Season 3: Episode 1

I enjoyed watching True Detective (E1:S3) last night. It was not a show I generally watch but I have heard good things and love Mahershala Ali so I accepted the invite to watch it.

About 20 minutes in I found myself having to work through a triggering moment during the peep hole scene. My childhood bathroom had one and my father used to look at me undress and bathe when I was in 5th & 6th grade.  It was so upsetting. One day when I was getting undressed to bathe, I felt a presence near the door. I  looked through the hole and he was on the other side. Eyeball to eyeball. Father and daughter. Father on daughter. Daughter on display without her consent. It was scary and I felt powerless. I have no idea how long and how many times he had been watching me. After that, I would stuff wet toilet paper in the hole and hang clothes on the hook to keep him from looking at me.  

As I am typing this post I began to think about my naturist and exhibitionist tendencies and found myself for a split second questioning whether my sexual abuse history is at the root of things that I am into. It is not nor is this line of thinking productive. I recall as a young girl feeling violated by his predatory gaze. When I enjoy being free in my nudity as an adult (generally non sexual) and in my sexuality, I am asserting my power in deciding who gets to see and who can and cannot have access to my body on my terms. I share this caveat because those of us who have sexual trauma histories are often plagued internally and externally with having  unconnected dots about our very complex sexual and trauma histories inappropriately connected. Yes, our sexual trauma has impacted our lives and sometimes detrimentally. But we are allowed to have sexual desires, preferences and kinks that are separate from our trauma just like other people have theirs. We are allowed to be free—of shame, guilt and worry—and that includes our sexuality and bodily autonomy.  

I do want to say how frustrating and tiring it is be trying to relax and watch a TV show and then be sent spiraling back to a moment where I felt powerless and preyed upon. Triggers are real. Trauma is real. Fuck people who don’t get that realness we are navigating as we try to survive our lives. 

I am truly grateful for my survival, especially in the moments when my heart begins to race and the buried memories come flooding back. I am determined to live this life but sometimes must fight to take another breath when I feel the waves of past terrors washing over me. I am grateful for the gift of being able to write through my pain and I look forward to watching episode 2. 

Deep Breathing...

Deep Breathing as Survival (drafted March 2017)

Last Wednesday the temps suddenly dropped and everyone had to put their winters coats back on. I work in a historic building in downtown Chicago and our heat comes from radiators. 

As I walked through the office that day trying to focus on my mounting list of work tasks, I began to hear the all too familiar clicking sounds of the radiators. I had heard them all winter but after having the heat off for a while, the hissing clicks  sounded especially loud. 

I grew up in public housing projects that had radiator heat. The clicks of the radiators reminded me of both of my childhood home. A home in which I was not safe. A home in which I was sexually, physically and psychologically traumatized by my father. A home that I escaped and never returned.

As the clicks continued, I found myself unable to focus on my work but without really knowing why. I felt panicked and unstable even though I knew I was not in any direct danger. I was distraught because I needed to settle since I had a shortened work week given a surgery that I had scheduled for later in the week. 

I breathed deeply and I just survived the day. I struggled emotionally throughout the work day. I prayed that the cold days would end. 

On Friday, I was admitted the St Francis Hospital in Evanston for an outpatient procedure. During the pre-op process a nurse shared that I would be given a sedative that would put me asleep so that the surgeon could begin my surgery but that I would wake up mid surgery. My heart immediately began to race. My father used to sexually assault  me when I was asleep so the thought of waking up when someone was hovering over me was unsettling. I tried to express my general concern to the anesthesiologist and he did his best to be reassuring. I still felt uneasy. I worried that I would wake up feeling startled/frightened and instinctively try to defend myself. 

I breathed deeply and tried not to angst. 

I was then wheeled to a pre-op/post-op room to await being wheeled into the operating room. For some reason the multiple beds in one room and an older woman who began moaning after getting out of her surgery reminded me of being in the hospital for my first abortion. It was a late term abortion and women and girls all were put together for our procedures. I was the youngest person there and it was one of the scariest experiences in my life. I hadn't thought of that day/night and those collective moans for a long time but suddenly, the memories came flooding back.  

I had to force myself to stop thinking about it. I needed to hold my shit together since my surgery was about to happen. Breath, Sekile. Breathe. 

I was then wheeled into the operating room. I was not scared but was still unsettled about waking up mid surgery. My anesthesiologist tried to chat with me to keep me calm by chatting about music he liked from South Africa. Then the nurse began to use "soft" restraints to strap each of my arms down so that I would flail around once I woke up. This almost pushed me over the edge,  even though theoretically I understand the purpose of the practice. All I could think of was waking up and not being able to defend myself because I was strapped to the bed. In an instant, I was disempowered and trapped. My anesthesiologist began asking me where my name was from and I blurted out "I can't focus on that right now, I am feeling anxious and overwhelmed!". He continued to do his best to keep me calm but it was a lot to take in and was happening so fast. I guess I breathed through it.

Luckily when I woke up in the middle of the procedure, they had put a tent up that visually blocked out what was actually happening. I was able to hear first and then adjust to the situation. Not being able to see was a good thing for me in this moment. Like I've already said, I thought I would wake up and want to protect myself, especially if I found a man hovering over me. 

In the end, everything went well. I was even able to go to a party yesterday, less than 24 hrs after the surgery. But this situation reminded me how much I live with my trauma daily. Trauma histories are heavy and looming. These experiences are sometimes hard to carry and are unpredictable.

