leadership. Protection.

This was when I began learning about grassroots organizing — not in theory, but in practice. Protecting the culture of the group meant setting boundaries, building trust, and occasionally making decisions that not everyone agreed with.

Over time, the community grew exponentially. We eventually had to introduce engagement standards to keep the group focused on active members who were genuinely participating.

Over the years we have navigated many challenges, both inside the community and outside of it. Not everyone has always agreed with my vision or the way the group operates.

But one thing is undeniable: the impact has been real.

Hundreds of families have found connection, support, and friendship through this community in Orange County.

In recent months we’ve even heard from families relocating from places like New York and Atlanta who told us they felt comfortable moving here because they knew a community already existed waiting for them.

That is something I never imagined when I first created the group hoping to find thirty mothers.

Since then we have hosted hundreds of events and helped connect mothers with countless resources across the region.

The success of the community has been something we are deeply proud of. But over time we also began noticing the limitations of the platforms we were using. Algorithms, visibility changes, and the unpredictable nature of social media meant that the community’s growth and reach were always dependent on systems we did not control.

And when you spend years building something meaningful, you eventually realize that relying entirely on someone else’s platform has limits.

Which is why the next chapter of this work is about building something of our own.

Held & Rooted is the result of that realization — a platform designed intentionally to support maternal communities in a rapidly evolving digital world.