theblackbradshaw-blog

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The Black Bradshaw Turns 30!

Today marks my entrance into the phase of a woman’s life that I refer to as GROWN grown. I survived my 20s, a time period that was ripe with issues, troubles, and barriers. I learned so many lessons and the one I appreciate the most is that the moves you make in your 20s set you up for success or failure in your 30s. I stressed a lot. I didn’t make any time for myself. I didn’t take care of my skin, because being blessed with good genes, I didn’t think it required any extra care. I made a lot of wrong turns because I thought I was grown and didn’t need to seek guidance.

But in every action, every obstacle, every event - there was a lesson to be learned. And while I celebrate my birthday, I want to share those with you.

My child is my greatest legacy - Everything I do now is to make sure that his life is a reflection of the work that I put in to break generational curses and establish an unshakeable foundation.

It’s okay to be an Angry Black Woman, you just have to make your anger effective

Understanding the full spectrum of my emotions - and how amazing and incredibly powerful it is to be able to feel and process those feelings.

Realizing my passion and working towards that - My career consists of doing something I love while giving back within my community. It makes going to work every day easier. Nothing is perfect, but all of it is worth it.

I don’t need drugs to deal with life - I smoked a lot of weed in my 20s, trying to get outside my head and ignore my feelings. I now live a life that I don’t need to constantly escape from. I’m dealing with everything as it comes. No more hiding.

These last ten years, I discovered who I am, as a capable, beautiful, ambitious black woman. Looking forward, these next ten years will uncover more of my talent and ability. I’ll exist comfortably, wearing my confidence like a second skin. 

Follow me on this fascinating journey. . . 

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

Happy Black History Month

It’s so important that you affirm yourself as a black person, here in America. This doesn’t mean that you need to be happy and pressed about your blackness 24/7/365. No one would ever deny that existing as a black person comes with a unique set of challenges and roadblocks. But know that you are black and understand what that means for your life. I like to think about the fact that my existence, your existence, is proof that African heritage, African lineage did not die out with slavery. We can’t negate the truth that millions did not make it, but there are so many that did! And over four centuries, they lived their lives in a way that established their right, and subsequently our right to exist on this land, this country they built on their backs with free labor. Their fights, their contributions, their political engagements all brought us to this point in time where you and I exist.

“To be young, gifted, and black; oh what a lovely, precious thing.” - Nina Simone

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Stilettos, Numb Toes, & Letting Go

The truest glow-up is when you get older and realize how much you did not know when you were younger. For instance, because of my strained relationship with my mother, for many years, I suffered from abandonment issues (shoutout to my therapist for helping me unpack that). Fear of abandonment from people I loved or cared for made me hold on to a lot of what was toxic and harmful to me, all in the sake of not letting go or being let go.

I am older and wiser because of all that I have experienced since then. I know now that for me to ascend to higher forms of my existence, I have to shed dead weight. When you’re catching flights, not feelings, do you know how much it costs to bring extra baggage? I can’t do it. And I won’t.  Learn how to let go, Sis.

For the past week, I’ve been nursing three numb toes. I could easily place blame on the below-freezing temperatures and an uninvited snowstorm that took hold of my city, but the truth of the matter is, I was trying to be cute.

A week ago, I attended the annual party for the company Joe works for. This is a company I used to work for (it’s where I met Joe), so I had every intention of walking in the room as the stated bad bitch everyone knows that I am. And I was fine as hell okay! Together, WE served looks, but zoom in on these shoes.

 This 4.5-inch floral print heel is not a “party” shoe, and if I’m being transparent, it’s a shoe I’ve worn a total of five times in the three years that I’ve owned it. It’s time to let her go. My process of letting shoes go is the same process I have for letting anything go. I follow these three steps.

How much risk do I invite into my life by holding onto this?                  

If I choose to hold on to something, what are the chances that this thing will hurt me or hold me back in the future? As cute as these shoes are and as many things that I have in my wardrobe to pair them with, every time I put them on my feet for more than five minutes I suffer. I run the risk of damaging the veins in my toes to the point of no return. No heel is worth that. Apply this same principle to relationships. If the risk is greater than the reward, detach.