I know there was nothing that could be done about the radiators but the hospital experience could have been improved upon. I wished I had found the courage to inform the people who were providing health care to me that I was a sexual abuse survivor. I just kept saying I was feeling anxious. I could not name my pain. On the other hand, I feel like this should not have to come from me.  All health workers should be trained  to provide trauma informed care and know that the hospital experience itself can be a traumatic event.  They should be aware that many of their patients may have trauma histories. It's more than just being nice and saying "you'll be ok". I had to do a lot of self regulation to get through that minor procedure. They all were medically competent but were clueless about how their "standard" practice of strapping someone down can illicit strong feelings of vulnerability and anxiety for some patients. I do recognize that I am economically privileged given my access to health care. That does not preclude the fact that health professionals can be more responsive to the complex needs of their patients. Asking me if I have trauma history should be right next to the asking me if I have any allergic reactions to medications. 

I breathed deeply through it all and survived yet again. But this post is evidence that I am still haunted by my brief hospital experience 2 days later. Luckily, there's lots of air out there...

*************************************************
Here's a gift to all of you out there breathing through it all:

1 minute breathing exercise

on the balcony

 I shared my trauma story with my daughter yesterday. I shared it with both of her brothers in the past. My oldest son came into my room one time when I was sleeping and his presence triggered a flashback. I screamed at him to get out of my room. I decided shortly after to share with him that my father would molest me at night and that I got freaked out a bit but was truly sorry. He was understanding. my poor baby! I shared my story with my younger son out of anger and frustration. He was angry with his dad about our then upcoming move to Chicago and I had had enough of his jabs at his dad. I confronted him and shared that while what he was going through was tough, that is was not trauma and that his father was trying to make a better life for him. I shared what having an abusive father was really like and said I wished I had a loving dad like his. yeah, I went there. He soon chilled out and he is the most adjusted of my 3 children since we have moved. Our talk will probably will have him in therapy later in life but my buttons were pushed. (note to self: have a 2nd talk with him) My poor baby!!!! But yesterday was the last time that I shared my story with one of my children and it was the one I dreaded the most. Telling my daughter...

After a week long hectic move, it was the 1st day Z and I were hanging out on our new balcony. She was sharing how she and some girls from her school were organizing a protest against the school's sexist dress code. We talked double standards and respectability politics. She mentioned that it is just the older women, particularly black women that say something to her. I told her I had her back but also explained that some black folks are conservative and some may mean no harm and think they are protecting you from men's/boy's advances. I explained that black women's sexuality has historically been exploited and our responses (good and problematic) have been attempts to reclaim our dignity. I explained that even with those histories of racism and sexism, black woman and girls should demand their bodily autonomy. We agreed that what someone is wearing has nothing to do sex or enticement and people should not police a girl's/woman's body. I noted that men and boys should be in control of themselves. We discussed rape and rape culture. We both acknowledged that people rape people and that it is wrong. 

 But I also confessed that even I had to get used to her wearing leggings, short shorts and bikinis once her body started filling out. I told her it was hard and that I too wanted to protect her/cover her up. I then shared how it has been a struggle watching her do her thing as she grows up but I know that I have to let her go. I finally took a deep breathe and said that "it happened to me" and that I wanted to be sure it didn't happen to her. If you could have seen my baby's face when she realized what I was saying and as the tears welled up in her little eyes as my voice quivered. my poor baby!!!!! I kept going before I lost the nerve to get it out and shared that it was my father. She came over and hugged me.  I told her it was a scary time in my life but that I was ok. I told her I was her age. I told her I was proud of her for knowing that her body is hers and that no one should tell her what she can and cannot do with it. She said, with tears streaming down her face that she was sorry that IT happened to me. I thanked her and we comforted each other. 

The moment was both incredibly heavy and somehow also very light. If felt like we saw into each other's souls when we looked at each other with shared love and concern. I asked her if the balcony could be our "spot" for sharing and connecting and she said yes. Then Cabral called us for breakfast! Perfect timing, pancakes sooth the soul! 

p.s. School District 97, you'd better look out because my daughter and her crew are coming for ya!!  

Eyes up...Dis/Recovering My Body

 When our bodies are free we can move mountains.

I completed my first marathon on October 12, 2014. I finished the Chicago Marathon in 5 hours, 49 minutes and 12 seconds! Not bad!! I was out there with 45,000 other runners, walkers and wheel chair racers---each of us at the start line for different reasons but all with the same tools at hand....our bodies, minds, hearts and spirits ----and the same goal in mind...to get across the finish line. 

As I trained this summer, especially during the longer runs past 13 miles, I became fascinated by what my body was capable of doing. Sometimes I got distracted by what my body was “supposed” to look like but I was truly impressed by what it could DO! Each weekend I would look at the weekly run schedule and think “Damn, that’s far!”. But then I would lace up and sure enough about half way through the run I would realize that I was doing IT.  I also came to enjoy listening to my body. If my heart rate was too fast, I'd slow down. If I became excited because the finish line was near, I'd speed up. If I was struggling, I'd speak up and ask for help. If I felt uncomfortable, I'd tell my run partner the pace doesn’t feel good. If I am slacking, I’d acknowledge it and recommit. If I needed a break, I'd take one. This distance running journey was a testimony and tribute to being in a sustained conversation with my body.  Respecting when my body says No! and responding when it says Yes!!

