Above phote by Felicia Buitenwerf on Unsplash
My wife sent the article "Dear Black Women" (which you can access by clicking on this hyperlinked text) to me today. The article is written by A'ja Wilson--star of the WNBA's Las Vegas Aces and former star of the USC Women's Basketball Team. This might surprise some of you but I'm not a Black woman. Yet, there are a number of things Ms. Wilson describes in this article reflecting on her own mental health that I can relate to: the drone of my internal monologue telling me I'm not enough; anxiety; wearing masks; striving to be authentic; fear of others judging me because of my mental health issues. There are lessons for us all here.
And, Ms. Wilson's descriptions of racial discrimination that she describes are important for white folks to be mindful of. I read something recently by a Black writer who said that they often hear from white friends that they "can't imagine what it's like to be Black" or "can't imagine what it's like to be treated differently because of your race" to which the writer's response is: try. Try to walk in the shoes of African Americans past and present to view the American experience from their perspective.
This article is also important because the stigma around mental illness seems to be much more entrenched among African Americans than among white Americans. Thus, anything that can lessen the stigma around mental health--especially for my African American students whose parents have told them that mental illness is a "white problem"--Ms. Wilson offers us significant wisdom and hope.