 Can I afford to live without this thing?                                                   

This is not so complicated with a pair of shoes when there are many more boxes waiting in my closet for their moment to shine. With relationships and opportunities, though, the area is a bit more gray. Last year, I was working as a Customer Service representative for a company that I respected as a helping hand in my community. I wanted to climb the ladder at this company and become a part of that helping hand. They paid me a livable wage and I enjoyed my time there. However, when I learned that the career ladder was incredibly short and movement on it was dependent on someone vacating a longheld position, I set my sights on something else. It didn’t take long to find a job that can easily be molded into a career within the industry I want to work in. There were some tradeoffs, but ultimately, the circumstances surrounding my life tell me that I don’t need to work at a job that doesn’t serve my best interests just to make ends meet. So I let that go too.

 Everybody Can’t Go                                                                      

Different phases of your life will call for different energies, resources, and ultimately circles. In a time where people wax poetic about loyalty and relationships that hold constant throughout time, I’m here to suggest that there’s always a different way of doing things. Everybody can’t go where you are destined to go. If you resist this truth, certain relationships will be brought to the point of pain to get you to see that sometimes it's better, healthier, to let go. This is the hardest one to reconcile with because letting go of people is no easy task. It may hurt to lose contact with someone who has held you down forever and vice versa, but it might hurt you much more to hold on to them when your life is showing you that its time to let go.

In all of these situations, you have to be aware of what’s going on in your life and how your actions are influencing that. Pay attention to how you feel about things; often your intuition will let you know when its time to cut the attachments. When it does, don’t fight against what you know, even if it hurts. 

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

What’s Next: Life After Achievement

After you’ve checked off every goal on the list, what then? If you are like me and get a natural high from achievement, how do you continually get your fix? If you’ve ever done any recreational drug, you know that coming down from a high can be painful mentally and emotionally, and in some extreme cases, even physically. So what do you do?

Most recently, like December 14, 2018, I reached the bottom of my goal list. This goal list I created for myself in my early 20s, and set it up to be completed before I turned 30. I’ve never been one to set lofty, unrealistic goals. I’ve only ever wanted for things that I need to take my life to the next level. Although my childhood was stable, it was still characterized by lack. I remember using Food Stamps when they were actually printed, colorful notes with different dollar amounts. So any time I’ve set a goal, it's been realistic, and in the pursuit of ensuring my basic needs are met.

I dropped out of college two years after starting. There’s a list of reasons I could give you that could apply, but at the root of it is that I didn’t know what I was doing. Going back to school was always on that goal list, to be achieved before 30, but so many of life’s stories slowed me down. I had my son, got into a long-term relationship that drained more from me than was ever poured back, and I lost both my parents. The road to achievement was paved with many obstacles, but somewhere in the mess, I barreled through despite those road-blocks. I sat down in my first class in seven years in January 2016 and completed my journey in December 2018.

Pride. Overwhelming joy. Accomplished. Just a couple of words to describe what I was feeling as I walked across the stage to the sound of my friends and family cheering my name. It was a true moment in time where I felt that I lived up to my daily mantra “I am THAT b*tch.”

A few days passed, and as I got ready to celebrate the holidays with good food, gifts, and a string of days off work, sadness overcame me. I had achieved one of my greatest goals but I couldn’t muster up the proper amount of happiness. I was listless, restless, and unsure of what to do next. For the last few weeks, I’ve been asking “what now?”

Normally, the response is to set new goals. Create a new list! This is the year I enter my 30s, I am in an entirely new decade of my existence. Why shouldn’t I create a new list to correspond to this woman I have become and continue to turn into? How will I become a better version of myself if I don’t lay the necessary groundwork?

Goals are the soul of achievement, this is true. Setting a goal is how you determine what you want from this life and how to get it for yourself. Reaching those goals brings a level of personal enlightenment you can’t get from anything else. But, what the four-weeks post-graduation has taught me, is that there is so much more to life than setting and achieving goals. I don’t know exactly what I’m going to do in my 30s. There are things that I want to happen and right now I am in a space to let them happen organically.

I want to be less focused on creating a vision board that I stare at daily to direct me in life and more focused on living the life I envisioned for myself so many years ago. This is not a knock to vision boards and goal lists, they got me through tough times and out of well-dug holes. I am saying that I am simplifying the process from setting goals - > achievement. Going after the things on my vision boards often left me exhausted and gave me little time to do anything else. I was socially absent for the second half of my 20s because I was driven to tick off every box on the list.

