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TK thought the hustle was love. Awards, gigs, bylines, late nights, early mornings. Running until the body says “nope.”
Turns out the hustle was heartbreak. Opportunities dressed as disappointment. Depression dressed as grind.
This episode drifts through the wreckage: voice notes from the highs, reflections about the lows. And then the crash- burnout, body revolt, the quiet question: was any of this worth it?
With producer Kristen Bennett pressing play on TK’s story, and anthropologist, astrologer, and artist- Dr. Nicole Rawls whispering truth like a mirror you didn’t want to look in, Part 1 sits in that moment when you realize: the hustle don’t love you back.
Welcome to The Secret Life of TK Dutes.
Special thanks: Dr. Nicole Rawls, Kristen Bennett (Producer), Manny Faces (Engineer), Faybeo’n Mickens (Marketing), Pat Mesiti-Miller (Theme Music), Gabrielle Smith (Art), and Melissa Danielle (Friend).
👉🏾 Follow TK on IG: @tastykeish | @philosfuturemedia
👉🏾 Go behind the scenes on Patreon: patreon.com/c/SecretLifeofTK
★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★
👉🏾 Go behind the scenes on Patreon: patreon.com/c/SecretLifeofTK
Creators and Guests
What is The Secret Life of TK Dutes?
The Secret Life of TK Dutes is the story of what it means to become when the system won’t let you be. One woman sets out into the world, looking for ways to get ahead as an Artist. Producer. Daughter, Sister. Partner.
Together with those who bear witness, TK throws away the scripts and looks for answers, in airports, dentists offices, across borders.
Each episode is a new world, pioneering the art of loose autobiography to build the picture of a life in a community of voices.
What happens when you stop doing what is expected of you and start doing YOU?
A better life can be a hustle. It doesn’t have to be a secret.
So, hey. I'm TK, so good to meet you semi in real life. Looks like I have a podcast now. This is a show about what happens after the grind breaks your heart. About the toll of working twice as hard, being told to wait your turn, and realizing that the turn may never come.
TK Dutes:It's about what costs us, our health, our happiness, our sense of self, and how we claw our way back to wholeness anyway. Across this season, a team of producer friends helped me pull together pieces of my own story with conversations that feel like lifelines. You'll hear about grief, burnout, and heartbreak, but also about art, joy, and the little weird ways we find our way back to ourselves. This first episode is produced by my friend, Los Angeles producer, Kristen Bennett. And after this offering, we're gonna sit down together and unpack what landed and what's still sitting heavy.
TK Dutes:So let's start at the beginning of the end. The moment I realized the hustle I thought would save me was actually killing me. Welcome to the secret life of TK Dutest. Part one, the hustle don't love you back. Act one, the love affair.
TK Dutes:Honestly, if you're here, we probably already met in real life because I'll be outside. Here I am on the way to the Webby's creator weekend. Our team won a Webby. Cannot believe it. I just finished my first official long run back.
TK Dutes:Me and my friend Berry are gonna run a four mile to the Marrazano Bridge and back. It's the Webby Awards after party. Shout out to all the colleagues in the building. Shout out to the Beyond Voting team. Look how she brings her own salad to the airport and chicken too.
TK Dutes:Very demure, very mindful. Westlaw was in the building and hitting us with the fire. Here's to another season. Can't wait to win the next award. Cakes for you to eat.
TK Dutes:I wanna thank y'all, Afros and Audios, Black Podcast Association, the Black Podcast Awards because we need this. Right? Wear white after Labor Day. Turn your bedroom into your living room and your living room into your bedroom. Keep it weird.
TK Dutes:Keep it free. Keep it creative. Let's go. But for those of you who haven't met me, let me catch you up. I make podcasts.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:First Aid Kit is produced by TK Dutes. Good words with Kirk Franklin. Our executive producer is Keisha TK Dutes.
TK Dutes:This is a Netflix geek production.
TK Dutes:Executive producers are Keisha TK Dutest. Sometimes I'm behind the mic. This is NPR's life kit. I'm TK Dutes. This is your girl Tasty Keisha.
TK Dutes:You're listening to WBAI. I'm with the infamous mob. We're here to interview Deepak Chopra and Gotham Chopra about their new film Decoding Deepak. Y'all was listening to Bonfire Radio 10AM because it's time for TK in the AM. Let's do this.
TK Dutes:Welcome to the waves, Slates podcast about gender, feminism, and unapologetic transformative life shifts. Other times, I'm making art. This is my first large size piece, about four feet, about two feet, and it's going in this restaurant. My friend's restaurant is La Cicocino, inspired by Mexican, I guess, architecture, the walls out here, the street signs, the foliage. I've been a voice over artist.
TK Dutes:It's time to tell different stories. Stories of people and families that reflect and celebrate all of us. Social commentator. You gotta make your own people understand. Yes.
TK Dutes:Accountability happens at home. It starts at home. Right. You don't talk to your kids about this shit, they'll never know. You don't talk to your friends about this shit, they'll never know.
