SPECIAL ISSUE: HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE
WORDS - Shameka Poetry Thomas, PhD aka Dr. Poetry
Photography courtesy of SHAMEKA POETRY THOMAS

She is tired of being a strong Black woman. The generations of high blood pressure are literally killing her. Having to be strong for everyone (and everything) is exhausting her. Some nights she can’t sleep. Some days, she can’t dream. Why does she always have to be so strong? Why can’t she practice being… soft? At 3 AM, she finally said to herself: “I am tired of being a strong Black woman.”

She is tired of enduring heavy heart artillery. Tired of lifting dead weights. Tired of structural racism. Black bodies murdered, unarmed. She is tired of calling family members long-distance, planning funerals. Tired of sacrificing. Tired of cooking, cleaning, washing, and ironing. Bending over backwards. She is tired of people-pleasing folks, who ain’t pleased, even if she gave away her life on a golden platter. She is tired of giving away energy for free.

She realized she can no longer be your superwoman, your superhuman, your extraordinary, your perfect ten. Her Black girl magic did not wake up like this. Her purpose is not to be your ‘hair did, nails did,’ beauty standard. Today, all she can give you is: no damns.

Today, her blood pressure matters, just like her Black life matters.

She is burnt out. She cannot fake laugh at your office jokes. She cannot afford to say “yes” to  baking cookies for your baby shower; or attending your Zoom call/webinar. She cannot fold your laundry, fix your dinner, or mop your floors. She is drained.

These are things she wished her mother’s generation was bold enough to say. And then maybe she would not have had to witness her mother’s cardiac arrest. Maybe the decades of accumulated stress would not have killed her grandmother slowly over the years, navigating racism, sexism, class-based discrimination, an alcoholic husband, raising kids, the fear of no housing, and the fear of unemployment.

She wishes her grandmother could tell you the truth about intergenerational stressors. Instead, she witnessed her grandmother coming home from church, cooking dinner for a family of six, when she didn’t feel her best. She saw her aunties slaving over hot stoves, while managing chemotherapy appointments. 

And here it is: Black women, doing anything and everything to keep the family together in the middle of a pandemic at the expense of their souls. Compensating truths. Piecing together fragments with the pennies of a stimulus check. Blood pressure high from structural damage. 

Another fibroid in her uterus. Another blood clot in her veins. Another patch of hair missing in her Afro, underneath her lace-front wig. Another migraine. Another miscarriage. Another abnormal pap smear. Another ulcer. For Black women, having high blood pressure in the middle of the pandemic is a matter of life and death.

Black girl magic is so beautiful—but it is fragile. She cannot keep getting killed on your frontlines or assassinated at these white-collar (or blue-collar) jobs. Black women are precious. If structural racism is to be alleviated, then Black women need to be trusted. Black women hold up homes, communities, families, infants, and children. And the truth is Black women have been taught to HIDE their truth from you, just to survive.

Dear Black women, may you choose your life over your death. May you choose yourself (as your own version of wealth). May you choose your truth (as your own proof). May you choose the resilience of your ancestral roots.

Black women, I am tired for you (for us). You deserve to be healed. You deserve spaces where you are centered (and not concealed). You deserve colleagues who practice authentic anti-racism. You deserve easier friendships. You deserve family members who are not killed. You deserve to travel the world, unscathed. You deserve to dance and to laugh from your soul. You deserve to move through the world, unapologetically bold. 

Black women, live your LIFE. Admit when you need solitude. Admit when you need community. Please go to counseling, just as much as you meditate. Please pack light, sip lemon water, and dare to be great. Admit when you are tired. Admit when you need to cry. Please stop killing yourself behind closed doors, because being a martyr is the new way to lie. Please do not let the first time you get some rest be when you die.