I don’t want 30+ to look like that. In this decade, I am going to enjoy the fruits of those labors from my 20s. Spending insane amounts of time with my family and friends is most important because those connections drive me in their own way. Who knows what’s next? Babies? Marriage? Backpacking through Europe? Stepping away from a structured vision via a goal list will allow me to explore any and every option.

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Follow The Black Bradshaw on IG for more content focused on being a black woman in love, in the city, in great clothes! 

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Surviving

I had a different blog planned this week about goal-setting and achievement, but these thoughts overwhelmed me and found themselves on this page instead. The Surviving R. Kelly six-part docuseries premiered this week. I, like much of Black Twitter, flocked to Lifetime to see what kind of information would be exposed that hadn’t already been shared. I only watched the first two episodes of the mini-series, in which they briefly discussed his inappropriate sexual and romantic relationship to the late singer Aaliyah, but gave a much stronger highlight to stories of women I’d never heard of.

All of the stories shared a similar theme: a young girl in her teens was approached by R. Kelly or his camp and she was told that he would help turn her into a star via dancing, singing, etc. Instead of sharing their talents with R. Kelly and being catapulted into stardom and success, they were turned into his sex slaves, for lack of a better word. These women were cut off from their families and friends, locked away in apartments or rooms 24 hours a day, had all of their movement monitored and restricted, and were forced to engage in many sexual acts with R. Kelly and sometimes other women.

Without needing to hear this same story fall from the lips of multiple women, I am assured in the deepest depths of my heart that R. Kelly is a pedophile. There is no argument to be made against this fact that doesn’t represent how much people don’t give a fuck about black women and children in this world. And that’s really all there is to say about that.

With the #MeToo movement and the social climate moving towards making men reap what they have sown against women for so many years. When all of this first kicked off, I was excited to see R. Kelly finally be called to the front for his many crimes against black girls. But as each day passed and every name was called but his, I left the clouds I had my head in and dropped back into reality.

The hard truth that everyone who is not a black woman wants to beat around: Nobody gives a fuck about black girls and women. Except for black girls and women, and sometimes not even them. The sexual perversion against us has been taking place since the time of slave owners and the enslaved. We were nothing but property then, granted no agency or choice over our own bodies and the life they produced; and a lot of times it feels like those same sentiments are apart of our reality today.

I didn’t finish the docuseries. Seeing and hearing other women speak out about the trauma of being victimized in girlhood by a predator was t r i g g e r i n g for me, so I turned it off. I periodically checked in on the Twitter hashtag, for updates and to see how other black women were handling the rawness of the series. It was evident that we were all having the same responses to what was playing out. Disgust. Sadness. For some of us, our own memories were coming to the surface.

At the age of seven, I was assaulted by a family member. I never told anyone, and in the years that followed, I was confused about my own sexuality and what role men were supposed to play. I racked up a multitude of other uncomfortable, sexual situations with the opposite sex, which further skewed my perspective on sex and safety as a young woman in this world. I eventually went to therapy to start and complete the healing of those wounds.

Therapy helped me unpack so much about what happened to me and all of the stigma surrounding it. I felt dirty and ashamed as if I had done something wrong. The comments that were made about my body as it developed, although common for many black girls, was not normal, and none of it was because of anything that I had done wrong. The root cause of sexual assault of black girls is not a lack of innocence in black girls, is not because black girls are fast, is not because black girls have shapely, curvy bodies. The root cause is predators and pedophiles.

My response to violence and harm transposed against black women is aggressive and violent. I have always been willing and ready to go to bat for us because I know that many will not. I’ve been known for having a quick drag ready for anyone who goes against protecting black women. As I’ve grown, my desire to argue and debate has declined. I will always be available to educate and exchange information, but I refuse to argue about my own humanity and right to exist peacefully. I, like so many before and after me, survived my sexual assault. A part of my survival and continued inner peace is reaching back to help bring other women into spaces for healing and surviving.

If you’re reading this and identify, I hope you’ve survived as well. Reach out with any thoughts, comments, or questions.

Love.