The conversation continued along the marathon route on Sunday. I checked in with each body part. 

        mile 13: “Toes & toenails, how ya’ll doing?" 

mile 15: "Back, you alright?" 

mile 18: "Lungs, ya’ll getting enough oxygen?"

                                     mile 23: "Bladder, girl, you are doing marvelous!"

mile 24-26.2: "Legs, you betta' work!!!" 

My spirit continually tapped me on my shoulder along the way and reminded me to take it all in. The sights, the sounds, the smells, the energy, the support and the LOVE were all there giving me life and propelling me forward. 

And yes, at times I begged each body part to cooperate and they did, but in their own time and on their own terms. I had set a finish time goal of 5:25 but my body pushed back and said assertively, "I am finishing in 5:49:12!". 

My body, my will, my desire moved mountains that day and another piece of me got free as I crossed the finish line. When I got across I didn’t cry. I just smiled because my body had survived real pain before and this was not pain, this was joy.                                                    





                                           Pure JOY!

This is 11

I wrote a poem in 1993 entitled, "she was only 11". It was a poem about my father sexually molesting me as a young girl and and my mother's failure to protect me. It was poem of violence, trauma and abandonment. It was a poem that tried to make sense of what had happened to me as a girl decades before. 32 years later, 11 visits again.

Today, my 11 year old daughter and I were trying to make it back to Illinois after an action packed weekend of fun at a family wedding. Our return flight had been cancelled yesterday but today we made it to our connecting flight so there was hope. She was anxious because she wanted to return to make it to her friend's birthday party. It was the first one she would be attending in middle school with both girl and boy guests.  She wanted to look special for the occasion so she had on the dress she wore to the wedding but not too special so she edged it up a bit with sneakers. 

Our flight had been delayed twice so I left her side at the airport briefly to grab us some lunch. I got her gut wrenching tearful phone call as I waited for her sub to be prepared. Our flight had been cancelled for a second time and now she was going to miss the party. To make matters worse, we are stuck in a random city for the night. 

She was hysterical on the phone. I could hear an older black woman asking her if she was OK in the background. I told her I was on my way and left her sub at the restaurant. I walked as fast as I could back to our gate as I tried to calm her down. She was inconsolable and at moments accused me of not helping matters. (Side bar: No matter how bad I felt about the situation, I was not having that kind guilt tripping and quickly checked her on that behavior). I'm her mother, not a punching bag! Still, I hung on the line until I reached her and then held her in my arms when I got to her. I was weary. I knew we needed to get to the ticket counter if there was any possibility of us getting to Chicago or a nearby airport today but she was a wreck. She didn't care who was watching or what needed to happen. She needed to fall out for a bit. So we sat, she cried and I held her. When I wasn't enough, she called her dad and cried to him. 

Finally after what seemed like an eternity, I told her we needed to get new tickets. We were pretty much the last ones to get into the ticket reissue line. She wiped tears the whole time we waited. I held my bladder and my emotions. I got our tickets and then she collapsed again as the full reality set in that we were not getting home until tomorrow. 

She kept asking me to fix it and saying she just wanted to go home and to see her dad who had been traveling for the past 10 days. I reminded her that I cannot simply fix things I have no control over. She swallowed that pill bitterly. 

She eventually calmed down and even began to smile and laugh bit. We settled into a hotel and had lunch and played a few rounds of checkers. She had another crying episode and I, at my wit's end, decided that she had shed enough tears on the matter of a "missed birthday party". I reminded her that this is a small bump in grander scheme of her life and there were girls her age that were dealing with real shit. Rape. Abuse. Homelessness. Poverty. War. Dangerous unaccompanied border crossings without their parents. Yes, I went there. Because the girl was working my nerves and seriously, it was just a damned party! 

She finally cried herself out and fell asleep. I am lying in the bed across from her looking at her beautiful perfection and shaking my head at the intensity of her emotional expressivity. Yes, it's going to be a long adolescence but I am happy to be on this journey with her. 

I remind myself that she is ONLY 11 and suddenly I am realizing that our 11th years are significantly different.  My daughter  is dealing with petty disappointments that are age appropriate. Not sexual assault as I did at her age. My daughter asks for her father when she is in pain and he comforts her and supports me.  My father was the primary source of my pain. I am listening to my daughter and assuring her that she is capable of surviving her pain. Although my mother did assist me with aborting my father's baby she did not respond to my terror or assure my protection because she stayed in relationship with him. My daughter is empowered and embraces her budding adolescent sexuality when she decides to wear a dress to the party but I had mine taken from me violently. My daughter is allowed to express her feelings openly and publicly yet I was silenced by fear for decades. At age 11, my daughter  is spending a night in a hotel with me because her flight was cancelled. At age 11, I spent a night in a hotel with my mother the night before a late term abortion that had to be performed out of my home state. As her parents, we are actively trying to keep her (and her brothers) safe. My parents provided for me and my siblings but we were not safe with them. 

This is 11.

As I lie here, listening to her heavy breathing as she sleeps, I also began thinking about the interactions my daughter had with my extended family members this past weekend. Everyone adored her. All weekend she heard "you look just like your mother" and "you spit her out". I think she felt bad for her dad and said to me "I have dad's nose and hair", which she does. But to the Wilkersons, she was "little Monique" and was hugged, kissed and squeezed to death! She was both tickled and overwhelmed by the unconditional love that came at her from every direction. She seldom gets to see our extended family but they loved her like she was my 11 year old clone. I was loved up, too but I truly enjoyed watching them love her up. It deepened my sense of feeling loved by them. They loved her because she was of me but they also loved her because she reminded them of me at her age. It was an out of body experience for me and for a moment, I did live through her. I was retroactively receiving the love that they didn't know I critically needed 32 years ago. 