TK Dutes:And mentor slash public speaker. I want folks to recognize that underrepresented voices bring so much to your shows that we don't need this. But till then, give us your time, give us your money, give us your tutelage, and we will bring you more voices that are leaders, that are empathetic, that are amazing, that you have probably been overlooking in your communities. So thank you for having me, and I'm proud to be a New Voice alum 2016. And here I am now at the beginning of the end, wondering if it was worth it, wondering if anything I ever did mattered.
TK Dutes:All the grinding, the gigs, the speaking up and speaking out about the open secret that was systemic racism, sexism, and capitalism in the podcasting industry. That shit took a toll on my physical health, my emotional well-being, and my spirit. No matter how great my resume looked, I couldn't shake the feeling that I wasn't welcome. I thought that if you do good work, you say what you mean and you mean what you say, that you thrive. But I wasn't thriving.
TK Dutes:I was depressed more often than not. My body was revolting against me. I was barely surviving just cobbling together credits and opportunities. I made the hustle look so good y'all. I probably tricked myself into becoming that stoic little dog in the meme where everything's on fire.
TK Dutes:There were red flags everywhere. I was catching strays from an industry that I loved so much that I would quite literally hope that the next gig would be the right fit, the equitable one, the one that treated me and my colleagues like people. And just when I thought it was my turn, when I became an executive producer, a middle manager, I got laid off. Act two the breakup.
Kristen Bennett:So yeah, my thought here is I'm just gonna press play and then like when she says something that you're like this part in particular really hit me or like this is the why or like what whenever you feel ready to react just kinda like signal to me. I'll pause it, and then I wanna get your reaction to what you're hearing.
TK Dutes:Okay. Cool. Should I, because I'm in here with you. Should I go out and come back as a guest? I think it's record it's recording as well, though.
TK Dutes:That's me and my producer, Kristen Bennett. She and I were working together at the same company when I was laid off. Being black queer women, we connected over our experiences in corporate media. After this particular disappointment, I was numb, angry, exhausted. I thought I was healed enough to let my guard down but these folks, like the folks before them, said the right thing and I believed them.
TK Dutes:So then I felt stupid and I hate feeling stupid. It was embarrassing and trying to explain why made me feel crazy. I felt like a complainer, a loser So I poured myself into mentorship, education, dedicated myself to helping new producers, marginalized producers navigate a system that isn't welcoming to them. On social media, if you caught me on there, you'd see me sorting through my thoughts trying to figure out if the type of stories I do were predicated on being black and broken, all the stuff that they expect from us. Hey, y'all.
TK Dutes:So it's been a long time since we've done one of these walk and talks, and I just been thinking about something for a long time. Actually, like, really hurt my own feelings with this thought that like, can't I, TK, why can't I think of just super chill topics to report on? Why does everything have to be so big and serious? Yesterday, I posted my life kit episode about, you know, minding your own business as, you know, from the lens of an eldest daughter. I do episodes about boundaries.
TK Dutes:I do things about resilience. And you know what I realized? It's because, you know, I don't have the privilege of having the bandwidth to think of stories that that are like how to sew on a button or how to, you know, get the most out of your dry cleaning experience. And like, yo, like, shade. I want to be that guy.
TK Dutes:I want to learn how to be so free, but guess what? The world ain't free to me. Right? The world treats me like the world treats my people that look like me like. So I can't think of like chill topics.
TK Dutes:I got to think of ways to teach you how to treat me. So I'm going to come to accept that. And if I think of something chill, sure, great. If I don't, then what I'm going to do is keep on going. We have to think about ways to get paid as freelancers.
TK Dutes:We gotta think about how to, like, move in the world to not get hurt. So you know what? I'm just gonna keep doing what I'm doing. So in my time dissociating, I mean, scrolling TikTok, I came across Doctor. Nicole Chuzel, now Doctor.
TK Dutes:Rawls going off. The woman was talking directly to me or at least it felt that way. She managed to put how I feel into a three minute video and say something very specific that I had only expressed to my therapist and a handful of homies.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:I used to be a workaholic, and now there's no way I could work like I used to. I really don't ever want to again. A former higher education administrator and faculty member, right, did all of that. First gen, low income, was a McNair scholar, went from undergrad straight through grad school, proved and fought my way that I could quote unquote do the work, that I was intellectual enough that I could handle the kind of load that was required of us, not just to complete classes, but also just to be recognized as somebody with quote unquote enough knowledge and expertise in my field to be given the title of doctor. Then even after that though, there was still more proving.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:I had to prove that I earned that title and that it wasn't just given to me because I was a black woman who was first generation and low income, right? That I earned that. So then I got to more producing, right? I built institutes and centers and offices in less than a year sometime, right? I brought on staff and mentored and trained them, working with students, writing grants, writing the articles to prove that I could publish and have my peers review it.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:You know what all that shit did, y'all? It left me broken. It left me heartbroken, and it left me physically broken, because it was never enough. And when I had finally had my heart broken enough by the institution, I realized that I needed my heart to break because I had been breaking my own heart for so long that it had to be shown to me.
