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The Space for Sistas™ Podcast is a weekly conversation with Dr. Dominique Pritchett, a licensed therapist, speaker and well-being consultant from Kenosha, Wisconsin and guests. We are a wellness podcast for Black women and teen girls who are ready to dream, decide and do what’s necessary to live well.This week it's Dr. Dominique jammin' solo! __________________________________________________________________________Let's stay connected! Is there a topic you’d like covered on the pod...
The Space for Sistas® Podcast is a weekly-ish chat with Dr. Dominique Pritchett and guests about all things health and wellness leaving you with actionable solutions to step into our most authentic selves.
Welcome to the space versus this
podcast.
We are a wellness podcast for
black women who are ready to
dream decide and do what's
necessary to live well.
I'm your host, Dr.
Dominique Pritchett.
And today it's me.
No guest.
Today.
I want to focus on.
Being a black woman who is.
One of the few or only one in
the room.
Our black women valued in spaces
where they are those few and the
only one.
This room can be a school.
Work.
And your neighborhoods.
At church or anywhere that you
do not feel like you can elevate
your voice.
Be seen, supported, and safe.
This has been observed,
discussed and discuss some more.
And experience for hundreds and
hundreds of years.
And I know I'm not alone.
When I express how heavy this
topic is.
Some hot topics that propel.
A black woman's stress level in
that situation.
They're overwhelmed there is a
shared responsibility to that
overwhelm because it's often
rooted in a traumatic response
perfectionistic.
Tendency or a desire to prove
yourself to people.
Some of the things that propel a
black woman's stress level in
these situations are comments
such as what is professionalism,
your hair, your attire, your
seemingly angry.
Too happy.
You are perceived as
intimidating and not in the most
positive way either.
She usually met with a negative
connotation.
These areas amongst many of
them.
Result in self-editing or code
switching.
Self-editing or coat switching.
As a protective mechanism, I've
done it.
I've witnessed black women may
find themselves doing those
things.
Because we like to tell
ourselves it is an attempt at
survival.
No, it is an attempt to not be
seen surviving these.
We want to get through it to not
be seen as, I don't want anybody
to take note that I'm here
because when people take notice
often painful.
I don't fault anybody for trying
to survive their situation.
Because everybody has different
cars to play in different lives
to live.
If we spend most of our time in
life, just surviving, we never
get to enjoy it.
So considering that black
women's emotions are being
monitored.
Micromanaged to happy.
Too sad.
To angry, not angry enough.
Didn't laugh enough, laughing
too much.
It doesn't matter.
Every step becomes calculated in
terms of how we respond or we
don't respond.
Oh, and if your assistant a
leadership Rome.
And there's a few of y'all and
you're, or you're the only one.
Don't be surprised if you're
mistaking for someone that is
not in a leadership role.
I want to be very clear.
This is not the ring shade to
those.
In supportive roles or those who
have not reached a point of
leadership roles.
I'm talking to a specific black
woman out there in a leadership
role.
Isn't that crazy that we.
Aren't offered the same level of
grace or the same level of
respect when we are sitting in
those rooms.
A lot of times I'm in the room
with being the only one.
One, a few.
Is so disheartening when someone
looks like you.
Y'all have had sidebar
conversations.
Don't advocate for you.
When they see your discomfort
rising and that's reciprocal.
It's so disheartening.
I truly believe that person is
operating from a place of fear,
uncertainty.
And not wanting the microscope
on them.
Those are the conversations I
like to have is how can we best
support each other while we're,
In that room.
I speak with purpose.
I like to add value.
But until we get apple bit soup
or we have so many followers
many of the places reef frequent
people don't take us serious,
but here's the thing, that's
their problem.
That's not yours.
Again, that ties directly back
to self-worth.
If you believe you deserve to be
there.
Or if you believe you, don't,
it's time to build your own
tables and stop asking to be
places where, you know, you
won't be safe.
I put some posts out there on
social media and I asked women
to comment about that scenario.
Many of them have said.
I'm willing to sacrifice myself
is if it'll get my people, what
they need.
Wow.
I'm willing to sit with the
stress to prevent a New employee
from going through it.
Wow.
So we sacrifice in our self now.
To be seen, heard, and
supported.
That is quite contradictory to
what we want to teach folks what
we want to mentor, what we want
to coach, what we want to
clinically offer people when he
come to our office.
We're done with that.
That's a definite declaration.
So the point of the matter is
that black women are often
passed up for promotions.
There is current data and
research that still shows this.
That is why I'm having this
conversation.
To acknowledge we are one of few
or the only one in a lot of the
rooms.
Pass over for promotions and not
being seen as vital.
