Thoughtful reflections on anxiety, Black parenting and beauty
The influence of media beauty standards often begins quietly. There’s a moment most of us have had, standing in front of a mirror, doing the maths. Comparing. Measuring something against a version of ourselves that doesn’t actually exist anywhere, except
There’s a particular kind of tired that doesn’t come from your own life. You didn’t lose anyone. You weren’t there. And yet you scroll through the news, and something in your chest tightens anyway. You close the app, then open
There’s a version of this conversation where I tell you that Eurocentric Beauty Standards are unfair, you nod, and we both move on with our day. That’s not the conversation I want to have. I want to talk about the
You know the feeling. Your child comes home and says something small. A comment from a teacher. A rule that seems to only catch them. A hairstyle being questioned or sent to the office. On its own, none of it
These gendered parenting fears often remain unspoken, but they shape the way parents understand safety, risk, and protection differently for sons and daughters. Sit in enough case reviews, enough strategy meetings, enough kitchens where a parent is trying to explain
There’s a version of anxiety triggers and emotional reactions that gets talked about a lot: crowded rooms, loud noises, certain smells that pull you straight back to somewhere you didn’t want to go. Those are real, and they matter. But
There’s a version of your body that some part of the world, at some point in history, would have called perfect. You’ve probably never met her. She keeps changing shape. That’s the quiet tension underneath most of what women are
Most articles about anxiety are written for the version that feels manageable: the pre-exam nerves, the mild flutter before a big meeting, or the moment of uncertainty before something important. The usual advice is familiar: breathe deeply, go for a
Black Teen Safety often begins with a quiet calculation that happens in the mind of almost every Black parent, guardian, aunt, uncle or big cousin who’s raising a teenager. It’s small. It passes in a second. Your child says they’re
Relational Trauma Recovery begins with understanding the exhaustion that comes from being close to someone while still feeling the need to protect yourself. It is a particular kind of tired that comes from bracing for something to go wrong, not
Look at the Black men in your life. Their hair grows thick, coiled and healthy, largely left alone. Then look at your own hairline, or what’s left of it. Something in you knows the comparison isn’t fair. You make it
There’s a phrase that gets passed down before anyone properly explains it. Sell out. You hear it long before you understand it. Somebody’s cousin gets a fancy job and changes how they talk on the phone. Somebody’s neighbour moves to
At some point in your parenting journey, you might start to notice something. The questions you’re turning over — how do I raise a child who knows their own worth? How do I help them bounce back when things get
There’s a version of getting better from anxiety that gets talked about a lot. The one where you do the work, find the right therapist, take the right steps, and then one day you wake up and you’re better. Lighter.
There’s a conversation that happens in a lot of households — often quietly, sometimes loudly — that goes something like this. It sits at the heart of what many experts now call generational parenting: the way beliefs, habits and experiences
There’s a particular silence that falls when a parent tells someone from an older Caribbean generation that you don’t smack your children. It isn’t always hostile. Sometimes it’s just weighted. A whole worldview compressed into a pause. In many ways,
There might come a moment, as a mother, where you catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror and don’t quite recognise the woman looking back in this struggle of motherhood vs sexual identity. Not because you look terrible. But
At some point, without anyone asking your opinion, a decision was made. A decision shaped by beauty standards about what a woman’s body should look like. How much space it should take up. Where it should be narrow, where it