TK Dutes:Stop. Okay. It's gotta say.
Kristen Bennett:I feel it coming.
TK Dutes:Yeah. This is the part. This is the part that, that I well, this is why I sent this to you. This is what got us here. Heartbroken.
TK Dutes:Heartbroken. Because I thought I was the only one that used that phrase in my mind. I hadn't I don't think I had verbalized it to anyone, I mean, talking with you so much, talking with Trey, like, heartbroken. Because all the things she listed right before that are bringing up mentees, writing papers, all the things she listed them. And, like, I still do it now in my practice of, like, how I live and, like, how I work, but that's, like, on my terms.
TK Dutes:But before that, it was like, yo. We're gonna under resource you. We're gonna make you do all these things. And then to watch people because, like, they know they need you, and they know you can do the work. So, yeah, you could be a teacher.
TK Dutes:You could be a trainer. You can be a person that populates the office with, like, good workers and good earners, and and we won't let you elevate. So we know where to put you to get maximum productivity out of you and fucking drain you and not ever show you or give you a reward that is like really deserving of who you are and the work you do, right?
TK Dutes:Watching her TikTok, I saw so much of myself in Doctor. Rawls and her story. And reading through her comments, it was clear to me that so many others did too. Here was this obviously successful woman with the degrees and the resume that reflected all the hard work over the years and while we shared some similarities both black, female, queer, outspoken, we were different. She was in a completely different industry for me but she had the same problems I had.
TK Dutes:Why? So I kept watching and she talked about how she eventually left academia altogether and started to forge her own path in order to heal and try to find a way back to herself.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:I talk a lot about this on my podcast, Abolitionist Dreamscapes. I want people to dream beyond what we are told. I can't work like I used to because I was never meant to work like that. I was supposed to be creative. I was supposed to allow myself to dream and explore and bring it into the public.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:But when you do that in spaces that only know how to take, it will exploit you, and it will tell you that that is your function to give up your light to it. What happens if you call that shit back? What happens if you actually believe your reality and realize that all the ideas that you told yourself to keep you in spaces that are abusing you actually don't work? So who told you that shit and is it true? Because when I thought that my safety and security was tied to me having a job in these institutions so I could have my basic needs met.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:And then they took that shit away the minute I did not step and fetch. I realized that my definition of safety and security was a goddamn lie. So whose truth did I believe? Again, mine or these raggedy ass spaces that I knew were nothing more than a plantation that we're always gonna take. So believe yourself.
Kristen Bennett:It seems like the word heartbreak. Right? Like, that's what did it for you. And so, like, talk about, like, what makes that different from just like a disappointment or just being like flat out burnout. Right?
Kristen Bennett:Play people get burned out professionally. But like in this situation, what makes it unique? Is it like, it feels like, I mean, to me, it feels like grief.
TK Dutes:Yes. Because it is like the first time it happens.
TK Dutes:I'm
TK Dutes:disappointed. Upset, anger, all that is like the third time. I let the you know, fuck. I didn't learn my lesson. Heartbreak is I iterated.
TK Dutes:I changed. I tried it another way. I put it in a different sized box, and the outcome was still the same. So then you go, I'm not good enough.
TK Dutes:You see? That's what this mythical meritocracy shit does. It poisons our brains. Like, how can I spend over twenty years busting my ass in this industry creating shows, creating opportunities for myself and others, producing great work? Hell, even the people who are exploiting my labor every day tell me how great I am, how invaluable me and my work are.
TK Dutes:But the conclusion is I'm not good enough? No, no, no, no. I know better. Fuck out of here.
Kristen Bennett:I have two thoughts. Yeah. So okay. My first question is before you moved into this space, you were a nurse. Right?
Kristen Bennett:Like, You worked in nursing for a very long time. Do you think that if you experience something like this in that career, like, do you think it would have had the same kind of impact? Do you think that it would have been a heartbreak, or would it have been just a disappointment? It would have been, like, unique to, like, a creative aspect of yourself. Mhmm.
Kristen Bennett:Because you talk about we're in podcasting space or in the radio space, and, like, you're trying all these things. You're doing things that they're telling you to do, and you're not getting the results that that would make sense for you to get back. And then you start to doubt Yeah. Yourself. I guess maybe then the question for me is did the self doubt start to come in there?
Kristen Bennett:Right? Like, is there a point where you're working on nursing where you go on? Like, maybe the reason I'm not doing this is because I'm not good enough or I don't know enough about this thing or, like, I'm not doing something right.
TK Dutes:It never came up like that, but it did like, it came up in that I knew that I didn't wanna do that kind of work. Okay. And I said, you know what? I never wanna be those people that's, like, at work and don't wanna be there because that reflects in the work. So I did the work in a way that made it so I could stay that long.
TK Dutes:Sixteen years of a long time. I was a valedictorian of my nursing class. Oh, wow. I never think of I don't think about that. I don't even allow myself to, like, have that because the experience was so, like, also loaded with fear.
TK Dutes:So, like, when you hear me talking my shit, that's where that comes from. I had one experience in my life where I was not talking my shit, and I never wanted to be that way again. And it fucking motivated me to, like, be here with you. You know?
