The Retreat

A while back someone sent me a video of a woman speaking to a crowd of church women during some sort of seminar. The woman grazes over various topics and came to one that resonates in my memories today, hence this post. She talks about women, more specifically black women, crying in the shower or in their car. We retreat. We hide from the public, our loved ones, and our significant others to cry alone without any consolation. Most of the time its one of those ugly cries, one built up from stress or from unhappiness. We retreat to a place like the shower or our car and we completely let it all out. After we finish our cry, we gather ourselves. We check the mirror to fix our make up. We clear our throats a few times and take a deep breath. We then get out of the car or shower and join with our fellow people and act as if we weren't just crying like we felt the weight of the world on our shoulders. We brush it off and ignore our feelings until its time for our next ugly cry session. But why? Why is it that we don't seek comfort or better yet we can't seek comfort?

The weight and pressure that black women feel travels far past the present day. When we think about how things might have been during slavery we can only imagine the support system that the black woman was for her family. Providing comfort to the black man after a beating, unable to completely show emotions to help him be strong or even allow him to break down. Having to remain strong for the children because any break in emotion by you could cause them panic or fear. Possibly having your young son ripped from you and not being able to react too much in fear of punishment or knowing the other children must have a strong figure to look towards. In this time, the white woman sees her pain, but turns a blind eye and may even add to it. The white man is the cause of her troubles and even takes advantage of her disadvantages while forcing the black man to turn a blind eye. So, the woman cries when everyone else is asleep, when she is free, and no one can hear her sorrows. These same situations carry over into the present day. The mother is struggling financially but working as hard as she can. She goes to social services or a friend to ask for help and is denied but cant express true feelings to remain good in the public eye and not worry her children. Later that night the stress is building but she cant casually cry in the living room while watching Grey's Anatomy, she cant worry her children so she must cry in the car on the way from work before her children can sense any flaw in her demeanor. This isn't just something that affects a black woman who is a mother or provider. It's the corporate woman being mistreated at work by her white male boss and everyone else in the office turns a blind eyes. It's the young black college woman who doesn't seek comfort from her friends because as a black woman she knows they are experiencing this same exact stress. From the beginning of time here on this soil we have been conditioned to retreat and conceal our emotions.

How can we move past this? What is it that we can do to break this cycle? As daughters, we can let our mothers know that its okay to be sad and be stressed. As mothers, we can allow our young children (yes this includes the sons) that it is okay to cry and to release emotions and that crying is not something that should be punished. As coworkers, we can correct our boss and coworkers but we can also befriend and share with like-minded black female coworkers. As friends, we can offer up a shoulder for our friends. This isn't to say that we should take on the burdens of all of our fellow women or put all of ours on them but we shouldn't act like crying is a sign of weakness or a punishable crime. We don't have to justify our feelings or correct them for anyone. Sometimes we need a hug just to release the stress we carry and to know we aren't completely alone in our ugly cry sessions.