Bearing witness to them doting over her--grandmothers promising her sweets; uncles giving her all the change out of their pockets and letting her cut in the buffet line to get a 3rd helping of macaroni and cheese; aunts giving her peppermints, telling her she is beautiful and embarrassingly talking about her getting breasts. I too, received that extended family caring and praise as a girl. The early safe space created by my extended family has truly been a latent aspect of my survival that I had not given much weight until now. While I may have been facing hell in my household, they had already affirmed me and built me up.

It is important for me to also note that she is both privileged and blessed. In the midst of her tantrum it was my responsibility to remind her to put her life in perspective--missing a party is disappointing but it is not traumatic nor life altering. She should recognize her privilege is that this momentary upset was her greatest pain. 

But I do also appreciate that she is also a child--and children deserve to be heard, validated and loved. They also deserve the freedom to express their feelings of both joy and pain. She had prepared for joy today but she experienced pain. Yet, she is blessed to have both glowed and crumpled under the warm quilt of her immediate and extended family this weekend. 

This is her 11...

...and my 43 year old heart is swelled by the vast ocean that separates our life experiences. 

Homecoming: On finding a "good man"

Recently, I was exchanging a round of texts with one of my dearest friends. We were debating on the importance of men in our lives--in the realms of romantically/sexually and emotionally/psychologically. She felt that women represented feminine energy in a relationship and that a man complimented that feminine energy with masculine energy. She also felt that a father nurtures a child in a unique way, maybe a more masculine way. I feel that we all embody both masculine and feminine qualities and that we are whole without  another person. I see others as enriching our lives. Intimate connections with others affirm us but that we must gain affirmation of self independent of others. I also see the role/duties of a father as being indistinguishable from that of a mother. I know I will get a lot of push back on this but a nurturing parent is a nurturing parent. period. I have witnessed my son, 29 years younger than me, step between myself and my daughter when I was not parenting effectively. He essentially was the voice of reason and ultimately comforted my daughter and gave her what she needed in that moment. What she needed was nurturance and he provided that for her, regardless of his gender and/or age. There is nothing biological about my mothering. I am learning as I go and there is nothing about my gender identity as a woman, my predominantly feminine expression or my biological femaleness that aids me in this process. Children need caring adults in their lives. Whether those adults have penises, vaginas or some combination of both doesn't matter. Who does that parenting doesn't matter. Your birth parents or those in your community can stand in the gap. Yet, my friend raised a point that I’m still chewing on. Maybe once we have been abandoned or abused by our mothers and/or fathers, we have holes that we feel need to be filled and look to other adults who resemble these identities to heal us. 

I am not sure if I ever looked for a father figure to replace my father. I simply walked away. I did not see him as essential to my life journey. I never felt a deep loss. trauma, yes but I did not feel a deep loss of a father in my life. I DID feel a sense of abandonment from my mother and I spent about a decade of my young adulthood trying to attach myself to older black women. But they ultimately disappointed me. Not because they were bad people but because I had painted this idealized portrait of what I wanted out of my relationship with them. I wanted a “do over” mother but they were my grandmother, my mother in law, my supervisor, my dissertation chair, or my mentor. They were not my mother. I eventually learned that I had placed unrealistic expectations on these women, to heal me, to love me in the ways I felt I had not been loved. I learned to mother/nurture myself. I learned to redistribute the weight I had placed on certain romanticized relationships with older women. Why are parental relationships given more weight that peer relationships? Why were parents defined as the singular sources of our nurturance and not ourselves? These questions have helped me love myself when others did not. could not. should not. 

But is loving ourselves enough?

My father did not love me. He failed at his adult duties to keep me safe and not harm me. He failed. Most of my professors at Morgan State University were men. They were intelligent, progressive, kind and witty Black men. They were not my father nor his replacement but I suppose they did help me to heal. They were all respectful and did not make me squirm in discomfort when I was in the room alone with them.  They gave me an alternate perspective of relationships between adult men and younger women/girls. between those with power and those who were vulnerable under that power. 

I recall being in Dr. Daryll Tally's office in the social work department in my junior year. We were talking about graduate school. I was telling him how I wanted to go to grad school in Baltimore because my boyfriend at the time was from Baltimore. He quickly retorted, "Don't plan your life around a man! Baltimore will be here when you get back. Go to grad school.". Thank you, Dr. Tally.  I listened to him. My boyfriend at the time broke up with me our senior year and I went off to Ohio State University for my masters degree. Dr. Talley's words stay with me today, I try to place myself first in my life plans. I try not center my life around a man—even the one I am in love with. Dr. Tally was not a father figure but he did what wiser adults should do—give sound advice and challenge us to defy our self-made boundaries. You are a good (hu)man, Dr. Tally!

