Imperfect Allyship and Trauma

Symptoms:

✊🏻It’s like a constant state of put your head down and keep moving forward fighting for what is right, but at the same time, constantly feeling physically sick to your stomach.
✊🏻Your body is so confused. Sleep is weird, your stomach is angry, you are a strange form of outrage, despair, and you know deep feelings of trauma are there, but your body is in it, you can’t function normally, and you can’t deal with those right now because you have more important things to do. Like fight for black people’s right to be ALIVE.

Truth:

It’s not about us. With the full knowledge black people have had to fight alone for generations; be an ally. For those of you who are white you are probably just now realizing black people have had recurring, oppressive trauma their entire lives, and generations before them. This is not new to them. It’s not JUST their trauma, it’s GENERATIONAL trauma. It is time for you to put your ego aside ( been there, more on that later) and learn. Grow. You can read a book. Listen to podcasts with voices who differ from your viewpoint or experience. Ego is a refusal to grow. Ego is a refusal to admit wrong. Put your Ego aside and learn to do better. Do better. Grow.

Embarrassed To Say, Been There:

Yikes: Up until I was 19/20 years old, I was a walking talking point of race and economic knowledge. I repeated only phrases I’d been told to believe or heard on the news. I had no depth of understanding on the topics, I only knew, mainly Republican, talking points. Deep in my empathetic heart I knew I disagreed, but I people pleased my way through politics and social issues. I regret that to this day and will work the rest of my life trying to do better.

Fast forward: As a freshman in college living in a city (Chicago) for the first time in my life; I learned I was the definition of sheltered, naive Catholic school girl. Think of believing you are blind only to be told that you can open your eyelids and see. That was me. Unfortunately along the way, I’m pretty sure I hurt a lot of people with my ignorance. And my naive baby heart held so tight for so long until I was ready to put my ego aside and do better. From race to social issues I learned life by meeting so many beautiful people different from me and taking college courses on sociology and psychology.

These experiences brought me slowly, but surely to the conclusion that what I had parroted my whole life was so wrong. And, man, is that a humbling experience. AND Learning I was wrong was the best experience of my life. Life changing. I learned better, so I did better (Thank you Dr. Maya Angelou). Turns out, in college classes opinions don’t count as facts and facts have to be proven by unbiased sources and research. (“Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.” -unknown.) I had my heart all along, it was just too blinded by ego and talking points to grow in education and knowledge. I’m not proud of that. But that journey made me.

If you are arriving to the party this late: admit you were wrong. Admit you’re learning to do better. True integrity is admitting you were wrong, and changing.

If you, like me, are currently in a state of trauma, chronic stress, and at times, despair for the world: there needs to be time to recharge. BUT Let your only fuel be fighting for the rights of those who don’t have them. Full stop. Not because it’s trendy. Not because others see you checking your fight against racism box. Not because you feel like if you don’t do anything it’s embarrassing. Not because you feel guilty. Only from a selfless, just fight for the equity of those you know and those you don’t. From that fuel, and that fuel only, recharge and take care of you. Let it open your eyes to the many reasons we need to continue to learn to do better. Let it open your eyes to WHY protests and MASSIVE structural changes are not just necessary, but life and death for black people.

These feelings are so complex. I don’t begin to pretend to say it well. I’m imperfect in my allyship. But I continue to strive for learning. Striving to be the best ally everyone else deserves. If you’re feeling this way, congratulations, you have a heart who feels deeply for others and is brave enough to use it. I’m with you, gosh dammit it’s f*^#+*} hard. But I know we won’t regret being unabashedly ourselves. Being unashamed in the pursuit of bettering ourselves as allies. Unashamed at bettering the world for others. And unabashedly talking and questioning in hopes of changing the hearts of those too scared to learn, change, & do better for people they don’t know.

Stop It With The Blue Lives: It’s Not About You.

Fixed it. As someone who works in social media, the original of the photo below is so deeply troubling that I will not even post it for reference. I edited this one because it can be used to inform others to do better.

The original also breaks flag code, but I digress. The Deep Problems with this are:
1.)The very deliberate changing of the colors of the original to be blue (fun fact police officers DON’T actually have blue skin)
2.) The small font size mentioning victims and bad cops in comparison to…
3.) The big font size focusing on “good” cops.
4.) The privileged defensive language (I can and will).
5.) The putting of victim and bad cops on the same level, in the same font size, in the same font. Beyond cringeworthy.

Apply it to your life:
Let’s say someone’s child tragically died of an illness. They’re giving a eulogy about what that child meant to them, what their life meant to them, and someone takes the microphone, with a perfectly healthy child and yells ,”MY CHILD MATTERS,” in their face. How would you feel? How would they feel? That’s what the ‘blue lives matter’ does to every person of color every single day.

