Mothering Black girls, for me, can be fraught with the responsibility of teaching them Black women's stories while clearing space for them to write their own.
The poem in this picture has meant so much to me over the last few years. I get emotional every time I read it. I hold my head high and feel so thankful I found it.
She must have sensed my neediness, because she invited me, a fragile stranger, into her apartment. It was cozy and inviting, strewn with kid stuff and safely baby-proofed. I lay my little one on a blanket on the floor and took a deep breath in, relaxing for the first time in ages.
This wasn’t normal. A mother should have so much love for her child. She should know what to do, and when to do it. She shouldn’t dread when he would wake up to eat. She shouldn’t dread living her life in two hour time frames. And she shouldn’t hate herself for it. But yet I did.
I had what I thought to be normal baby blues. I had a hard time looking at pictures of my son from the previous week because I felt he was growing up too fast. I cried all the time.