I also recall being in Dr. Elmer P. Martin’s social work practice class. He required  us to write a paper on object loss and object constancy. The purpose of the assignment was to reflect on something that was tough/traumatic/distressing in our lives and what kept us whole during that same time period. I decided to write about my incest survival. I think I still have the paper. It was the first time I had put pen to paper on the issue. It was emotionally draining but I think it was the best paper I had written at Morgan. On the day the assignment was due he asked that we share our topics with the rest of the class. I was horrified. I tried to find the words but erupted into tears and buried my head in my desk for the remainder of the class. Too soon. Still too raw. It took me two weeks to return to class. Dr. Martin shared his own story in my absence. It was about his father molesting his sisters and his mother pressing charges against him. It was about surviving having a father who had been a sexual predator and being a child of an incarcerated parent. I missed Dr. Martin’s story in class but I gained so much from him for discussing his personal life with our class. Thank you, Dr. Martin. You taught me that it was OK to be vulnerable in front of others. I continue to try to live by your example. You were a good (hu)man, Dr. Martin. RIP

Mr. William Carson, Sr. and I crossed paths in 1992. I walked into his office saying I wanted to go to graduate school. Over the next year he would read my admission essay, drive me from Maryland to Ohio for black grad student visitation days at Ohio State, give me a bike to get around campus, attend my graduation from my MSW program and take pictures of the event. A couple of years after that he would drive my friends down to NC for my wedding and take pictures of yet another special day in my life. He never asked me for one red cent. Four years after that, he’d be there for me again for my and my husband’s graduation from our PhD programs. He and his camera captured our big day yet again. Words cannot express how his unassuming but constant presence in my life has meant to me. I’ve come to learn that I was not a special case, Mr. Carson treats everyone he knows kindly. I am so pleased that I was able to thank him publicly at his recent retirement party from Morgan State University. After 30 years he was finally “graduating" and moving on to indulge in his life’s joys—traveling, visiting his family and yes, taking pictures. At the dinner, I thanked his son for “sharing” his dad with us Morganites. Thank you, Mr. Carson for all that you have done for me professionally and personally. You taught me that sometimes we just have to be there for other folks not to seek praise but because it is the right thing to do. I try to channel your professionalism and dedication when I interact with my students although you have very big shoes to fill! You are a good (hu)man, Mr. Carson!!

I am probably a professor because of the positive influences of my undergraduate professors and administrators at Morgan. My fair Morgan...it was a safe haven for me that gave me the space to remember who I was outside of the abuse I had experienced in my family home. 

So where am I going with this? 

I’m not sure. I am thankful that I had other men to interact with who were not predatory. Yet, I never imagined that they were father figures nor held expectations that they were replacing my father when they helped me along the way. At the end of the day, it was not their gender that shined through, it was their humanity. their caring spirits. their sage advice. They were/are good humans. At the same time, I do acknowledge that they were indeed men and having positive experiences with men is something I cherish as well. 

But through it all, I am learning that we heal and flourish from having good people in our lives, starting with ourselves.

Q: What's in a name? A: freedom

I am the first born daughter of Deborah Wilson and Wash Wilson, Jr. They named me Monique Antionette Wilson. I liked my name growing up, despite being called almost last at every school event and ceremony because my last name was at the end of the alphabet. I also tolerated being corrected by others because my middle name, Antionette, was spelled incorrectly since my version had the "i" before the "o".  My name sounds French and that made me feel fancy and sophisticated. I had many nicknames, some I loved "Cover Girl" (my older male cousins Butch & Teddy said I was as pretty as a Cover Girl! I love me some them!) and some I grew to despise "Crow" (because of my skinny bird legs). Then there were the school years of being called "dead eye" because I have a lazy eye and being called a "slut" behind my back. Ahhhh, names, they carry weight. 

Over the years, I created physical distance between my sexually abusive father and me by going to college and not returning home, but I found myself still wanting to "free" myself from his surname. Initially I thought that I could easily just change my last name to my mother's maiden name of Wilkerson. It would mean just adding three letters, KER, in the middle of Wilson. Simple enough. I was also reading more and more about the Black experience in the US during that same time period. I had recently read Kwame Toure's (formerly Stokely Carmicheal) book "Stokley Speaks: Black Power Back to Pan Africanism". It included a speech he gave at my alma mater, Morgan State University, that resonated with me politically. I also read "The Autobiography of Malcolm X". He too, changed his name from Malcolm Little to Malcolm X to El-Hajj Malik El-Shabbaz as part of his political and religious journey. "Assata: An Autobiography" by Assasta Shakur (formerly Joanne Chesimard) crystalized my understandings of the gender politics within the Black Panther party as well as the criminalization and surveillance of Black bodies at the hands of the US government. These revolutionaries and authors sharpened my emergent thinking on black and Pan African politics but they also influenced my thinking on naming.

I learned that your name is yours. I also learned that your name can shape your identity and your politics. Or did I learn that your identity and politics can influence your name? This is a cart-horse debate that I don't wish to take up here but I do believe that my search for self, a self independent of my father's unwanted advances and a self free of white men's chains were emerging simultaneously.  I descend from a long history of racial and gender oppression and a long history of black women pushing back against these histories in an attempt to chart their own destinies.  Although, I lacked the sophistication to name exactly what I was doing when I decided to change my name at 23 years old, I know that these histories informed my act of resistance.

So, while I was in my master's program, I went to the Black Studies library at Ohio State University one day to do research and checked out 2-3 books on African names. I eventually found two names I liked Sekile (again with the missellings, I think it is actually spelled Sakile) and Nzinga (also spelled Nzingha and Njinga, sigh). I had decided I would change my sur/last name to an African name but I was not sure which one to go with. Sekile/Sakile was from the southern region in Africa, a Zulu name that meant "peace" and Nzinga/Nzingha was the name of a fierce 16th century, warrior queen who ruled a region in Africa, which is now Angola. http://www.blackpast.org/gah/queen-nzinga-1583-1663. I liked both names. One evoking peace and one evoking independence, resistance, and strength. Monique Nzinga? Monique Sekile? I liked the names but neither had a ring to them when combined with my birth name. I mentioned my struggle to someone and they quickly suggested, why not use both? Nzinga Sekile? Sekile Nzinga? Sekile Nzinga. yes, Sekile Nzinga!