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

My Top 3 Lessons of 2018

I’ve been in my head all day rounding up the lessons and the energy that this year has given me. I know that we all feel like this has been the longest year ever, and in a lot of ways, I agree. It has been lengthy and drawn out, but I’ve enjoyed many of the moments. Moments that I’ve taken gems from that I am carrying into the new year.

1. Be Present for the Living 

It can be hard to be both a mother and a child when you have to bury your parents. I buried both of mine some years ago, and for the better part of my adult years, that has left a hole in my heart, in my life. Holidays have never been the same. At times of challenge and adversity, I’ve felt empty and lost. 

While attending a Thanksgiving meal with my son’s paternal grandmother and her family, everyone in attendance went around and spoke on what they were thankful for. One of the elders made a comment about being grateful for the ability to be present for her family. “Let the dead be dead. Focus on life and the living.” It might seem harsh, but there’s a bold truth to consider. Do not get so wrapped up in your loss that you forget to live your life. I miss my parents all the time, but much more than I miss them, I love the people that I get to show up for every day. Placing my energy there ensures that I am consistently present for my living loved ones. 

2. Deal With a Man Who is as Solid as You Are 

If you know that YOU got you and that you’ve always made moves in your best interest, you have to pair with a significant other that would only do the same. 2018 was full of transitions. With the reality of a 300-hour unpaid internship looming over me, I had to figure out the best situation that would allow me to keep my finances in check, be available to my son, and finish out strong in my final semester of school. 

Here’s where that solid partner steps in. Joe decided that what was most important for our relationship at that time was for me to achieve the goals I had set in place long before he was ever apart of the picture. He is a provider, making sure his family is taken care of is a trait that’s just built into his core.

I am able to achieve, not only because of my talent and hard work but because I have a man standing behind me helping with the insanity of the balancing act. 

3. Everything is Love

As a naturally introverted, antisocial individual, it can be difficult to make genuine lasting connections with other humans. In my professional life, I am charged with building connections with the clients I serve as well as the different resources and organizations in the city I could potentially refer them to. *Cue social anxiety* In the past six months, I’ve gotten better at this, and I owe it to the fact that I realize everything is love. Passion work has to come from a place of love to be done well. When you deal exclusively with other souls, there has to be an understanding of love and how love is what makes everything possible. Not romantic love but Agape love. Selfless, unconditional, the method for connecting spirits. All of life gets easier when everything flows from love.

I am taking these three powerful lessons with me into the year that I turn 30. I know 2019 is going to satisfy a lot of my personal and familial desires, and I believe that with this additional knowledge I’ll be able to achieve more for myself and my others.

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

Black Women, Stress, and How to Live Healthier

At the intersection of black and woman, a lot of magical shit takes place. Strength, resilience, undeniable beauty, intellect, and success are just a few of the adjectives you can use to describe black women. For so many years, black women have championed getting the job done; the job being taking care of home and everyone in it. By any means necessary is not just a catchy slogan, its a way of life for a lot of black women. We are mothers, sisters, friends, lovers, and with each title, a slice of our pie is taken and given to someone else. And most, if not all black women, wouldn’t have it any other way.

The idea of a black woman putting herself last at the benefit of someone else is not new and it's not really even talked about in our communities. It's more like an unspoken rule we are taught in childhood. In our early years, we learn that being born female means that you are meant to give and take care of others. Don’t complain about your birthright, just step into position when it’s time to. We bend over backward to make sure that those we are connected to, those who depend on us, are taken care of. We’re the last person on that list and ironically enough, we never have enough energy, time, or resources to make it to the bottom of the list.

This m.o. Is dangerous for us. The stress we incur from placing everyone’s burdens on our backs is killing us, literally. I don’t know if the caregiver trait is nature or nurture or a blend of both, but we don’t have to be eternally bound to something that instigates our own downfall.

I’m talking about being selfish. At least, that is how other people will see it when you put yourself first. The self-care and mindfulness trend that’s taken over social media has us on the right track. But it's about way more than a nail appointment and spending your time drinking wine in your living room. It’s about placing yourself at the top of your list of priorities. All of that care and compassion that we selflessly give to others, has to be turned inward. The person that we most need to be concerned with taking care of is ourselves.