Figures in the ecosystem at
work.
There is no wonder why there
have been an astronomical amount
of black women who have become
entrepreneurs or exploring the
world of entrepreneurship over
the past five to 10 years.
We're exhausted.
As I said, We gave people a lot
of power over us.
We know that.
If you don't know, I'm telling
you now, exhaustion, that
overwhelm that is giving people
power and permission over our
lives.
Well, pay me enough to have that
kind of control over my life.
So keep that in mind.
Of course these experiences are
not the same for every black
woman.
There are subcultures in the
black community itself cultures
with that.
Different industries.
See how it resonates with you,
but I just know I'm not alone.
Going along with some of the
challenges we've been taught to
play the game.
In order to survive, when there
are only few of us, this leads
to burnout.
This lease the bat energy.
This leads to beliefs that we
don't deserve the beat there.
I invite you to declare an act
on this declaration.
If you.
Don't feel good there.
Move around.
If you don't feel good there,
move around.
If absolutely possible.
I'm sure you've experienced.
What many people call
microaggressions?
Microaggressions are those
everyday slights insults put
downs.
Uh, dismissive attitudes and
offensive behaviors that people
experience on the daily.
As they interact with other
people.
Who may not be of the same
culture.
The same hierarchy.
And so many other differentials.
They're often attached with
isms, sexism, racism.
Age-ism.
They can be direct or indirect.
They can be done as solo
behaviors here, they're
infrequent or collective with
other aggressions.
Also those people can operate
solo or with other aggressors.
And an article called racial
microaggressions for everyday
life published in the American
psychologist.
A journal.
They identified racial
microaggressions as a brief and
commonplace.
Daily behavioral, verbal and
environmental indignities.
Here's my thoughts, whether
they're intentional or
unintentional.
They communicate hostile.
Behaviors.
Negativity.
Mostly directed towards people
of color.
It doesn't feel good.
Many people say, but people
don't know they're doing it.
I have a hard time believing
that part.
Were they state perpetrators?
Who do microaggressions are
often unaware.
That they engage in that level
of communication.
I have a hard time believing
that.
Am I alone on that?
Maybe this concept is just so
big that people aren't aware
when they are exerting their
privilege and power over someone
else for gain.
You hear the term narcissism,
uh, borderline and all of those
terms, you so loosely.
But a person practices, their
micro, aggressive, demeanor, and
demands.
That's a practice.
Because they've gotten away with
it for so long.
Especially when we are one of
few or the only one in the room.
So.
I want you to keep in mind,
microaggressions can come in
three forms.
Micro insults.
Micro assaults or micro
invalidations.
You hear the definition embedded
in the word.
So I'm not going to go into
that.
What's most interesting is that
none of these actually are micro
as they often leave a macro
impact in the sense that these
interactions influences a
person's entire system, their
entire life.
And ripples into their personal
and professional lives.
If you're a business person, an
entrepreneur, a parent, or
whoever.
Sit with.
What comes up for you after a
day of being in that fishbowl?
Or in a space where you have to
tone down your shine.
Ask the people around you, how
is that ripple is impacting
them.
Look at how it's impacting your
bottom line.
If you're working, a.
day-to-day job.
Then you're trying to be an
entrepreneur.
Look at how that's impacting
that.
Imagine to take back that power
and reinvest that power back
into your business.
What will you walk with a level
of confidence?
That is unshakeable.
We honor.
The days where we don't feel
well.
Well, we honor that.
If we took a deeper inventory of
how it's impacting our bottom
line.
Do you got attached stuff to a.
Let me attach it to something
that means a lot to you.
I'm gonna share a little bit of
history.
A little over a hundred years
ago, which ain't that long,
right?
The us Congress ratified the
19th amendment.
Basically it was ruled that
women could not be denied the
right to vote because of their
sex.
The 19th amendment y'all.
That was a deep one.
Especially for black women.
Who, despite the 15th amendments
promises of voting rights,
regardless of race, still could
not vote because of their
gender.
I think for a moment.
It took not one.
But two different constitutional
amendments to secure a black
woman's right.
To vote, to have a say.
In us democracy.
This was past a half a century
apart and magnifies the reality
that race and gender contain to
significantly impact women of
color.
Especially black women.
Leaving them to be one or few or
the only one in the room.
With certain jobs
responsibilities.
Remember honey years ain't that
long ago.
Black women continue to face
complexities and disadvantages
socially.
Occupationally economically.
Impacting their daily
functioning.
When we look at the data.
And the statistics of,
Counterparts compared to black
women.
Unfortunately.
We are leading in depression.
Anxiety.
Medical conditions.