I shared my name change decision with one of my childhood friends. Interestingly, her name was Monik (pronounced, Monique), too. She was actually in the process of changing her name to Akilah Njeri. We cracked up at the similarity of our name choices and at the coincidence of our timing. Our friends and family weren't as amused. As I shared my new "radical" name with friends and family, I was met with backlash and disapproval by some. "So, what do you think you're blacker than me?!", one friend asked defensively. "I understand you wanting to connect with your African ancestry but what about your white ancestors?!", a family member quipped. Those were the statements from those who were brazen enough to have face to face conversations with me. Eventually, most came to call me "Monique..I mean Sekile!" and then later, just Sekile. Anyone over the age of 60 got a pass, my Grannie still calls me Monique and I still answer to it.  I never told anyone that I was changing my name not only to identify with my African ancestry but also to symbolically sever my connections to my child molesting father. 

Over the next few years, I met co-workers and former classmates who were going through the same name changing process and they encouraged me to not just "go by" Sekile but actually change my name legally. I married in 1996 but had not begun the legal name change process.  So our marriage license says Monique. However, my pregnancy with my first child served as the catalyst for my official name change. I wanted my chosen name on his birth certificate and filed the necessary paper work at the court house in Prince George's county in Maryland in 1997. 

It was at that time that I made the difficult decision to also take my husband's name. I had just spent the last 4 years claiming my independence from histories of violence and trauma but in this case, this was a man that loved and respected me. This was joy. It was a confusing time, so I succumbed to the societal pressure that most US women face to take their husbands' names. My partner said he didn't care but I was not sure. He loved me and I wanted him to know that I loved him.  I became Sekile Nzinga-Johnson legally in 1997.

I feel like I lost a little of myself in that decision but I later began to appreciate having a name that was connected to the Black experience here in the US. That is where my closest ancestry lies and I am deeply indebted to all those ordinary blacks folks, like the Johnsons of Mobile, Alabama, who worked hard, struggled to stay alive and contributed to this society with little recognition. Maybe this is me rationalizing my heteronormative decision so that I feel less gendered but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

I am still in the process of healing from my child sexual abuse. It is lifelong. I have accepted the infinity of its pain. Yet, in the past year, I've also have found myself circling back to appreciating the name Monique. Monique lives. Monique symbolizes the innocence that should have been my childhood. Monique is joy. She coexists WITH and IN Sekile. Yet she has stayed hidden, dormant within until she felt safe to come back out and play. It's taken years, decades for her to feel secure in this world. As Sekile, I find myself calling upon Monique quite often these days. Monique reminds me what real pain is and to not let the small things in life take up more space than they deserve. Monique reminds me that I need and deserve time to play and be free. Monique makes me speak on it and act on it. injustice. speak, Sekile! Monique, with her working class reality, reminds PhD'd Sekile to remain wild and untamed by middle class respectability politics and fired up about inequity. I am Sekile. I am Monique.

Been thinking about another name change these days....Sekile Monique Nzinga-Johnson. I know, it's kind of a mouthful! Until then, I'm going to go drink a glass of sweet tea and hula hoop with Monique.

-Sekile M. Nzinga-Johnson

p.s. 2/10/20. I recently dropped the Johnson from my last name although I kept my partner of 26 years. Nzinga-Johnson is still my legal name but Nzinga is what I will use professionally and socially. I continue to evolve into myself and he continues to be the man who is secure in his masculinity with no need to "own" me or mark me as being his possession. Freedom lives here.

--Sekile M. Nzinga

p.s.s. 3/28/24 My new SS card and my new license came in the mail today. I am now officially/legally Sekile M. Nzinga, a free assed black woman. 

(Not a ) Mother's Day Post: Happy Our Lives Day!!

I keenly remember seeing a school video of myself in 6th grade wearing a green leotard top and thought that my breasts and stomach looked big. I was pregnant but had no recollection of having sex. I did have a recollection of my father coming into my bedroom at night fondling me in my sleep. I did recall waking up one night and being wet between my legs. I did recall waking up and seeing my father’s penis in front of my face. In hindsight, I’m thankful that I do not recall the details of my impregnation. The brain protects the spirit. The spirit protects the brain.

After several tests and an ultrasound it was revealed that I was pregnant. I then had to tell my mother about my father. She did what every women who feels the need to upholding an institution that judges women and demands them to stay “for better or for worse”. Obviously, she took this literally and protected my father over me. She never turned him in but instead coached me through a series of lies regarding how I got pregnant. My deepest apologies go out to the Latino men in my community who may have been wrongly harassed by the police as they searched for “3 Latino men who gang raped a 11 year old black girl”. In hindsight, I am not even sure the police cared enough about my innocence to actually investigate the “crime”.

My mother then asked me what I wanted to do. I could have the child and she would raise it or I could abort it. I was 11. 11!!!!!!!!!! But my spirit and brain joined forces again and helped me to get free. I chose an abortion. I had no desire to be a mother. I was 20 weeks pregnant so I had to travel out of the state of RI to NY for the late term abortion.