When’s the last time you got at least 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep? How many times in this past week have you extended yourself for the benefit of someone else? Now ask yourself this: how many of those people that you extended yourself to would turn around and do the same for you? I don’t have to guess at the number because I know. I’ve fallen victim to my own version of martyrdom, and it left much to be desired in life. The majority of my adolescence, all of my teenage years, and part of my adult years were spent caring for my father. He was chronically ill, and with most of my siblings missing in action, I put that burden on my back. I don’t regret it, but it did place a stress on me that no young woman should ever have to bear.

At 22, I had my son. Motherhood is a different type of stress, but a stress nonetheless. It didn’t take me too long to realize that I could not afford to give more to others than I gave to myself, because that would set me and my son back. I am a few months away from 30, and in the last few months of this year specifically, I’ve done a complete audit on my life. I’ve gone over every relationship, situation, investment, activity, etc with a fine-toothed comb and asked myself three questions.

How does this serve me and my family?

How does this serve others?

What kind of stress does this give me?

I found that there were things and people in my life that were stressing me to a point of physical discomfort. For example, I’d lay awake at night, perplexed by the current state of the country because of a bunch of “hot takes” I’d read on social media that day. Or I’d run myself into exhaustion because I was trying to be present for everybody while also working full time, mothering full time, and going to school full time. I cut strings and left a lot of things behind this year, and although it was difficult, it has made all the difference. I already have hypertension, there is no need to exacerbate my health issues trying to fix everyone else’s problems. From now and moving forward, life is about stressing less.

I’m going to close with this note: I know our mothers, our grandmothers, and our great-grandmothers have carried entire families on their backs, and let us never be anything other than grateful for that. But our generation has to be the change. We have to decide that things don’t have to be this way and aspire to something different, for the sake of our happiness but most importantly, for the sake of our health.

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

Love yourself more. 

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

What’s the Secret to Proactive Dating?

Preparation and being honest with yourself.

There are so many things wrong with dating in the 21st century, but I can guarantee you it’s not because women aren’t who MEN think they need to be to be “wifed” or seen as worthy of respect and proper treatment.

If you care enough about what men think to alter who you are, this post might not be for you. I’m talking to and for the women that understand the game and how to play it. To pretend that the game isn’t being played is naive and often dangerous for women.

Let me tell you a short story.

In high school, for whatever cheesy ass reason you can come up with, I fell in love with the guy who was my best friend. He was two years ahead of me, but we were both nerdy creatives and clicked on almost every aspect of life. Two years into our friendship, I was a sophomore, he a senior and getting ready to graduate, I wrote him a long letter confessing to my feelings for him. He told me that he loved me too but that I was too young for him. This was a plausible denial for me. He was legally an adult and going off to college to live his life around other “adults.” I figured that was something I could live with.

Until a few weeks later, I found out he had a thing for one of the girls in my class. They dated, and I maintained my friendship with him even though he had blatantly lied because it allowed me to keep close to him.

Let me tell you another story. Fast Forward two years. It’s MY senior year, and I’m breaking out of the shy shell that held me back all of high school. I realize that college will provide me with an opportunity to spread my wings just to see how far I can fly. My “best friend” has now become my first lover and my first love. I’m wrapped up in the very thought of being with him, having his babies, and growing old together. He writes me poems about how the stars in my eyes soothe the internal beast he’s kept caged. He tells me he loves me every day, but he is still in a relationship with this same girl, who years ago was “too young” for him. My rose-colored glasses have a crack in them. The day before I graduated I gave him an ultimatum, “me or her” I foolishly told him, not knowing that being chosen by a man who had already proven how little he cared about me wasn’t a win in any way.

So he “chose” me. We dated exclusively. I finally had my man. For years, I played the part, I was so eager to prove myself as worthy of the love that was not even mediocre. At best, it was ill-fated, lust-driven codependence. The sex was good. He was creative like me, so we found solace in creating around our individual wounds and pains. We had fun together. But every chance he got, he turned against me to satisfy his own desires. I never did find the basis for those desires, and the older I get and the more distance I put between me and that relationship, the more I realize I don’t care. It doesn’t matter why. What is important is realizing and accepting the truth; he played the game with my heart and my body like it was his favorite pastime.

An understanding of the fuckery a man will put a woman through doesn’t change the reality of it happening. The only thing that prevents women from being harmed by the abuse and mistreatment of men is an understanding of how and when to LEAVE those men behind.  

