I sat behind my computer screen nearly 10 hours on Saturday and again on Sunday, barely glancing up to look my five year old daughter and two year old son in the face. On Sunday evening I learned about the terrible news of Chelsie Kyrst. Like most of us, my immediate response was immense shock and sadness as I silently cited along with everyone else, “You never know what a person is going through.” I discussed the tragic news with my mom and twin, two of the strongest women I know. We shared our own dismay. Then we got off the phone, I picked up my laptop, and started working again.

            Like many Black women, a strong work ethic was embedded in me early on. I was socialized to fully understand that if I wanted any inkling of success, I had to be twice as good as them. “Them” meaning, those whose skin was several shades lighter than mine. I worked hard because I knew no one else was going to open the door for me. I had to open it for myself.

            Along with learning the rudimentary lessons of grade school, Black children learn two silent lessons that are never written on a teacher’s whiteboard, and yet they are inscribed in the very movement of their daily life: self-efficacy and resilience. Both concepts emerge out of an awareness of one’s personhood and can be psychosocial measures of wellbeing. Self-efficacy is the idea that you are able to perceive or sustain a sense of control and competency over one’s situation, despite the obstacles that you might face. The more popular, trending idea of resilience speaks to one’s ability to essentially “bounce back” despite difficult events one might face. Our society is fascinated by the positive effects of resiliency (rightfully so!), but very few want to consider how chronic resilience can correlate with negative outcomes.

            Some recent findings suggest that while African Americans tend to have higher levels of resilience, these do not necessarily have the effect of countering unfavorable physiological outcomes. In fact, an overutilization of resilience can have the adverse effect of being associated with poorer health outcomes, including neurocognitive impairment in later life (Nkwata et al., 2021). However, perhaps the most alarming aspect of resilience and self-efficacy as a Black woman and particularly as a Black parent, is that it causes us to lose sight of what lies underneath.

            When you live in a world where discrimination is frequent, social determinants of health are not just pretty words, and hypervigilance for your safety and your loved ones is a daily struggle, you develop what I imagine to be “tunneled resilience.” This is the idea that you essentially take on a “tunnel vision” perspective to life, in light of your own exposures to various risks, including prejudice, socioeconomic loss, and lately, trauma. Perhaps you throw yourself fully into your goals of personal achievement and other forms of self-efficacy to cope with the struggles around you. Or maybe you lean into what makes you strong, because to bend the other way means bending towards a world that is not willing to bend back towards you. That is, a world that is not willing to “bounce back,” with you, but continuously expects you to be the one to be flexible to adversity, withstanding the bias against you with an expectation that it makes you stronger, resilient, and dare I say, fascinating. Folks have always been fascinated with Black women’s ability to push against every shitty thing thrown our way. But I hope this is a gentle reminder, that you have a right to not be resilient. Full stop. Resiliency is not a privilege. Resiliency is a badge earned from a life that is often patterned by injustice. And while there are benefits, for those of us who must practice chronic resilience, we should not look at it as something to simply aspire to, but rather as something that should spark collective conversation and change.

It wasn’t until Monday afternoon that I really put my computer down. My professor had let us out of class early and I quickly thought through my “to-do” list of what I could accomplish in my new “free time.” As I walked to the car, I realized that I had fused productivity with an unhealthy form of coping with the parts of life that I did not want to fully face as a Black woman. When I worked, I didn’t have to face how truly unfortunate the world can be for us. I immediately thought of my daughter, a young Black woman who I hadn’t looked at much this past weekend. And even in that, in a lack of undivided parental attention, she was starting to cultivate resilience. I changed my to-do list to reflect her. I picked her up early from school, drove to sonic (we’ll talk about healthy food choices another time) and ordered us a large order of mozzarella sticks with our favorite sonic drinks. As she pulled the hot cheese apart and giggled, I said, “Mommy picked you up early today, did you notice?” “Yes,” she said. “I wanted to say I’m sorry for not spending as much time with you this weekend as I should have. I know I was on my laptop a lot.” 

Like most five year old’s, it seemed like the apology went in one ear and out the other as she continued to smile and eat her mozzarella sticks. I asked her what her favorite thing about school was, to which she answered, “Being outside.” Then she surprised me and said, “What’s your favorite thing about school, Mommy?” It took me awhile to actually think of a response, but with her innocent invitation, I had a moment to reflect on what brings me joy, not what makes me strong or productive. 

There is no quick fix to chronic resilience. It really starts with reimagining resilience through a lens of social justice. But at least for today, I briefly felt free of the barricade of chronic resilience because even though the world doesn’t bend towards us in black and brown communities, I was able to bend towards a daughter who was able to bend towards me. And I hope she grows up knowing that she is free to choose resilience only when it is right for her, and neglect resilience when it demands too much out of her and too little out of the world around her.