Kristen Bennett:Yeah. So the difference is because it's actually something you're a lot more invested in.
TK Dutes:Yes.
Kristen Bennett:Not just as a career, but as a human. Yeah. Right? Like, you are offering up these parts of yourself.
TK Dutes:Yeah.
Kristen Bennett:And what's interesting to me is, like because, like, I'm gonna be real with you. Right? Because you're talking about, like, I tried this and I tried that, and I got to a point where, like, I'm questioning Yeah. Question myself. Like, is it me?
Kristen Bennett:Am I am I? And I'm going, like, I don't know that I might ever get to that point because, like,
TK Dutes:maybe something's wrong with me because do you know what
Kristen Bennett:I'm saying? And I I don't wanna say it's common because, like, there are definitely a lot of, like, people of color, black women in particular, who definitely question themselves professionally and, like, you know, you're constantly checking yourself, especially if you're dealing with white people who are like in a hot position or whatever. Yeah. But like, I definitely feel like there's a solid class of us who were like, it ain't me. Right.
Kristen Bennett:These white people are online. Right? Yeah.
TK Dutes:No. I believe that. Like, it's weird because I I'm on that, like, white people on, period. Baseline. Baseline.
TK Dutes:Baseline. But okay. So I think it's like when when I get to see my colleague friends that are that are black Yeah. That are able to work within the confines of those crazy white limitations of capitalism, racism, sexism, all the all the isms. Like, when I see my homie make it to the upper echelons, like the upper, I'm looking at her, and I'm looking at me.
TK Dutes:And I'm like, I know we on the phone talking that shit. Right? I know you see it like I see it. I know you talking like I talk it spiritually. So what are you doing to adapt to a form that is welcoming to the fucking majority culture that owns all this shit.
TK Dutes:And I look at all of my friends that are able to do it, and I compare myself. And I also go, who else is like on my side of the fence that be talking their shit or thinking their shit, and it comes out in the work. Right? And I then I pull, like, I pull you, KB. I'll pull you into that category.
TK Dutes:It's a couple of people that pull into that category, and I'm like, what is it about this group of people? Why can't we operate the same as, like, our homies? And it's not no shade. It's just the what we have to do, like, tolerance window, I learned about in ADHD studies. Right?
TK Dutes:The window of tolerance. The window of tolerance for bullshit for people on my our side of the fucking coin is very small. Yeah. And our friends who have built a certain type of resilience and a and they have a script and a way to mask harder, have a larger window of tolerance for white nonsense, and have learned no, because we've all learned how to deal in white society. They just know how to keep it up longer.
TK Dutes:Doctor. Rawls had experienced all this same shit. But while my conclusion was that I wasn't good enough, hers was something that deep down I already knew. The function of these places, these institutions that I was trying to come up in, these places that I was working so hard for them to finally see me, recognize me, the folks I was trusting to finally give me the resources and space to blow them away. These spaces that would gladly take my work but didn't trust me enough to take my word.
TK Dutes:Their function was always to extract every bit of what made me shine out of me and then stick me in a corner while they reap the benefits. It happens in lots of industries and so many people eager to advance work themselves to exhaustion sickness and yet heartbreak just trying to prove their worth. The extra fucked up part is they expect us to be complicit in our own abuse and then they retaliate when we dare speak up about it. So what's the way out though? After the thousandth time this shit breaks your heart, brings you to your knees, and then abandons you.
TK Dutes:How do you get back up? How do you find your way home? I've been watching your content, taking it in, and real talk, doc, I gotta say, I'm like, are we are we twins? Like, what used to make it so plain, everything that I'm like going through thinking, all this stuff. And before I like give you more flowers, just want to tell the people like who you are and give you an opportunity to say more about yourself.
TK Dutes:But you are Doctor. Nicole Truszell of Abolitionist Dreamscapes, a show that I've been watching recently. So I take you as a person that like helps people unlearn the isms and all the things. And as a person that has just gone through, not just gone through, but realizing that life is a continuous cycle of the isms and racism, sexism, homophobia, all the and the isms, colonialisms, all that shit that, like, weighs down on us, that it's been stressing me out, making me sick, and I'm trying to look for more. So I find you, you're like a beacon of
Dr. Nicole Rawls:hope, That
TK Dutes:we can unlearn that.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:So yes, I guess how I describe myself, online, say anthropologist by training, an abolitionist scholar and teacher in practice. But really, I'm a dreamer. I break things that don't work and I dream of things that can. I think that's really what it comes down to. So I'm a strategic dreamer.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:And I think that's been a big part of my work, especially now going forward in just my life of figuring out what does it mean to, if I broke all the things that didn't work, while at the same time was told that my job was to teach about the things that didn't work while living in those systems and structures. Structures? What What does does it it mean mean to to believe what I was teaching and believe my reality? And once I believed it, how do I make a new one? And I think that's a lot of the work I do both with myself and with other people in the public is, if we believe ourselves in our realities, and then we allow our bodies to start talking teach with our minds, then what do we do?
