I think that it is very hard to know where or even what our next step is when we #LeaveLOUD. Many of us find ourselves wandering in the wilderness; the space between our previous spiritual community and our next church home. Leaving an unhealthy church and entering into the wilderness gives a sense of freedom, […]
Read the Introduction, Part Two, and Part Three. During my fifth pregnancy, I contracted a rare infectious disease that made it necessary for me to abandon my plans for giving birth with a midwife at a birthing center and to find a doctor who would take me at seven months pregnant. You would think that […]
Read the Introduction and Part 2. For my first three pregnancies, I had the luxury of receiving care from a Black OB/GYN. My family relocated toward the end of my fourth pregnancy, which resulted in a struggle to find a care provider. Most of the practices that I contacted would not take me because I […]
According to the National Institute of Health, severe maternal morbidity (SMM) rates have nearly doubled over the past decade. The incidence of SMM was 166% higher for Black women than white women from 2012 to 2015. To be clear, it is racism—not race—that impacts prenatal care and maternal outcomes. This post is part of a […]
Black Maternal Health Week is April 11-17 each year. Advocacy for Black maternal health should be a regular part of our advocacy work and not just during this designated time. The purpose of Black Maternal Health Week is to bring awareness to the systemic disparities stacked against Black women, center the voices and experience of […]
I’ve been wrestling with something that I wish I would have done better a few years ago. I was in a season where I was trying to find a church after suffering through racial trauma and spiritual abuse in a white evangelical church. The problem is that I was searching for a new church without […]
I know that Tessica’s story is fading from the headlines and that there isn’t as much discussion about her as there was a month ago, but the story of how Black women are treated in society isn’t new. The inability to treat warmly, show regard for, or show tenderness to the very Black women who […]
I’m a daughter of Virginia. Most of my ancestors migrated to Virginia from the Carolinas during the late 1800s and early 1900s to escape what they referred to as “country life,” which entailed sharecropping. In other words: economic slavery. They came to port cities like Norfolk to seek a better life than what they had. […]