Here are my nuts and bolts of a late term abortion. The saline solution was inserted into my abdomen with a long needle. That induced contractions. The roomful was of other women and girls going through the same experience. The moans. The moans. All night long. Seeing the fetus. The painful removal of the placenta. My spirit was challenged that day. Even witnessing what I witnessed and experiencing what I experienced, I’d choose that abortion again and again and again. I had little power in the world at age 11. But that day that I chose to have an abortion was my assertion of power over my life and my body!!!!!

5 years later, when I was in 11th grade, I had unprotected sex with my then boyfriend. He convinced me that my bc pills were still “in my system”. Smooth move and clearly my brain was not fully engaged that day. But my spirit was intact and I knew that I did not want to become a mother in that moment. I made a uninformed decision (I did actually believe him and at the time I had not developed the highly political skill of telling a boy NO when it came to sex) but I had no desire to pay for it for the rest of my life. I shared that I was pregnant with my mother and told her I wanted an abortion. I had a 1st term abortion. She accompanied me and used her health insurance to pay for my procedure.

A year later, the summer before I headed to Morgan State University, the same boyfriend and I were having sex. He told me to climb off but I didn’t. I was just beginning to enjoy sex and it felt good in that moment. Sadly, my newfound moment of sexual pleasure landed me pregnant once again since I was doing so unprotected. In some ways I felt punished and betrayed by my body and my brain. How could I be so stupid!? I was finally making it out of my abusive household and I had fucked up. Some might argue that choosing an abortion as my reproductive decision at this point was selfish. But I disagree. I had power over little in the world but I knew I had power over my body and my future. Caring for the self is not selfish. So I walked right past the anti-abortion protesters with my head held high and I had another 1st term abortion. I moved into the freshman dorms at Morgan State still bleeding and recovering 7 days later. I didn’t share my decision with my mother this time. I no longer trusted her with my body nor my future. I was charting my own course and after 18 years in my bio family’s unsafe and abusive household, my spirit and brain were steering me towards my freedom. I did use our family’s healthcare insurance and while both of my parents worked for Blue Cross/Blue Shield, the company had a confidentiality policy that protected my privacy even as a teen, even from my parents. The anti abortion PNA laws that require pregnant teens to notify their parents are both dangerous and restrict their reproductive freedom.

I share these reproductive experiences on Mother's Day to demonstrate the wide variety of reasons why girls and women (and trans men & non-binary people ) choose not to biologically reproduce/parent/mother. Sometimes it is because of rape/incest, sometimes it is because we don’t know how to (or can’t) say NO to our intimate partners, and yes, sometimes it’s because we may have engaged in risky behavior by having unprotected sex. Add 1000 other sometimes to my aforementioned 3. No matter the circumstance, we all deserve access to legal, affirming, safe, & confidential abortion care. I am so thankful I had these healthcare conditions for my 3 abortions. My abortion history is part of my trauma history. Yet my spiritual and intellectual assertion of power over my life, my body, and my future during these—at times horrific and uncertain moments— is also central to my history of joy! So this Mother’s Day, I chose to celebrate the moments when I/we choose life…MY LIFE/OUR LIVES over motherhood.

Most importantly, on this and every other Mother’s Day, I remain politically committed to demanding that the state continue to respect and protect our reproductive decisions and make reproductive healthcare (including abortion care) accessible to all.

My Grannie: The Brazen One, The Believer

She who dared to ask me what haunted me. She who believed me the second I told her. She who loves me, nurtures me, BELIEVES me, stands by me and protects me. My Grannie.

I wrote this post on May 13, 2014...it is July 2, 2014. Our girls are still not home. Justice NOW!

Having children can be triggering life events for survivors and witnesses of childhood trauma. Although I fear for all of my children's safety as they walk this earth inside black bodies, I am especially triggered by having to raise and protect a daughter. I always say that I was blessed with her last because the creator knew I had my own healing to do first. She is almost 11 now and everyone says, "she looks just like you" all the time. But I am so grateful that her 11th year bears no resemblance to my 11th year.  As her body develops physically, I struggle with letting her go so that she may have her own journeys while also protecting her from the gender based violence that exists in the world of which I am sadly too familiar. The ache and angst is deep but I'm comforted every time she gets off of the bus and makes it back to me. I'm comforted when she has sleep overs at friends' houses and she reports no harm was done upon her body or spirit. I'm proud of myself for allowing her to go. I work hard not to control her body and movements, although her love for the comfort of jeggings is testing my resolve! But I continue to buy them for her noting that what one wears has little to do with their risk for victimization. With painted on pants and budding breasts, she comes back to me and I live another day to worry, build her up, love her, educate her, discipline her, be challenged by her, and pray. I know I am not alone.  I know I am not the only brown/black parent  who is terrorized in these ways concerning their brown/black girl child's safety and freedom. I also know that ultimately I may not be able to protect my black children from harm. This is a theoretical "knowing" but acceptance of this fact will be much harder.

But for now, she comes back to me.  Yet, many of our babies are not coming home.The larger public seems to care little when it is a trickle, although that steady trickle has created a gaping hole filled with of girls/women of color, both trans and cis. Gone. but not forgotten. Gone. but not always fought for en masse. Gone. No hashtag. Gone. Our girls' lives devalued. Erased.

Where is our collective rage channeled to action for ALL of our daughters, sons--children?!