All cops are not bad. But it’s not about them. It’s not about you. Policing needs to change because innocent people are being killed; innocent people who look nothing like me. If you are a cop, and you allow your people to kill people or harm minorities because of race; you TOO are a bad cop. And every person who makes excuses for people being innocently harmed, profiled, or worse, killed are just as guilty.
If your family member was killed for being a woman by a man; would someone scream in your face “MEN’S LIVES MATTER!!!!!!”? Unfortunately in today’s world, maybe, but everyone around them would see they’re wrong and stand up for you.

Race shouldn’t be different. No one doubts police lives matter. The difference is police aren’t killed for who they are, for being born, they CHOSE to be a police officer. Of course no one deserves to be killed. And that’s EXACTLY the point! Black people didn’t choose to be born into a racist society hellbent on their oppression; YET they are killed for existing with skin.
I know people who have cops in their family have good intentions and real concerns for the safety for their family members, as they choose to do a very risky job.

What you need to realize is this: for hundreds of years people of color have had their slaughter, lynching, raping, & genocide excused, as blue lives matter unintentionally does. You should never say blue lives matter, not because police officer’s lives don’t matter, of course they do, but you should never say it because that is you signing your name and legacy to a system excusing the mass genocide of people of color for being born and having skin.
. . .
For the sake of my friends, some who have become family, my nearest and dearest, and those who I don’t know, I will not allow anyone posting any blue lives matter comments on my posts or page. People of color are humans who deserve to live. Full stop. They deserve to be spared from the retraumatization of seeing this blue lives nonsense. Not on my page.

The Flag Day I Celebrate

Especially after watching certain news channels I’ve been nauseated with the sentimental feelings given to the Confederate flag. Flag Day is to celebrate the American flag; made by Betsy Ross. The American flag is one of unity. A little history session: The Confederates were anti-America; not prideful of ‘Merica. They wanted to break away from America. They were perfectly happy raping, torturing, and abusing slaves because it made their lives comfortable and easy. In recent history, the Confederate flag has been defended by the southern states, domestic terrorists such as the White Supremacists (far right) and the KKK, and the Republican party. It is obvious as day that this is not respectable company for the Republican party to be in. Their reasoning is “The Civil War, is part of history.” Using this reasoning one could say, “A Nazi flag should be flown in Germany because it is “part of their history.” Last I checked, the Germans are not very proud (rightfully so) of the Nazi’s causing the Holocaust. It is part of history, but not history our country should be proud of. A history of betraying our own country, and the torture, rape, abuse, and terror of innocent people is not one to celebrate.

With that background in mind, on flag day I celebrate the American flag as one of unity. The American flag represents freedom and all who long for it. I celebrate the people who risk their lives for people’s right to be free in this country. I celebrate the fortunate people who speak out for the less fortunate in society. I celebrate the the immigrants working 2-3 jobs to support their families and give their children a better life. I celebrate the teacher who teaches her students inclusivity instead of exclusivity. I celebrate the child at school who sits with the immigrant child during lunchtime regardless of the risk. I celebrate the mothers and fathers working hard so their children can go to college. I celebrate those who do not judge those different from them, but learn about them to promote unity. I celebrate the people who show love and acceptance regardless of when it is socially acceptable. I celebrate the spouses and families of the soldiers because they sacrifice their having most loved ones around for the common good. I celebrate the single mom on welfare who is working 2-3 jobs to feed her children. I celebrate those who fight for equality of all people gay, straight, black, white, and other.

The America I know, and miss desperately in the last year, is one based on goodness, freedom, unity, and equality. I celebrate THAT America. NOT Nationalism, division, or racism. I celebrate the good Americans who do not divide, hate, and sabotage. Regardless of the hateful, divisive, and racist rhetoric of our President; we all must continue to celebrate and be the true American goodness and unity that our flag represents.

The Purpose of a Wedding

Here we are wedding planning; 6 months to go until our wedding and 9 months post engagement. My family had a running joke I had my wedding planned since I was twelve, I just had to find a guy. Im so blessed I did; and an amazing one at that, Jack Mikolajczyk. Little did we know when we entered into this wonderful, crazy engagement and wedding planning process how many people to whom we would have to explain the purpose of our wedding; us getting married and starting our married life together. Not: having an expensive party, inviting every person we’ve ever met, centering a giant party around 200+ people’s opinions, getting drunk, or eating a lot of food. A wedding is about the engaged couple getting married. Simple right? wrong.

In a perfect world, it would be that simple. People would be happy for the engaged couple and be there to share in their joy. They would be at the wedding with no strings attached; just to be there for them, but it’s not that easy. We live in a “ME” culture, ‘I want what I want so I have to manipulate you to get it so I can make myself happy.’ This “ME” culture is anti-what we want in our marriage. When two people get married they become one. They protect, love, and sacrifice for each other. These three things are the priority of our relationship and as of October 21, 2017 will be the priority of this crazy adventure called marriage.