We're still leading and people
got the nurse to tell me that it
doesn't impact her bottom line.
It doesn't impact how they show
up in their businesses in life.
Data doesn't lie unless the
there's a liar.
Who's reporting it.
So as I continue.
I want you to keep those things
in mind because it's not just a
showing up.
It is a historical.
It is a generational impact.
It's a ripple effect.
When I worked in corporate.
There.
We're separate rules.
Separate expectations.
Compared to my counterparts.
With this.
I knew I will be let go without
explanation.
Throughout my career.
I never had a black woman mentor
and the mental health industry.
Or in a leadership role.
Which I imagine was due to many
reasons.
Under-representation, there.
Less black women in medical,
especially stem, academia, law
enforcement, whatever that
reason was.
Not until I started my doctorate
and I had a black advisor and
dissertation chair.
When we are subjected to the
isms of the world, racism,
sexism, we have a double
barrier.
To that positions us.
To be exposed to other.
Aggressions such as sexual
violence, harassment.
Of the hundreds of women that I
have spoken to over the past 16
years being in the field.
In therapy sessions, speaking
engagements.
Critical incident response calls
to fortune 500 companies or mid
level companies, coaching
clients.
And even in my own circle.
They.
We share a common thing.
The world does not protect black
women.
And we often don't feel seen
supported or safe, especially
when it's outside of those
circles.
We're often held to a different
set of unspoken rules.
We are often voluntold to
spearhead DEI efforts.
Manage difficult clients that
look like us, or even be given
all the referrals for clients
that look like us.
Well, we're asking for a
variability, we're asking, to
consider our projects or
whatever.
When I was at that company.
I endured harassment.
Microaggressions, which I
consider macro.
When they let me go after.
Working there six years.
Leaving for three months, they
cleaned house and I went back
for one month.
They let me go.
Because one, they said they
couldn't afford me.
Then they said, I wasn't a team
player.
Then they said, people didn't
feel comfortable around me.
Then they just said I was
outright intimidating.
Whether I say it things or
whether I didn't say things.
When multiple black women over
the years from that company
would reach out to me and ask me
my experience.
I was honest.
Within a short duration of
being, let go from that, that
company.
I settled a lawsuit.
For discrimination.
And harassment.
I didn't know my rights then,
but one thing I did from day
one, I say, Okay, take it in all
my observations.
I kept a thorough journal of
every encounter at every micro
mezzo and macro example of
aggression.
Put downs, whatever.
I kept a journal.
Who I spoke to who I followed up
an email about my feelings, the
meetings, they had, the write
ups they did up me and I wasn't
even made aware of them.
When that time came, where I was
ready to amplify my voice,
because I had other options.
That lawsuit was easy.
It was emotionally painful.
But I had everything I needed.
I want you to keep that in mind,
as you are in these spaces.
Do your due diligence of taking
note?
Going to your therapy
appointments, do what you have
to do.
To stay emotionally intact.
It is time you stop sacrificing
yourself for everyone it's time
to stop depending on others to
affirm your worth.
You are worthy in every room.
Home.
Community work.
Where you are one of few or the
only one.
It's been time to secure what's
necessary for you to exist in
those spaces without fear.
So, how do we do this?
By giving ourselves grace.
I recently had was at a speaking
engagement where the theme was
grit and grace.
And I delivered a message using
the acronym, grace.
Give yourself permission to be
so damn human.
Make human mistakes.
Take human chances.
Identify realistic ways to shift
unproductive thinking.
Well, I should just keep my
voice quiet.
I should just play the game.
Why should you.
You were not put on this earth.
To damn your light.
You have a birthright to
abundance.
But that abundance and the gifts
you receive, it requires you to
step out on faith.
To challenge the status quo.
And to protect yourself.
Assess the narratives impacting
the bottom line.
The bottom line can be your bank
account.
Your emotional health, your
physical health.
Assess those narratives.
A lot of the times the
narratives, aren't what we truly
believe is what we've been told
all these years.
We have not either identified or
we are afraid.
To do it differently.
The cognitions redefine those
Scott's.
We got to redefine the thoughts.
What the, what we're telling
ourselves.
And lastly.
Elevate your opportunities.
If you are in this position, I
talked about some heavy stuff of
how it's impacting black women.
I want to leave you with you.
We are in a unique position when
we are one of few or the only
one in a room.
Identify how to maximize it,
identify how to find your
allies.
As you elevate your
opportunities In this position.
Plan.
And execute when you want to
pivot, which can happen both at
the same time.
If that's not the place for you
anymore.
Anymore.
Thank you so much for listening,
please subscribe, download, and
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