It's so hard being a woman.
It's so hard being a woman with her shit together.
I have these moments in my car when I like it quiet. I turn everything off even my phone and just ride to my destination in silence. These times allow me to be still but most of the time these moments allow me to cry. Sometimes I don't even know what I'm emotional about but tears still find their way down my face.
The other day I was having a fairly good day and I was driving home and began to weep. I would cry then stop and try to figure out why the hell I was crying. Then I would start crying again, I don't know if it was residual tears from my original cry or the fact that I was unaware of why I was crying. I heard a voice in my head say, some tears are just because it's hard being a woman. It's hard to be a great sister friend. It's hard to try & shatter the glass ceiling. It's hard to make sure you don't fit the negative stereotype when you meet a Whitman. It's hard to work 10x as hard as your male counterpart for half the recognition & pay. It's hard to be everything to everybody. It's hard to come out about abuse. It's hard to be a great mother. It's hard to be a great wife. It's even harder to be both. It's hard to debate being a woman and maybe not wanting children or to be married. It's hard leaving my house with my bald head and being gawked at because as a woman I should have hair. It's hard being a single woman. It's hard being a black woman. It's hard being a woman. It's just hard.
I had to realize that these tears don't make me weak, they make me self aware. They make me aware that even in the midst of me being focused on my goals, my career, my life, that my soul acknowledges I need a release. It's a beautiful thing to be able to let go, even if for a minute. Even if the letting go doesn't heal my hurt, it still gave me a second to be hurt. I feel like being a woman gives you the freedom to release emotion at any given moment without cause. So if I want to randomly cry in my car and not have a direct reason why, I can because I am a woman.
And just so you know, you're doing great. You are a great friend, you are a great mother, you are a great wife, you are a great woman.
#dearWomen Let it out