"Any conversation about death is really a disguised conversation about living." - Attica & Tembi Locke

⚠️Content Warning: Grief, Loss, Death - I'm not going in depth on these topics, but I do reference them in the first section. If you're not in a place to internalize these topics, feel free to skip to the "How's School?" section.

⚠️Length Warning: I wanted this to be short, I really tried, but I also wanted to have a real conversation with y'all since it's been one hell of a month.

Friendly voting reminder - Election Day is fast approaching on November 8 - remember every vote matters!

Girl, What's Been Going On?!

It's hard to believe it's November! I swear October just started and it was really only a couple of months when I started summer classes. I don't know about y'all, but pandemic time is really an anomaly. It moves incredibly fast, but at the same time it feels like we’ve been standing still since March 2020 (make it make sense).

I have sat down to write this newsletter a few times in my head, but if I'm honest (which I will always be in this space), for the past couple of months I've been in a space of survival. If you follow me on IG (cough cough), you've seen me post a few times about how October - March starts a time of the year in which I struggle to get through month after month of the anniversaries of my parents' passings and birthdays, holidays, and my own birthday. Couple any of those events with seasonal affective disorder, and for fun let’s throw in anxiety, normal life stressors, and being Black in America. 🫠 So in September I found myself back in therapy, and a couple of weeks ago my Black female therapist suggested seeing a Black female prescriber who could do a medication assessment (yes, it is important to be clear that my team is Black -- this is intentional). After my assessment, I made the decision to start medication (this is my second time on medicine), and was awarded my third mental health diagnosis of prolonged grief disorder. (Prolonged grief disorder is a very new DSM diagnosis and the moment I read it, I knew it would find its way into my life story. I have a lot of feelings about it, which may become a special newsletter in the future.)

Honesty Hour: As someone who lives with dysthymia (think Eeyore), it's hard to know when my baseline has moved or when I'm experiencing double depression. I do know that since the pandemic, I've been struggling a little bit more to regulate my energy levels and balance the collective feelings of grief, anger, and anxiousness due to the pandemics of COVID-19 and racism and white supremacy. Going into this period of the year, I decided to be proactive and to trust my gut that I needed a bit more help to come out on the other side of this.

You might be asking yourself why is she sharing all of this?

The answer is simple. Because I am a Black woman who lives with multiple mental illness diagnoses and who believes in health equity with my entire heart. And despite what the world may tell you, there cannot be health equity without mental health equity. It is harmful AF to keep telling Black women you admire them for their strength, while ignoring our disproportionate rates of morbidity and death. Black women have become the world's "strong friend," and we're tired. We can't keep saving y'all's asses at the expense of our sanity and our lives, because at the end of the day y'all don't care about us the same. In summary, I want a soft life and I want all of my sisters to have a soft life. We more than deserve it. 💐

I am also sharing, because while we have made strides to reduce the stigma around mental illness, there is still a lot of ignorance on what depression, anxiety, and grief look like. For me, most of the time, you would never know if I'm struggling because I am extremely high functioning and exceptionally well at masking. Other times, like right now, I can't and won't mask, because I am hurting. And that's okay, because it is human to hurt. And, I am human. Yes, Black women are human too.

If it makes you uncomfortable to read about a Black woman expressing aspects of her humanity, I ask that you investigate why you feel that way. Are you worried that I'm being too vulnerable? Too transparent? That this information may be used against me in the future? Believe me, I've asked myself all of these questions, but to me it is more important to make sure that I am seen for everything I am and am not. When I receive my flowers, I want you to know the woman who has been through hell and back, and chose to make those trials and tribulations her superpower. And if my transparency costs me anything, I know it is okay, because God and the universe will provide whatever is lost and improve on it ten fold. Periodt.

How's School?!

Despite all that is going on in my head and heart, school is going VERY well! Remember... I said I am extremely high functioning.

So let's quickly recap.

• Summer Term: I took four courses: Leading Organizations, Media Interviews and Applied Public Health Communications, Racism and Public Mental Health (elective), and Youth Voice in Public Health (elective). I LOVED my electives. They both perfectly encapsulated areas of interest for me and caused me to think about new aspects of racism, mental health, youth advocacy, and the roles in which I intersect with all of those topics. The media course was also good. I got experience in crafting a 90 second pitch and boomeranging difficult questions in interviews. Now for the downer - leading organizations. What I will say is that this course was VERY white. And as I think about it now a few months out, I stand by my initial feelings of it being ridiculous for a class in 2022 to be taught with such a white lens and view of leadership. Don't worry, I raised some good trouble in LiveTalks and in the evaluations. During summer term I also got COVID-19 for the first time after evading it for two years. It kicked my ass (and still is - "Hey, long Rona" *in my Killmonger voice 🙅🏾‍♀️*) and it made me late on a couple of assignments for a couple of courses, but the teaching teams were very understanding.

• First Term: I took two courses: Climate Change Problem Solving Seminar and Fundamentals of Program Evaluation. I was planning to take three courses, but long Rona started showing up the first week of the term and I realized that I needed to take care of my health, first and foremost. I really liked the program evaluation course. I feel a lot stronger in my ability to design a good evaluation plan and understand why and how programs fail to show impact or a real theory of change. I know I will be going back to class notes as I think through my dissertation proposal and I'm thankful that I decided to take it now versus later. The climate change course - meh. Again another course that had a white lens, and when I and other students tried to push speakers and the professor on aspects of race and equity, the responses were lackluster. What I can say is that this course made me personally research the impact of climate change on populations that most forget about, like persons involved with the criminal legal system. Ask yourself, what might it look like to be a person in a jail or prison when an extreme weather event comes through, or when heat waves become the norm, or freezing temperatures, or airborne pandemics? These are the equity focused conversations I would've hoped to have in class, but even without them, at least my wheels are turning and I'm sticking true to my lens on historically excluded populations.

• Second Term: I am taking two courses: Fundamental Tools for Promoting Health Equity and Promoting Equity for Adolescents and Emerging Adults: Problem Solving Course. I am cautiously excited for this term since both of the courses are in my concentration and focus areas. Wish me luck. (And for my fellow DrPHers reading - I wish you luck this term as well).

• Other School Stuff: I was nominated to serve as a Member-At-Large for Student Assembly and was elected to serve as the Black Graduate Student Association (BGSA) Co-Chair of University Relations & Community Services. 💁🏾‍♀️💁🏾‍♀️ I also was asked by the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health Alumni Association to moderate a pretty cool conversation on breaking barriers to accessible healthcare and the importance of the built environment. I chatted with Halle Tecco and André Blackman, both people you should check out if you've never heard of them.

What Are You Doing For Fun?

I wish it was an easy answer, fun has been pretty far off the agenda, BUT, I did find the time to go on my annual haunted adventure. I drove 2.5 hours down to Ashland, VA to visit Red Vein Haunt. I think it was a solid 6/10 in terms of design and bang for your buck. By no means was it my favorite haunted experience. I think the crown for that still goes to the PennHurst Asylum in PA. Knowing the history of asylums in this country is scary enough, but imagine walking through one in the dark during October. I still get goosebumps thinking about it. 😳

Wait, What's Next?

I've been working on a couple of things, because I guess I can't sit still, and hopefully by the next time I slide into your inbox, I'll be able to share a bit more. Other than that, let me know what you want to hear from me. We're building this community together.

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Until next time, always remember to take up as much space as you need.