 The recent atrocity in Nigeria reminds me that my daughter may get off the bus today and make it home but that OUR daughters continue to be systematically taken from us and victimized at home and abroad. As a parent I ache and wonder daily how are my sisters and brothers in Chibok are dealing with the incomprehensible fact that their babies did not come back home that day. This was supposed to be a regular school day. Now they are living an oxygenless nightmare that the world is bearing witness to...and will soon forget about. Little sisters, you deserve to be home. Parents, you deserve to sleep. and to be at peace. 

As a world citizen, I remain unsure as to how we should collectively respond to this situation. I have no answers but am fully aware that the US has a dark colonialist and imperialist history and practice of "helping". So the only thing I feel that I can offer to this discussion is to remind our government that they while they mobilize around injustice against girls/children they can do so by ceasing dropping bombs on them; and ceasing the systematic denial of  access to healthy food, clean water, safe housing, and quality healthcare, education and jobs, and yes, they can also aid in returning our daughters (and sons) home! 

Let us continue this outpouring of love and support by channeling our collective rage to economically, politically  and ethically care for all of our children. 

We belong to them..all of them.

In the meantime, I am praying that our little sisters are returned in peace and that their paths of purpose guide their survival thereafter.

Mother's Day 2014: Honoring the ally-partners that love us

My life partner and co-parent has truly amplified my joy and has witnessed my struggles through my pain, respectfully, non-judgmentally and tenderly. Together we created 3 unique versions of perfection. They remind me daily that though they are of me, their journeys are their own. For these lessons, I am grateful.

Thank you, Maya. Love, Monique

I have been meaning to write about how literature, particularly how literature written by Black women has impacted my life and healing. The first book that I read that featured a theme of child sexual abuse was Maya Angelou’s “I know why the Cage Bird Sings”. 

Up until that moment, I did not have a language for what I was experiencing. And though I don’t recall her “naming” what happened to her, Maya Angelou’s thick description of the violation of her body and spirit gave me a language to frame my trauma/pain. Somehow reading about her childhood sexual abuse in a book made what was happening to me more real, more valid. I pulled strength from that book, Maya’s journey and testimony. My memory is fuzzy but I think I recall reading it as a freshman—not sure if it was assigned or if my friends and I were taking it on. I worked at the Providence Public Library after school with a bunch of friends and school mates. During our break we would hang out in the stacks and read books. (sidebar: Yeah, kids from the hood read books for fun) I recall reading it during this time period. But as I am typing, I also recall reading Alice Walker’s “The Color Purple as a young teen.

I picked it up off the table at one of my friend’s house. Was is 7th? 8th? Or 9th grade!? I do remember it was her mother’s and while I occasionally had a penchant for 5 fingering stuff when I was younger, I do recall returning it when I was done. Struck by its power, I think I needed some physical distance between its heaviness and me. In that book too, Walker included Celie’s survival from child sexual abuse as a central theme.

Now, I am sitting here wracking my brain trying to reorder my contact with these two life altering books and authors. But together they built the foundation of my journey towards fighting back and reclaiming my life. I am unsure if they helped me “heal”, but they gave me language and a mode of resistance, which for me was powerful. I then knew that Black women talked about and against what was happening to them. I also learned from those turned pages that they documented sexual trauma in fictional and in nonfictional forms. Walker and Angelou’s narratives also located trauma with a larger counter-narrative of survival. Both authors wrote in a way that propelled their readers (and me) forward. They gave me as a reader something to hold on to…to hang on to.

So it is was a heavy-light heart that I say farewell to one of my angels on earth, Dr. Maya Angelou. For today she has journeyed on to the spirit world. May you rest in power!!!

I dedicate this JOY post to her (along with other brazen Black women writers) and thank her eternally for giving me and countless others the momentary escape from our realities through her beautiful and prophetic gift of writing and for giving us the language to name our trauma in our struggle for survival.

You own everything that happened to you

Starting this blog is both affirming and terrifying. I am emotionally undone today. Tears. Excitement. Self preservation. Vulnerable. Exposed.

My thoughts on trigger alerts

I am at an impasse. This blog will discuss sexual abuse, rape, child abuse, racism, sexism, elitism, poverty, homophobia and other forms of structural violence. As a person who has two degrees in social work and has worked as a therapist for survivors of trauma, I am forced to consider whether I will foreground the potential triggers embedded in my blog at the beginning of each post. I am also a survivor of many forms of abuse and personally feel re-traumatized when directly exposed to images of rape scenes or other stories of gender based torture. However, even with these professional and personal histories, I’m choosing not to regularly announce that the content that I post here could be triggering. Why? Because, my intention with this blog is to assert that trauma and joy can co-exist and not privilege one over the other. We do indeed live with trauma. As women. As people of color. As subjugated folk.  How will our collective rage spill over to action if we do not stare our collective pains in the face?!

Systematic violence and oppression require collective confrontation and for keepers of a culture of violence to be held accountable. Those who are most affected deserve validation, healing and justice.  I believe that we begin to heal by resisting being silenced. We draw strength and seek justice from naming the thing that should not be named.

I am making the assumption that those who will read this blog are not eternal victims who are beyond repair. Instead I am imagining that they often searching for community and that they are hoping that there is another side of that wall they are facing. I don’t mean to reduce other’s pain but I DO aim to forefront life—even when it involves tragedy. I take this position not because there is temporal and spatial distance between me and my trauma. I carry its heavy load daily. But I stand firm because I believe that each breath has the potential of a joy filled future in spite of our aches. What do you think of my decision? As survivors, do we need to be protected from possible triggers at every turn?  This is where I am today but I would to discuss this issue further with other survivors.