Beginning this month, the Health and Racism Working Group (HaR) is pleased to publish articles by HaR members on issues related to race, racism, racialization, and health. HaR members are community members and workers in Peel, individuals who are committed to having conversations about social justice. We begin with a contribution by Rita Nketiah.
Rita
Nketiah is a Pan-African Feminist activist currently living in Brampton. She is
the Coordinator for the Black Community Action Network of Peel, an organization
committed to building the capacity of Black communities throughout the region.
Her interests include Feminist activism and discourse, anti-racist education
and self-care. In her spare time, she plots Revolutions J.
Battling Depression: A Young Black
Womon’s Perspective
The
first time I thought I might be depressed was in 9th grade. When I
think about it, there was nothing in particular that happened. Or maybe nothing
really traumatic. I mean, there was a boy that I had dated the summer before
starting high school, and when school returned he went back to the States. It
was my first major puppy love. I took it hard. We tried to keep in touch
through msn (yea, back in the day!), but alas, distance and time differences
made our online romance impossible. After that, I started becoming quite the
recluse. I started high school, and was once again at the bottom of the social
order in my school. But I don’t remember being picked on. I just remember this
cloud of sadness that hung over my head. I wrote quite a bit. I talked with a
couple of friends who were also quite sad often. I just remember feeling sad
and hopeless from time to time. In hindsight, I am not sure what to make of
that moment in my life. There are days when I think I was just a teenager going
through hormonal changes –but then, I saw so many of my peers who were “always”
happy, and even their low days didn’t appear
that low. But me? I always had some existentialist questions floating in my
head and would share with anyone who would listen –which was usually no more
than two friends. I always had this feeling of anxiety, mixed with fear and
sadness. I couldn’t name it. Not out loud, anyway. After all, I was only 14.
What could I possibly be depressed over? Secondly, I was a young black girl
living in Rexdale –we didn’t get depressed; we were not supposed to be
suicidal; those were words reserved for white girls; and depression and suicide
had to look a particular way, or else we simply could not call it that.
And
yet, I had days where the tears just flowed for hours. Sometimes they were
triggered by something someone said to me about my body, personality, whatever.
Sometimes the tears were triggered by thoughts of worthlessness in my head. I
was fragile. More fragile than I let on.
I
was also quite cerebral. I was the child that could go somewhere deep in her
mind for a while, even in conversation, or walking to class. I was moody and
introverted developed a reputation for being moody and miserable so this
did not help my Depression. Whenever the pangs of sadness or loneliness hit, I
would go further inside myself.
Fast
forward to second year of university. The first time my friend told me that she
was suffering from Depression, I did not believe her. In fact, I told her that
there was no way that she could be suffering from Depression, because I had suffered from it when I was
younger, and unless she was feeling suicidal (and had attempted suicide), then
she could not have been really suffering from it. What she was going through
was sadness, university stress –but definitely not depression. This was in our second year of university.
This
mix of shock, disbelief and arrogance is something I regret to this day. In
denying her to name her depression, I did what so many people did to me and
continue to do to young black womyn; I denied her humanity, her ability to be
vulnerable with another human being, her right to admit that things were not
okay. What I didn’t understand at the time was that Depression could take many
forms. While some of us actually do attempt to commit suicide, others go
internal. They may begin cutting themselves, or have a loss of appetite
altogether.
Now
at age 25, I think I still struggle with bouts of depression –of course, now I
have very real stressors, ranging from economic independence, aging parents,
sexual identity and all the realities of the quarter life crisis (yea, it’s
real, y’all!). And I wonder if we all face it from time to time. In fact, I
wonder if Depression isn’t actually the result of a social dis-ease. The effect of intersecting forms of oppression that we
are not always able to name or speak to, because we have been told to “suck it
up”, to be happy with our lot, and oh, my favourite “It could always be worse”.
The reality for those suffering from Depression is that, saying things could
always be worse does not actually help us cope with our current situation. It
may actually make Depressed people feel a compounding sense of guilt for wanting
to “complain” about their “good life”.
I
also think we need a new discourse about Mental Health. If we can recognize
mental health is not a given, in a society that is so deeply and toxically ill,
and that marginalized communities often struggle to talk about social dis-ease, we can begin to find concrete
solutions for grappling with mental unhealth
and depression in our communities.
I
want to leave you with two (2) spoken word pieces. The first is by Stacey Ann
Chin, a Jamaican-born Spoken word poet and Queer activist currently residing in
the U.S. The second piece is one of my favourites from a Spoken Word Artist and
Mental Health advocate, Bassey Ikpi. Both pieces are about the struggle that
many (young) black womyn have in admitting that we need (self-)care. They are
about having honest conversations (with ourselves and others); about telling
the truth of where one has been and what they have experienced, and knowing
that what has happened to us is not our fault.
2 comments:
Thank you for sharing.
Thank you so much for sharing. God Bless.
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