Shedding Societal Expectations: The Black Immersive Mother Edition

There is no doubt- and so far no end in sight - of the looming societal expectations of mothers. Women and nonmen have always had extra and often contradictory hoops to jump through just to seem slightly good enough on the tiers of white expectations. Add on top of that motherhood and you've entered a whole other arena where the game is rigged YET AGAIN. At some point, and excuse my language, we gotta say FUCK IT and enoughs enough. As your neighborhood immersive perfectionist, I have firsthand experience in combating my own consistently growing parental standards, so I certainly don't have time to navigate these backward, often white supremacy laced criteria society continues to throw my way as a Black mama.

It's long since been discovered that white supremacy has affected every aspect of the Black experience, even the mothering experience. We have to consider more layers when raising our children. The extra steps can make us overly critical of ourselves and thus resulting in a fluctuation in ego when it comes to parenting. In the end, that societal criticism makes us more strict on our children for fear of how we and they will be viewed. It's a cycle that can bog us down and perform a harsh character assassination if we aren't careful. I am not going to front like being apathetic toward societies views of motherhood isn't a privilege, but I be damned if I'm not going to be honest in saying

ITS A PRIVILEGE THAT WE DESERVE ABOVE EVERYTHING.

The book Revolutionary Mothering by Mai'a Williams and Loretta Ross has completely shattered my world (in a good way) and stirred up some beautiful thoughts.

1- Simply having our children is the ultimate act of resistance because society didn't/ doesn't want more Black lives.

2 Mothering our children the way we, and they deserve is radical abolition in its own right.

3 Black mothership is immersive to the point it consumes us because society has made it that way. It can be immersive but not consuming.

The expectations of Black women as mothers has lead to an influx of authoritarian and punitive parenting style. I see Black mothers everyone revolutionizing to change this narrative. We are healing and breaking generational curses so as to fight colonizations affects on our children and parenting. The super woman trope has led to lack of self care and burnout among Black mothers. Again it's okay to be immersed, but don't get consumed. This right here is as much for you as it is me: It's okay to want space from your children, ITS OKAY TO CHOOSE YOU. My favorite saying is "you cant pour from an empty cup". If your cup is empty what are you going to pour into your children?

So end game question is what? Okay I get it. I believe you. Society IS overbearing on Black mothers and colonization bleeds into our parenting. You recognize it now how are we to fix it? In no particular order there are some things you can 100% begin doing to stick it to society and start living wild, free and Blackity Black.

1. Recognize your childhood trauma and Identify your adopted generational curses.
2. Do the work to unpack childhood trauma and break generational curses. So you did the first step you were mindful and identified the problem let's unpack it and begin fixing it. For some this looks like therapy with a professional, for other sit could be just recognizing and just doing things differently. Your journey to unpack won't be uniform and that's okay. As long as you are mindful and doing the work for your sake and your children's.
3. Always be open to accountability and learning. This is a process. This isn't a oh there I fixed it type thing AT ALL. This ain't a quick fix. This is THE LONG HAUL. Babydoll if the revolution was easy everybody would do it.
4. Manifest differently for your children. You've unpacked and now it's time to manifest through actions and words differently for your children. This can look like not raising your children under the white thumb (easier said than done I know), not allowing respectability politics to guide how they behave in private and public, allowing room for age appropriate developmental behavior without wanting to react punitively. It looks like wild and free children who get to be just that without the extra scrutiny from society and you as a parent.

At the end of the day. Sticking it to society through revolutionary mothering and self work isn't easy. It's a consistent, rough, and mindful journey, but it's a beautiful one. It's one you want to take. For yourself, for your children and for your children's children. Black mothering is immersive and revolutionary and rightfully so.