We did not begin our relationship thinking, ‘What is everyone else’s opinion of how we should relationship? How will we relationship without asking everyone we know for their opinion? What ever will we do?!’ We began our relationship having a lot of fun together, caring about each other and put the thoughts, needs, and wants of our partner’s over our own; it was pretty easy. If our relationship is based from that; why would we not be able to have our wedding based from that? The real answer is there is no good reason it couldn’t be. In our relationship only the two of us get a vote. Our vote is for our wedding to be reflective around our relationship, based around the two of us, our love, and a whole lot of fun. We’ve surprisingly gotten a lot of flack for that, and a whole lot of people who want votes, but if a wedding is not based on the love of the engaged couple; it’s just an obscenely expensive party with no love. We don’t want a party; we want a fun, happy, loving, strong marriage.

My Health

As a performer, without a healthy body I cannot do my job. You only have one body, so I’ve adapted to the mindset I would rather spend more on healthy food now than medical bills later, but it wasn’t always like that. In the winter of 2015-16 I was very sick. I constantly had something: a sinus infection, bronchitis, stomach issues, or exhaustion. After many a visit with both my primary care physician, gastroenterologist, a friend of mine who is a Certified Naturopath, and several failed attempts to get better with antibiotics and other medications; I decided to cut gluten out of my diet. There was a good chance already I was allergic to it, but after all the medical tests I’d gone through I did not want another one so we decided on an elimination diet to see if it would help.

It took a good 2+ months to completely detox from gluten, but the difference was night and day. My skin was better, my digestive issues were non-existant and I’ve yet to be sick unless I accidentally ate gluten aside from the yearly cold! Every body is different and everyone has a different gut and genetic makeup; however this truly was my magic wand. To this day I am an avid believer in the combination of natural medicine to fix the CAUSE of health woes. I’ve started by trying to eat mostly real food: vegetables, less meat, no pork, and substituting wheat for natural rice, quinoa, and corn substitutes. Conventional medicine still has its place in medical tests that can detect problems that already exist, however I’m healthier for focusing on the ways natural medicine can PREVENT health issues.

I am naturally a thin person, but I did not realize how much extra, unhealthy weight gluten had bloated me with until I cut it out and lost almost 20 lbs. Cutting gluten is NOT a diet. It is a health choice that has to work with your body’s chemistry and makeup. I made sure in cutting gluten that I still ate enough fiber and carbs to stay at a healthy weight. Without the natural approach I would still be sick as a dog and would never feel this amazing! Please know: Cutting gluten alone will not make you healthy. There are gluten free cookies, cakes, ice creams, peanut butter cups, candy, and alcoholic drinks, but simply because they’re gluten free does not mean they are healthy. The only thing I really miss is New York Italian bread! It is so tempting to cave when I’m in New York, but I haven’t! I’ve put the links below to my favorite wheat substitutes so I do not feel deprived!

Bagels and Bread:

Gluten Free Pasta:

Easy Side Dishes:

http://www.naturopathic.org/content.asp?contentid=59

The Election- the hypocracy

I am ashamed of our country. Before you explode in attacks calling me unpatriotic, read more…

I was raised to be kind. To put myself in others’ shoes. I was raised conservative and Catholic (meaning whole, or one). My mind is boggled that a country with so many brilliant thinkers elected such a hateful, lying, narcissistic, celebrity to the greatest office in the land. Donald Trump mocked a man with a disability, as a presidential candidate he told people to ,”Go F%$& themselves,” into a microphone, incited violence, said he can just,”Grab them [women] by the pussy” (YUP, I quoted what he said! NEWS FLASH: That is sexual assault!), for over twenty years he has been accused of sexually assaulting women, he is accused of raping a thirteen year old child (girl) in the 90’s, is friends with Epstein (I will not dignify him by saying his first name) who is also connected to that rape case and is a sex offender, and last but not least, he disgraces the responsibility of the presidency by telling downright lies and will not admit being wrong despite being disproved by FACTS. This is dangerous.

Donald Trump claims to be pro-life, but he barred middle-eastern and Muslim refugees from entering our country putting them in worse danger of being murdered (including children), doesn’t support sexual education preventing unwanted pregnancy and sexual abuse, is against lowering healthcare costs and reform for women, wants to do away with Obamacare (which hurts our veterans healthcare), and is against Medicaid and government assistance for the poor and vulnerable.

This is only the beginning of a scary four years and in one week this all has happened and then some. My goal is to not change anyone’s mind. My goal is to point out the hypocrisy on BOTH sides! My goal is to have a creative outlet to share my perspective as a woman, artist, and advocate in a time of hate, lies, and bigotry. There are exceptions to every rule, however the less we point out our own faults and the faults in our country’s elected officials the more we contribute to the maltreatment of least off in our society.

To close, a quote by Eli Weisel, a Jewish Holocaust survivor, writer, and activist:

“We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.” -Eli Weisel

Informed Artist