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DCMJ unsilenced is a podcast produced by Don't Call Me Josephine - a nonprofit for health equity. We seek to raise awareness about and test solutions to the social factors that impact health outcomes. This podcast is a component of community-informed programming referred to as "Respecting Voice".
Don't Call Me Josephine
is a non-profit for health equity.
We go by DCMJ for short,
and are cautiously unsilencing about the
social factors that impactwell-being.
We recognize the importance of respect,
starting with a name.
My name is Keri Pinna, and I'll be your
host for today on DCMJ unsilenced,
where we raise awareness about, and test
solutions to the social problems that
impact behavioral health.
Behavioral health, for our purposes,
addresses the combination of mental
health and addictions.
Mental health and addictions often
coexist. For example, I work a lot with
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD.
Those who struggle with PTSD usually
also struggle with depression, and
it's also common to seethe same folks
depending on food, substance use,
gambling, gaming, shopping, and even sex
to help regulate the difficult emotions
that come with PTSD and clinical
depression.
These are just a few ways that mental
illness and addiction show up in the
world of behavioral health. Today,
we'll be talking about the role of
sisterhood and safety in maintaining and
promoting behavioral health, versus
illness. Relationships that make up a
sisterhood are among the strongest
predictors of how well we do in the face
of adversity
that often rises to the level of being
traumatic.
I'm joined by a friend and colleague
who's been having these conversations
with us for a little while now. Rena,
would you like to introduce yourself?
Tell us a bit about
who you are and how we know each other?
Yes, my name is Rena Zapata,
and I know Keri
throughIn Progress. We
were connected through here, and then we
moved into the circle space
at UMC.
I forget what that was called. Yeah, we
talked about calling it Respecting Voice.
There were
safety circles, and then the overall
programming.
What else would you like our listeners to
know about about you?
So a little bit about me and my role
here - I am the
coordinator. I am
the promoter. I'm the voice.
I'm the face. I kind of do it
all here. I set up all
the programming with Kris. We talk
about what we want to bring here to the
studio. And then, so...
our off season, I am just in the
community like, "Hey, what kind of stuff
would you like to see at, you know,
Studio 110?" and tell them what we're all
about here, and what we offer.
...demonstrate a class and how to... so
that these these young artists
can get the skills that they need to
succeed in whatever their craft is.
So, you're... you're really kind of
listening to the community voices,
engaging communityartists' voices and...
Yeah, just kind of their background
stories, who they are as people, where
they come from, and just their hardships,
their come ups, everything...
You've learned the origin story behind
Don't Call Me Josephine.
You know that we use that as a way to
guide our approach torespect...
...the thing that we see as
most important in maintaining behavioral
health. We talk about starting
respect with a name.
So, basically we ask each of our guests
what names not to call them.
And then we like to explore
what are people's preferred names. So,
for example, for me, I ask men in
particular not to call me the B word,
and I prefer everyone else not to call me
Miss. The why for the B word is pretty
obvious, and the why for Miss is that
it's a gendered title that poses a lot of
problems for a lot of women.
I prefer to keep it humble with first
names, so most people just call me Keri,
but it is nice when former students and
colleagues call me Dr. Pinna because I
earn that title. What really gets me
though,
is when I get kids calling me titi -
auntie.
One thing that does top it is when my son
calls me mom. How about for you, Rena?
Will you tell us,
our listeners, a little bit about what
names not to call you?
What you prefer most people to call
you, instead, and which names make you
feel extra special? For sure.
So don't call me crazy.
It's kind of self-explanatory. I
have a very active brain
and sometimes I kind of just go with
what's there. We know that.
Sometimes it takes a little bit for me
to, you know, come back down into the
real world and, you know, focus. But I
know what's going on...
most of the time, but...
You can call me a
thinker. You could
call me
a friend.
I like it when my kids call me Mommy,
because some of them
are about to be an adult.
I have a preteen. I have a
toddler and I have an infant, so
I especially love the word... the name
Mommy, because
the bigger they get, it's "mom", "ma",
"bra", you know.
And Mommy is...
they need me. They need their mommy. So
calling me mommy, that's... that's the
one that just melts me.
It doesn't matter how angry I am, or how busy I am...
And my second favorite name to be called
is is Tia - Auntie.
That kind of goes hand in hand with
Mommy. Yeah. You know, we're a very close
family. We we grew up doing everything
together. We... We still get
together quite often for suppers,
just hanging out, everything.
So yeah, Auntie is my second
favorite...
What role would you say that sisterhood
plays in
the parts of your identity that are
wrapped up in those names?
Mommy, Mom, Ma, Bra,
Tia... The sisterhood
is important because I really feel it
takes a village
to to raise a family, not just kids, but
your family. You know, whether you have
kids, you have fur babies, you you have
neither and you have your... just you
and your partner, that's still a family,
you know. And and I feel that the
sisterhood of it brings in so many
different people on their walks of life
and their journey and what they've been
through. And so the input from different
people that are close to you, that
that have the best well-being for
you... It's a safety net. It's
it's a resource. It's it's a...
family in its own that you can... connect
with, and and get tips on and
you know, just kind of talk about the
things that you've gone through,
or the things that you're currently going
through or maybe offer some advice
because you've been through something
that somebody else is talking about. So I
feel like it's a bond that,
without it, I mean... I don't
think we would be this far
in evolution.
Can you give us one or two examples of
ways that sisterhood has shown up in your
life to help promote your well-being? Oh,
for sure. So my own sister,
she's been my Mama bear my whole life.