It took me years and a lot of psychological and physical setbacks for me to leave that relationship and stay gone. After I cut the final string that tethered us together, life moved differently. A heavy weight was lifted off of my shoulders. There was some sadness, but it was nothing compared to what I felt, every day in that relationship.  

I made the mistake of thinking that admission of “I love you” meant a man was not running his game and pulling the wool over my eyes. Sometimes the “I love you” is genuine, and sometimes it is just a means to an end. I urge you to consider the source, the timing, and ultimately the reason why those words are being said. You have to be able to view your relationship from an objective perspective to be assured that you’re not the hitter’s lick.

You can be emotional. You can be in love. You can hope for the best and daydream about a future with him, but you’re doing yourself a disservice if you don’t actively prepare and prevent yourself from being played for a fool. There are people (women) that will say being calculated in this way takes the fun out of dating, but it’s my honest belief that having a calculated approach to dating takes the drama and heartbreak out of it, making it a more freeing and enjoyable experience.

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

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The Power & Importance of Confidence

About a week ago, a dear girlfriend stopped by my house for fellowship and to show her support for this next step I've made with my boyfriend. We sat and talked for quite a while. We talked about everything, her transitions, my own, dating, our kids. The list could go on. The thing from our conversation that stuck with me long after she left was an affirmation she kept repeating.

 "I am enough."

 "I am" is one of the most powerful beginnings to a statement because whatever follows after it is what you declare for yourself and your life. To say to yourself, "I am enough" is to speak in the space of acceptance and confidence that might be otherwise unprecedented in your life. After she left, I went into the bathroom and stared at myself a little bit, and then I spoke the statement out loud.

"I am enough."

 Of course, it was quiet. The words didn't fall on deaf ears. I waited a few seconds to see if anything would change and then I repeated it. Nothing magical happened that night. I felt a little weird, but there was nothing to write home about. A few days later, I was getting ready for date night. Dressed to kill, I knew that I looked good, and when I looked in the mirror that night, I felt it. I stared into my own brown eyes, smiled and said, "I am beautiful." And then I giggled.

 Joe, who was behind me tying his tie, looked up and stared at me with the crazy eye. He asked me if I was okay and I told him that I was more than.

 "I am enough."

 I repeated it again, and the weird feeling from the other night didn't return. Instead, I realized that I couldn't stop smiling. My hands roamed over the satin dress and met each curve with gratitude and understanding. It's me. In the only body I've ever had and will ever have. And in this body, I am enough.

What power that has; to take the acceptance into your own hands. To base your self-esteem on the value that you see without needing it to be validated by external sources. I know the pain of feeling like you're at the bottom of the social order because you don't look like what "pretty" is described as by the media. Telling yourself that you are enough is recognition of the fact that as you are, as you have always been, is beautiful, worthy and deserving.

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

you are the whole universe. but society teaches limitations

unknown

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For Colored Girls Who’ve Cut Their Hair When Life is Too Much

Do you feel like your hair is connected to you in a spiritual way? As if your memories, thoughts, and secrets are interwoven into each strand? The saying goes that if a woman cuts all her hair off, she is ready for a big change. As a woman who has dramatically cut her hair over five times, I can vouch for the truth in that statement. Most recently, like yesterday, I did a big chop; letting go of the locs that have framed my face for the last 4.5 years.

People keep asking me how I feel. The only words that come to mind are free and liberated. New. But the reality is I feel like me. For the past year and a half I have been toying with the idea of changing my hairstyle. Not because I held a disdain for my locs; I loved them. They were as much apart of my growth as the rest of the things I’ve encountered during this journey to 30. But something inside of me shifted, and it bothered me that my outside did not reflect my inside.

I felt the discomfort of holding on to parts of me that it was time to let go of, but I wasn’t necessarily ready to make that change. So many people over the years had approached me about my locs, telling me how beautiful I was, and how refreshing it was to see a black woman embracing her natural (read: nappy) black hair. When I fell in love with my hair, other people took notice. An aura of acceptance and love of the natural made me feel beautiful in a way I never had before. I was a beautiful black woman. I knew it, and other people knew it too.