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Because you can't do
TK Dutes:the same thing if it's not working. And that speaks to exactly like, the clip that made me, it made me DM you instantly. I was watching one of your TikToks and it was creating a new life story and I think that's where a lot of us girls are at the moment, a lot of people. I'm even meeting like just your garden variety white dude, and just having conversation and like everyone is just like, yo, turns out there's another way to do this life thing and I have to unlearn that. But in creating a new life story, you use the phrase heartbreak in relation to what society tells us and then what really happens.
TK Dutes:And that, I think, kind of describes for me, like, my professional career. I'm a podcaster by trade, like, this is what I do, I produce for other people, I've hosted, you know, I've been on some, on some things and, I enjoy the work. And it always has felt like the work didn't enjoy me. The people didn't appreciate what I was bringing, but they always wanted to be there to use my skills, my body, my brains for gain and then discard me. And that's not what the world told me.
TK Dutes:The world told me that if you do everything right, you make everyone happy, you do good at your job, then you will be rewarded. You will be blessed, you know, not, and not in waiting for the heaven, blessed, I'll wait like now, money, right? And I'm realizing that's lies and fallacies, and then depression and sickness and all that stuff happens. So when you said heartbreak, I thought I was the only one that was naming it that way. So where does that heartbreak come from?
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Because you realize you got lied to, right? And I think that's the thing. We have to realize that part of how we even buy into these systems that don't work for us is that we have to somehow get our love from them. We are taught to love our abusers. We are taught to give up our authority to others.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:We are literally groomed into becoming workers. Now, depending upon how society sees you, that grooming is going to look different. Because even what you said earlier about white folks now, even themselves trying to figure out like that I've been lied to as well, of course, that the first one's been lied to. Because that is the maintenance of a system that needs people to dehumanize themselves to dehumanize others. Because the idea of privilege, always talk about this, we got to push that shit to another perspective, because the occupied privilege in these structures and systems that are built on plantations means that you are occupying a position of mediocrity and reproduction of a normative that needs you to disassociate yourself, remove yourself from your ancestors, from your land, from any kind of understanding of your cultural knowing, so that you might be able to, in the future, sit at that table, but most likely won't sit at that table, you'll be used by that table.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Right? And so when you want to try to be privileged in this society, yeah, you might get a couple of things with that would expense. You go home and you don't like that man or woman that you're with. You go home, you don't like them damn kids, right? The wine that clocks in the happy hour is the only thing that gets you through.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:You're not living, you are literally a walking dead. I say this all the time about the walking dead. We see so much walking dead. So when you realize that, and get you been lied to, there's an anger. And then once you allow that anger to come through, burns something away.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:And what you're burning away is the reality that you gave up parts of yourself to a system, a structure, to a person, to whatever it is that never liked you to begin with. Of course, it's going to break your heart. Yeah. Right, it's gonna absolutely break your heart. Yeah.
TK Dutes:And I find that like, yo, it doesn't just, it's not one thing. It's a series of things. And I would just keep, I would be, I would collect myself, I would collect my hurt and be like, you know what, this next time, right, this next time. And it sounds very like what they teach you about being in an abusive relationship. Like, see the flags, notice, you can leave, you can Yeah, but when my bills though, right, Like, when my bills are dependent on, this job or the next gig or the whatever or and and letting these people come into my inbox and hurl f words f at me or Yes.
TK Dutes:You know, blame me for recording that went bad meanwhile they didn't the ones that didn't turn on the microphone, right? But you have to eat shit. Like, this is like, this is the stuff that happens over and over, especially in industries where that are like, quote unquote, for the greater good. There's this like, we just want to tell stories, we're just going to push out these stories. So, know, like, doesn't matter if you don't sleep and you're just like, I just want to tell the story of the people in this war torn country.
TK Dutes:So you, the producer, that's I always say is the lowest total person on the totem pole, right, and the most abused person. So if you're in this position for a long time, you're set up for repeated heartbreak, then you have your general workplace BS, and then your life BS. So what I'm finding is that over and over it kept happening, but over and over I can't walk away. And then also that my abuser slash employers were learning the language of how to keep you in. So, you know, there was a year of the black girl, right?
TK Dutes:Black girl magic. And so now they all looking for, let's go black producers, black women, black gay women, every permutation of black woman, this is what they were looking for. And they knew how to get us. I felt like a person in a cartoon and the words were in the box like, equity. This show is for black people.
TK Dutes:Don't worry, you don't have to cater to white listenership. And that was the job was in a box with a stick on it. And the language was in the box. And I walked in and I got trapped. And it kept happening over and over again.
TK Dutes:Can you talk about that like phenomenon of people knowing how to like speak that language? And how can we see those red flags?
