The Weight We Carry: Loving Black Girlhood Without Stealing It

Black women are often the first thieves of Black girlhood. The policing of our bodies, attitudes, and brilliance doesn’t start with the world. It begins with us. Our fears, our traumas, our inherited survival instincts. We do it because we know what the world does to Black girls. But in trying to protect them from it, we end up mimicking it.

I wrote that paragraph after reading a Thread by Amanda Eaddy McKeithan. She asked: “If fear wasn’t a factor, what truth would you write first?”

That question cracked me open something bad!!!!

Because I’ve carried this truth for three decades tucked behind every raised eyebrow, every silent correction, every internal “that’s too much” I’ve ever whispered to myself or projected on to another little Black girl who didn’t deserve it.

Amanda’s prompt gave me freedom to write what I’d only ever thought. To finally unpack the way we as a community have confused protection with policing, and how early that harm begins.

The first time I was told I was “doing too much,” I wasn’t even in middle school.

Too grown. Too developed. Too opinionated.

The same outfits my classmates wore? Suddenly “not age appropriate” because of the kind of attention it would get. I learned early that I could either be cute or covered. Smart or humble. Seen or safe, but never all at once. So I spent my teens and early adulthood rebelling against the idea that I had to choose. And the ONE time I tried it their way, I lost myself so bad, I'm STILL in therapy trying to find her. 

I have always wanted something different for my daughter.

That’s why I chose a school where the majority of the staff are Black women. Women my age. Women I thought would understand how deeply I wanted to protect her girlhood — because I’m still learning how to process what was taken from mine.

But back in May, they called me about her outfit — a dress, mind you, nothing inappropriate — I immediately felt that familiar ache in my chest. And Instead of bringing a change of clothing like suggested, I did something different.

I didn’t storm into the building to angrily defend her right to wear what she wants. I showed up to mirror who she’d one day grow to be. Same style dress. Similar curves. Same unapologetic confidence.

And do you know what I was met with? Warmth. Encouragement. Affirmation.

Older Black moms seasoned from raising older daughters through this exact phase—smiled and said, “She’s gonna be a problem.” And not in the way the world usually says it. With love. With admiration. With pride. Because my daughter worked that presentation space with equal parts brilliance, beauty, and unshakable self-belief.

She’s was never the problem. And neither are any other young Black girls exploring their world, learning to be, express, and find their voice. They're proof  that we can raise girls who don’t internalize our shame. That we can disrupt cycles without punishing the parts of them that shine.

Now, the truth is, I didn’t arrive at this clarity by myself.

I leaned on two of the women who know me best: singer Imani Gooden and Jamillah Hankerson, founder of Mix It Up Body Products; women whose friendship holds space for my joy, my rage, and my little girl wounds. When that school situation happened, I didn’t hesitate to FaceTime them. Because that version of me — the little Black girl who once felt too loud, too curvy, too smart, too “grown”— still needs reassurance. Still needs to know she wasn’t wrong for existing in her fullness.

Their responses didn’t disappoint. They celebrated how I chose to show up. They centered my daughter's childlike energy and brilliant mind. Her stories. Her softness. They reminded me that I’m not alone in wanting better. And that wanting better is not betraying the beauty there is in how I was raised. So sis, 

If you’ve ever silenced a Black girl in the name of safety…

If you’ve ever doubted your own softness because no one protected it…

If you’re still trying to unlearn how shame dressed itself up as love in your childhood…

You are not the villain. We don’t have to be the first thieves. We can be the first witnesses. The first believers. The first freedom-givers.

Whether you're in your 30s, trying to parent, mentor, and re-parent yourself in real-time. Or you’re in your 50s, just realizing how much was taken from you…hear me when I say, you deserve to be free from the belief that control equals care.

You deserve to feel proud of the parts of yourself they told you to hide. You deserve to raise and support girls who get to live their girlhood, not defend it. Let’s stop trying to make them “less.” Let’s make the world more ready for them. And while we’re at it? Let’s make space for the girls we used to be.