By Randi Locke, Northend Agent’s
How behaviors from black mothers that were intended to protect children impacts black mothers today
As of late last year I was blessed to become a mother to a beautiful baby girl. While I have always wanted a daughter, for me, having a daughter held more weight. For me she embodies the promise I made to myself as a little girl that my daughter would know she is loved by me no matter what. While I have been in counseling on and off for years, it took me having her to begin to see my mother in a new light. She raised me from a place of fear and now that I am a mother I understand where it came from. Along with the anxiety about how my daughter will safely navigate the world as a black woman; I have been fearing things that I thought she would never have to deal with like tear gas, and measles. While scrolling through news articles on Instagram, I came upon a post from author Alishia McCullough that quoted excerpts from chapter three of her book Reclaiming the Black Body. The book as a whole discusses the cause of black women’s fraught relationship with how they view their bodies and how to heal it. In Chapter 3 McCullough recalled the moment when she realized her grandmother was taught to be critical of herself and other black women’s bodies. Stating that “The more time I spent around my grandmother, the more I came to realize that she talked about everyone like she did to me – from the women in the stores whose clothes didn’t “fit their body shape” to the hairstyles she didn’t approve of. She projected all of her learned insecurities onto everyone around her…. She had been socialized to be fearful around my developing body and wanted to protect me from the sexualization black girls are disproportionately subjected to.” After conducting her research, McCullough was able to connect this behavior all the way back to slavery. McCullough states that in order to try and prevent the slave master from abusing their daughters or the slave master’s wife becoming envious; mothers would insult their daughters in front of them. The hope was to make them appear less attractive. Reading this caused me to understand how my mother did not see some of her actions as harmful. Rather shielding me from a potentially dangerous situation. Aside from insulting their daughters, mothers tended to not be as nurturing either. Not because they did not love their children, but because there were constant external threats. According to a follow up of an episode of Ben Franklin’s World written by Emily West of Omohundro institute, African American mothers were not able to fully mother their children. If they were not raising their master’s children, they were either working or being raped with the intention to conceive. Looking at my own motherhood journey knowing that I not only have the weight of my own trauma to unpack; but realizing that after 246 years of slavery and 90 years of Jim Crow we have barely begun to address how these events colored our behavior as mothers. To begin to address this, I shared these findings with two other mothers and asked how this knowledge will impact their parenting moving forward.
Doris, mother of a six week old son
Though my mother never exhibited harmful behaviors that directly harmed me, I found that she unknowingly taught me to use humor and misdirection as a way to handle my problems. Knowing that the harmful behavior my mother experienced when she was young at the hands of my grandmother went beyond our family, makes me see her in a whole new light. My mother was intentional with not applying these behaviors towards me which I am thankful for. However for myself and my son’s sake I am working on how to handle my problems in a healthy way with my therapist. Although I want my child to experience a mother that is not weighed down with fear for his safety; I know that even though he will never be able to receive the same grace as his white classmates I don’t want him to keep his head down in constant fear. I hope that he not only knows he can find understanding and safety within me, but that he has the opportunity to find other spaces to grow his confidence and form community.
Sana mother of a five year old daughter
Growing up there was always a clear imbalance between me and my brothers. My mother exhibited more leniency towards them whether it was not asking them to pay back the full amount they owe; or uplifting their contributions more than me and my sister’s. While I believe the source of her behavior comes from her personal upbringing more than the trauma of slavery, I know she does not do this intentionally but because of how the world treats black women. I feel that she and other black women have a hard time believing that we can form spaces and communities where we don’t have to constantly humble ourselves. Though humility can buy us some sense of safety, it should not cost black children their innocence.
I wish I can say that one day we can just let our little black children be care free but it’s hard to see that future from here. But what I can say is that we are starting to finally cultivate that safe space for them inside the home. Whether that is stopping habits like physical discipline or belittling them behind the guise of helping them, we are learning how to provide for their emotional needs better than our mothers did. The load of 336 years worth of racism and abuses impact on black motherhood cannot be fixed overnight, but our generation are taking the steps to repair the damage.
Photo by Andrea Piacquadio: https://www.pexels.com/photo/mother-and-daughter-drinking-4831866/