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Here's the thing, right? Let's talk about the plantation once again. We enter a plantation. And I always, I work in all kinds of different industries, right? Was in higher ed and nonprofit, I've worked with folks in government, we worked with folks in in corporate and the like.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:It's the same shit, different font. Because it's all part of an institution that is part of the plantation to maintain the status quo, going back to that norm, that idea of privilege is really the norm. So this is when you have to believe your reality. When you walk into those spaces, we are disciplined and trained to perform a certain role. Let's talk about Black folks, Black women in particular, Black queer folks.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:What is our place in a plantation system? Right? And what does a plantation know very well how to do? They know that when they see our bodies, the first thing this space will read us as is a caretaker in one way, shape or form, but what kind of caretaker? Yes.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:We're not a white woman caretaker. No, we are black women. And if you're queer on top of that, if they know you are gay or lesbian, then there is a way that you are read as both a labor source and a source of reproduction. You have to remember that, you have to believe that. And then the thing is, and that's what's gonna break your heart.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Because in order to believe it, you have to experience it. This is the problem. So you're going through these systems, just like you said, same thing in higher ed, you're going in, they get the language. I was working in justice spaces, motherfuckers was feeding back to me what I said to them. So you saw my body as a place to consume to teach, but then you also saw me as the easy target to dump your shit on because the institution wouldn't protect me.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:So there was a way in that moment when I had my own coming to Jesus, whatever you want to come into the ancestors, got my ass handed to me moment, I had to believe the space for what it was. Even though I had a bunch of black and brown and queer folks in my face talking to me about justice, they were weaponizing it in a way that was just like white folks. I had to believe that. Because the space knows what it's doing. It knows how to take our bodies, use it for consumption, and then get us to put labor out.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:So if you understand your oppressor, if you understand the raggedy space you are going into, you going into a dirty house, how are you cleansing and protecting yourself? Right? Don't go in naive. And also don't go in thinking that you are going to now be the savior because that's the Western arrogance too. That's The US Western arrogance.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Quite frankly, I'm going say this with love y'all with love. I'm gonna hold
TK Dutes:your hand while I say this. Hold it, please.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Black and brown Americans will be the worst motherfuckers who sit here and reproduce that American arrogance when we are trying to be seen at the table of our oppressor. Because the oppressor then will use our bodies to be at that table as a representation of its progress. Hence why we've only have Black folks, particularly Black women sitting at that UN representing The US, not giving the ceasefires the past year. That's what a plantation system does to our bodies. It knows how to use us to make sure that it is quote unquote, normal and progressive.
TK Dutes:And the example is so good that it, like you said, it's, same shit, different font, it replicates everywhere. And I gotta say the time that I was that person, being the figurehead, being the like, let's bring in TK to the Zoom. Right? Oh, and then realizing, you know, when the hard thing had to be said, I'm a whole middle manager. I got whole bosses and founders not saying it.
TK Dutes:I'm like, why am I saying the thing to the head of insert fancy company here?
Dr. Nicole Rawls:This face is a coward, we have to realize this face is a coward too.
TK Dutes:Yeah.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Then I always say this, especially when I'm working with black women in particular, are you okay not being seen as the fixer? This is where we see our attachments to the structure. See, this is where you have to take that mirror. I say, Oh, Schoon's mirror and look at it. Yes.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:And ask yourself where you have been trained so well that you are okay being the step infect of the space. When you can actually acknowledge that part of this shit, you also are complicit in your own subjugation, then you can take that back. That's how you take the energy back without judgment.
TK Dutes:How do we recognize that though?
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Well, just did, right? Think about it. How do you recognize it? Your body. Right.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Yes. Your body has been telling you that, right? Think about your headaches, your stomach, you gained some weight, you can't eat, you got constipation, you got IBS, you get headaches, you go home and you're irritated. Black women, especially our anxiety and depression show up very differently. You will be very functional in depression.
TK Dutes:Oh my god, daily, daily.
Dr. Nicole Rawls:Daily, you will produce more. I produced more when I was the most depressed. Because the only thing I knew how to do. Yeah. Right?
Dr. Nicole Rawls:That's the disassociation that we are taught. We are taught to disassociate.
Kristen Bennett:Was that you signaling me? Yes. Okay, good.
TK Dutes:So right off the bat, she comes in hot, you know, like, I'm so exhausted. I'm tired. I'm not getting chosen. Because the thing is, when you work like this and you're so productive, someone's supposed to choose you. Yeah.
TK Dutes:There's that notice. They're supposed to notice. And I've been working so hard at being noticed that I started to break down. And then the heartbreak of what she's talking about, realizing that you could do everything right. So this is just another version of, like, for the girls that are getting married and having kids.
TK Dutes:This is the work version. Right? You could do everything. I could go to college. I could meet the guy.
TK Dutes:I could have the kid and still get a divorce. Right? Or the nigga die. Right?
Kristen Bennett:Like So you could be trashed.
TK Dutes:Like You could be trashed. Like, you could do everything you're supposed to do. This is just that in another fucking shell. And now I'm like, well, shit. The grass is not green, and the girls don't have it.
TK Dutes:Act three, the aftermath.
TK Dutes:And then, the heartbreak turns into physical manifestations that happened, happened, happening, whatever. The most extreme was learning about my fibroids.