Fast forward almost five years. I have lived so many experiences in those few years. Experiences that I have attached to that girl. That look. And as loved and amazing as she may be, I am not that girl anymore. I’ve shed a couple of layers and knocked some of the chips off of my shoulder. My current existence and journey requires much less baggage than I am used to traveling with. Cutting off my locs was the logical next step in the journey to whatever my 30s are going to bring. These next few chapters of the story require vulnerability and a fresh look. An upgrade.

I am trusting that in this process, my beauty will remain if not magnify with this cut. Besides, hair can be beautiful but it does not a beautiful woman make.

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

How Getting Rid of Keys Closed a Chapter in My Life

Today I turned the keys in for the apartment I called home for the last three years. It was a small, basement apartment in a large apartment complex. The neighbors were always loud and rowdy. I lived down the street from a popular concert hall so there was never any street parking in front of my building. I had windows that couldn’t open and were too high up to let any natural sunlight flow into my apartment. It was far from perfect, but for a long time, it was my sanctuary from the world. My safe space. 

It served as the background for a lot of the stories I have to tell. The memories I’ve created would shake the future tenants, if walls could talk. 

Anywho, my time there has come to an end, as I have taken the next step in my long-term relationship and moved in with my boyfriend. I want him to be my husband and the future father to anymore children I have, but before I give him that privilege, I’ve got to know if I can tolerate him 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, for an endless amount of years. 

Realistically, this entire arrangement terrifies me. I love my man. He is my biggest fan, supporter, best friend, confidante, great debater and so much more. However, when I think about sharing space with a man in this way, giving up my own to combine our lives, I can’t help but to think about what happened the last time I lived with a man.  

I was young, dumb, and in love. In love enough to want to clean up behind a man and wash his dirty drawers, but not smart enough to understand the economics and reality of cohabitation in a long-term relationship. We tore each other down, for lack of knowing how to handle our differences and the struggles we faced as young parents.

When I left that relationship, I did not know if I would ever again share a living space with a man. Fast Forward six years, and I am more aware of myself and what it takes to sustain a long-term relationship. I honestly believe I’m with the man who this can work with. So although I signed off on a chapter of my life when I dropped the keys into the property manager’s hands this morning, I know without a doubt that I am going to fill so many pages with the stories from this next chapter in my life. 

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

Get Rid of Men That Know Your Worth but Can’t Afford It

On my list of fuck-ups, a.k.a ex-boyfriends, there’s one who gave me game that helped me to understand the importance of knowing my worth. One day, while laying in bed with this particular asshole, we were having a conversation about the ways men and women “use” each other. He told me that men will get into a relationship with a woman that they don’t like when its beneficial to them. It wasn’t until our relationship ended that I realized that our arrangement was defined by this truth.

And what a truth it is. A woman is the most magnificent part of this simulation that we call life. In any situation or whatever her social status she is, she’s resourceful and knowledgeable to the point that she is able to navigate and survive a world that despises her. In the past, life has been able to blind us to our own talents, accomplishments, and contributions. And when a woman is unaware of her value, people who are less than jump at the opportunity to take advantage.

My boyfriend didn’t like me, and even though the sex was Top 5 best (literally our only binding factor), I’m now very sure he wasn’t even attracted to me. He was loyal to his need for me. What I brought to the table is what kept him around for so long. He thrived on making me feel like my accomplishments were small, but didn’t hesitate to use those accomplishments for his own benefit.

For a brief period in my dating life, I believed the things men would lie to me about. So I didn’t know my worth. I wanted to be somebody’s girlfriend. I didn’t consider what I brought to the table other than romance and femininity. I never took into account my literal book smarts; the fact that I’ve always made and spent my own money, my motherhood, and the talents god gave me. All of these things plus some have been the foundation for a life mostly lived without immense struggle and lack. I thought I needed a man to be a bad bitch.

Imagine that.

I’ve struggled through those things to learn what’s real about me and what that means for my dating options. I will never again provide for a man who has made it evident that I am just a sum of what I can offer for him when he is not even a small part of the equation. I have learned what my worth is, and it’s my greatest desire that you know yours. Examine yourself and your contributions to your relationships. Add up your value and then fill your dating pool with people that can afford it.

[theblackbradshaw-blog]

What a time to be alive. Black women in multiple shades covering magazines; showcasing just one of the many aspects of the #BlackGirlMagic. I love us.