I've gone to her for
everything, for all the questions,
just need to yell or scream or
vent, she... She listens
without judgment. She offers
advice. She comforts me.
She cries with me. We laugh. We, you
know, she
helps me, like, think... logically,
because I'm just impulsive sometimes...
A lot of times. I'm not even going to
say sometimes.
She's seen a thing or two and she's had
some kids, you know, and hers are all
grown, and mine are still different ages.
So, she she's got some wisdom.
Yeah, 'cause I feel like at one point or
another, a lot of us experience the
same emotional... type of
feelings,
even though our situations are different,
you know, and so
the emotional sense of it is like they've
been there, they've done that, and
they're, you know... they got to scrape
you off the bathroom floor and shove you
in the shower, because you're so
depressed that you can't, you know, they
they know what it's like. So they're
going to do everything in their power...
Yeah. ...to not let you feel what they
felt. So acknowledging what a common
experience that is... Yeah. ...you
know, being a mom having to scrape
yourself off the floor, and
we're learning in the world of behavioral
health.
That sense of safety is related to
to to maintaining well-being, preventing
illness, keeping us from getting to the
worst places of depression and PTSD and
addiction.
One of the examples is that we've seen
such huge increases in in problems
related to COVID, but we've also for a
very long time been aware that there's
problems related to more common threats
like gender-based violence and racism.
Most people don't know that women can
develop problems like depression, PTSD,
and addictions from these types of
experiences.
I'm not saying that these are the
experiences that you've had or anything,
but thinking about those that you have
had, how has sisterhood impacted your
sense of safety and well-being in the
skin you live in?
Just knowing that I have someone or
someone has me. To speak up for them
when when a situation like that might
occur, and they don't feel big enough
to say something back, or maybe they
don't like confrontation.
I feel it's very empowering to have
another voice behind you, reaching up and
and saying something on your behalf. You
know,
they're not going to let you suffer by
yourself. They're not going to let you
suffer in silence.
All of us. All of us strangers. I don't
know. Not you. But you know, if I don't
know you and and you give me that look,
I know. So this is
one that's not, I mean,
maybe it is talked about a lot, but not
in our area, is the
Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women.
And I don't belong to
any Tribe up here, Nation
up here. But my DNA tells me
that I am Indigenous.
I have indigenous Southern roots, and
and that's a sisterhood in its own
too.
Far too many women go missing, and and
we don't know
who's next. We don't know that we could
be next, our neighbors could be next. So
it's just a matter of...
that my neighbor behind me
that I may not know... They might have my
back one day,
might be looking out for the kids at the
bus stop one day.
I don't know, you know, but I thank you.
Thank you for looking out, especially for
the kids, you know?
And so just knowing that my fellow
neighbor sister
has her eyes out, too, that makes me feel
a little bit better.
'Cause I know if I saw something, even if
my kid wasn't on that bus, you better
believe I'm going to go out there and be
like, "Hey, leave these kids alone!"
"You want to mess with them? "You got to
mess with me first," you know? Yeah. So
we... We got to have our... We got to
have each other's backs. Yeah, there's
there'sthere's no other logical way.
We were talking about that kind of
second nature thing and
and wanting...
I think you were kind of getting at that
we've got this like second nature Mama
bear as women thing that we that we
naturally do. You know we tend to see all
the kids as as our own kids almost, and
any kid is in trouble, we're going to go
and try to help them, and...
You were talking about wanting to make
sure that we have almost that second
nature or we do have a lot of that second
nature with each other as women too,
because you were talking about MMIW,
Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women,and
it's easy to move over to... "Man, it
would be so nice to not have to explain
this," .... ...that it... to see more men
have that second nature of seeing
anybody in need, and just understanding
we need to help each other... ...Yeah.
And I'm not saying "All men," you
know. Some men just don't
realize that that's what's happening.
Yeah, I guess... And
the way women are looked down on and
treated as a society,
you know. Some men are completely blind
to that, and and whether they
intentionally are or unintentionally...
They have moms, they have sisters, they
have aunts, they have grandmothers, you
know. So many... They came from a woman.
It's it's just sad to see that they
wouldn't band together too. And some
do. You know, I'm not saying that there
aren't men out there.
It would be good to see... a
collaboration there sometimes. I think
about these things, actively. So I really
appreciate that you're being careful that
we don't do the "all men" thing, right?
Yeah, 'cause it's not all. It's a trap.
It's not all men. There are many men that
are... that are very much on our side,
and looking out for us, and taking care
of us, and the
connections be,tween the two is I think,
what we're talking about promoting. Yeah,
beautiful. So um... What is the most...
most important thing you want women,
girls, anyone born assigned female at
birth... What's the most important thing
for them to know about sisterhood,
safety, and the skin we each live in?
The most important thing to me, I feel
like, is with the sisterhood,
don't be afraid to be yourself.
There's a lot of us that are just like
you. And you're not alone.
We got your back.
There we go.
Thank you for sharing your time, Rena.
Thank you for sharing your lived
experience, and your wisdom,
as we begin to explore the social factors
that impact our behavioral well-being,
differently across identity factors like
our gender.
Thank you to our listeners for joining us
on this journey to raise awareness about,
and seek solutions to behavioral health
inequities. For more information,
please go to dcmjunsilence.org/
podcast. There you'll find resources
talk a little bit
bit more about the issues we've covered
today.