TK Dutes:For folks that don't know what fibroids are, they're benign tumors in or on the uterus. Most of the time, they don't cause any symptoms. Most folks don't even know they have them. But sometimes they cause symptoms so severe that they're life threatening.
TK Dutes:And then learning that I had them in a jarring way and that they are brought on by high cortisol, which is stress, a stress response. And yes, black women are predisposed to them because of reasons. Stress. So if the main reason is black life stress and like just the wear and tear in your body and the epigenetics of it all, The wear and tear starts early because white nonsense is so big. And the fact that we have white nonsense that my friends on the other side, my friends that are fucking VPs of a thing, I see the fucking code switch.
TK Dutes:I see that's pain. To me, that hurts. And that they go home, they take off their bra, girl. Whoo. I need a gallon of wine.
TK Dutes:Right? Why do we both need a gallon of wine? Because white nonsense is so big that even though you can see my friend being at the upper echelon of these companies, that they're hurting too. Then I feel bad if we all have to deal with white nonsense, and that I feel bad that capitalism is white nonsense Oh my god. And that this is never gonna stop.
TK Dutes:And then I feel hopeless. And then I feel depressed. And then I don't wake up on time. And then and I thank God I don't have the kind of depression. I'm functionally depressed.
TK Dutes:I've been functionally depressed. I show up for meetings. I can execute. But when the laptop closes, I'm self medicating or I self medicated. I slept for more than twelve hours.
TK Dutes:I've cried. I've angered. I've binged eat. All the things. I'm functionally depressed.
TK Dutes:Then I'd look back. You look back in your lineage or whatever. I don't know if this might be too much teeth for the shit, but I'll say it because we're on here and I'm just keeping it real. I love my dad.
TK Dutes:So right here, I had to stop. I had to stop myself because I couldn't exactly put into words what I was feeling. But I remember watching my pops, hardworking dude, loving, brilliant man, who like many other dads of his generation and many before that would find solace in a six pack to deal with the immense bullshit the world was throwing at him.
TK Dutes:That's a nigga that did everything right. That's a nigga that didn't get chose. That's a nigga that's super black. That's just a nigga that started initiatives. He was a co founder of the black organization at the Taxi and Limousine Commission.
TK Dutes:Taxi and Limousine Commission are the police of cabs. Yeah. He and his colleagues started that. I found an article of my dad. I have to find it again.
TK Dutes:He never talks about it. In all of this, he's had his own radicalization process, but I now realize as an adult, part of why he's self medicating is because of all these things, right? I'm seeing that this is a man, from young man to now that has iterated, tried a different bunch of different things. And I'm like, sound familiar?
TK Dutes:The article I found was in the New York Times from 1981, a few months after I was born. The headline is, Half of Minorities Dropped from Class for State Police. In the article, my dad was interviewed about his experience as a police cadet. It reads, Some of the 36 Black and Hispanic recruits who dropped out or resigned before graduation said that academic problems had been the least of their troubles at the Academy. They talked of a double standard practiced by academy officials when it came to dealing with minority recruits and asserted that they had been harassed out and had not failed their courses as officials maintained.
TK Dutes:A lot of the black guys who graduated today had to smile, fake it, and take it to make it through, said Ronald Dutest, a 26 year old black man who resigned from the academy just three weeks before graduation. They are not looking for good troopers but for people they can direct and mold, he said. They don't wanna deal with your blackness and your background and can't accept you being proud of what you are.
TK Dutes:And the racism was so racist of me. They put bananas in the black cadets, you know, nigga, monkey, all that shit. So he fucking sued them. And he was like, ain't no way. My name is Ronald Dutest, and I don't get they were like marking them lower, the black cadets.
TK Dutes:So he's like, I don't get seized. What is you what is you talking about? And knowing myself and how we roll, I know he's not lying. Yeah. So I'm looking at a person that has like tried different things.
TK Dutes:I'm looking at a person that I'm like, I see myself in.
TK Dutes:Listen, y'all. I'm gonna drop a little content warning right here because we talk about medical stuff and blood for the next few minutes.
TK Dutes:I'm looking at a person that also has has physical manifestation that had one day in my house, he had a medical emergency. My dad went got up, went to the restroom. All we hear is I'm like 12 or I don't even know. I'm young. He was in college.
TK Dutes:He went back to school. He starts throwing up blood. Ground, like, in the fucking family restroom. They got we lived with my grandparents. It was like a intergenerational household.
TK Dutes:And all I heard, my mom, she went, she found him. He was out cold. He threw up all his blood out cold. She's screaming. She's just like yelling for help.
TK Dutes:And my grandpa, this blind man comes down to the basement, like what's going on. And now as we talk, I'm thinking about my physical manifestation, fibroids, and how that showed up for me. And I didn't even realize. So, like, my my my on the floor in the bathroom time was so all this shit was happening. And and I also noticed an accumulation, but the shit has to hit a point.
TK Dutes:Yeah. So the shit hit a point. I'm sitting on my bean bag, and I'm on my laptop. I'm every day scared to open this fucking laptop, and I'm hungry and all of things. I get up, and I just feel something go.
TK Dutes:Nigga, I'm bleeding down my legs. I'm bleeding down my legs and I go to the restroom. Like, I, like, scoot. Like, do the waddle. The little weird scoot waddle.
TK Dutes:I get to the bathroom. I sit on the toilet, and I'm like, something's coming out of me. Bro, it was like a fucking clot the size of my hand came out of me in real time. And now here I go, I don't have insurance. I so I I'm like, how do I cannot go to the hospital.
TK Dutes:Like, I can't. That's just not an option. Like, my brain doesn't my brain doesn't go like, when you're sick, you call a doctor. My brain goes, when you're sick, orange juice, garlic, you know, like home remedies. So I my brain went there first.
TK Dutes:Who can I call? What can I drink? Could I how many pads do I need to wear to function through this issue? So then I I call I, you know, I call whoever's coming. My brother was coming over that day and see who's coming over.
TK Dutes:And I hit them both. I said, y'all are on the way. Some shit is going down. One of y'all needs to get here just in case it goes down further. And then I call I texted my friend.
TK Dutes:Thanks god for, like, knowing just different people. And she's done in, like, maternal wellness, and she knows shit about the womb. And I'm like, this bitch got something for me. I know it. I told her what happened.
TK Dutes:She said, get these herbs. This is gonna help with the bleeding. And then, of course, go see somebody.
Kristen Bennett:Right.
TK Dutes:I get I text them. I'm like, somebody go to the store. Get these fucking herbs. I started slamming down this fucking herb.
TK Dutes:I eventually found my way to a doctor. And they told me that my fibroids had gotten so bad that I needed to have surgery to stay healthy.
TK Dutes:That was the main event, but that was a lead up. What was happening was I wasn't paying attention to my body in the lead up. I did know something was happening.
Kristen Bennett:For a while.
TK Dutes:For a while. Because why was my period ten, twelve, fourteen, twenty days? Why am I sleeping on towels? Why do I feel why did I let's be real. It's gonna be real here.
TK Dutes:I stopped having sex with people because I was embarrassed. I didn't know what was gonna show itself. Come right. Yeah. Right?
TK Dutes:And I was like, if I don't aggravate it, then I just so now now you having problems in life manifesting in your body. You having self esteem issues. I feel like a wild animal. I felt like a wild animal in my bed, right? Making stains everywhere, throwing out countless amounts of underwear, walking around like, what's the best pad to use?
TK Dutes:Nigga doing pad research. Like, why? So feeling like a wild animal, working in a abusive situation, trying to protect my team that was being abused as well, it was too much. So that moment for me, I don't think I decided to change my life, but I decided something had to change. And I think that was the beginning of whatever this this is.
Kristen Bennett:So you connected, it seems like pretty early on, the stress that was happening in your life to it manifesting in your body. Yeah.
TK Dutes:Because that undercurrent was always with me watching other people. Like, my mom, she's always on. I didn't realize like that's her baseline is to always be on a quest for a stress free life because it's not easy for you and like nothing has ever been easy for us. So I'm like, why is she perpetually like breathing? Like she really be breathing like a pregnant woman.
TK Dutes:Keisha, you just need to breathe. She, I'm like, do you haven't had a child since 1989, but yet in '20 perpetual stress relief. Like, I'm like, oh, because life sucks. So, like, this disappointment is really a lifetime. And I've been identifying the points in my lifetime to get here and finally say, fuck that.
TK Dutes:Now what does fuck that look like?
TK Dutes:Alright. This is usually the part when the producer shares how everything landed with them. But this time, I want to ask you to come with me to part two, also produced by Kristen Bennett. Like I said, I truly could not have started this process without her. And I can't wait for you to hear how she's holding all this and whether she's ever walked through what Doctor.
TK Dutes:Rawls and I have. So go ahead and hit play on part two and let me know what you think in the comments here or on socials at tastyquiche or at philosfuturemedia on IG. I'm dying to hear from you because I know I'm not the only one. Thank you to Doctor. Nicole Rawls formerly known as Doctor.
TK Dutes:Truezel This episode was executive produced and hosted by me, Keisha T. K. Dutess. Written, produced, and sound designed by the award winning illustrious Kristen Bennett. Additional audio support and engineering from another heavy hitter, my brother from another, Manny faces.
TK Dutes:Thank you to my most righteous dude bro, Pat Mesiti- Miller for providing our intro and outro theme. Marketing support is by FM Digital's Fabian Mickens, aka one of my top five and yours, Liquid. Show art and episode art by my fellow first gen sis Gabrielle Smith. Look closely at the work. It is fire.
TK Dutes:Special thank you to Melissa Danielle, my friend and the holistic wellness coach that helped me get the herbs I needed when things got really rough. And if you would like to go behind the scenes of my secret life, join my Patreon for special BTS episodes and moments for paid members. Patreon.com/secretlifeoftk. Yeah. About to put some glaze all over these cakes.
TK Dutes:Yeah. So anyway, that's my story of how I don't fuck with the movie Ghost Dog. Thank you, and good night.