In this multidirectional episode, Dr. Azumah shares how the fiery flames of a burning car taught her empathy and made her a better doctor. She also explains the impact of racism on how a person of colour experiences impostor syndrome and why empowering black and brown girls should be prioritized. In addition, she described the role of where one lives in a person’s life outcomes.
Nuggets of wisdom in this episode
It's good to plan, but it's also good to be flexible in life
We've experienced a lot of prejudice and racism, and empowering girls that look like us is a way of transferring the hurt, the pain
Prophylactically empowering young black girls, young brown girls will help them be confident and increase their trajectory for success
It's hard for your brain to release creativity if you are scared that you’re not supposed to be in that space
There's no race better than your race
There's a correlation between confidence and performance
There's a role for non black people to be allies because allies help create equity
References in this episode
Your body language may shape who you are
Martin Luther King Jr’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail where he talked about the guilt of the silent majority
To learn more about Dr. Ebere Azumah’s work and connect with her, visit Love Your Menses and Azumah Solutions.
Join the Messy Can't Stop Her Sisterhood at https://www.facebook.com/groups/3204395256540448/
If you would love to share your story on the #MessyCantStopHer podcast, click here to let me know.
Thank you so much for listening.
Music Credit: https://indiefy.me/wanted-carter
In this multidirectional episode, Dr. Azumah shares how the fiery flames of a burning car taught her empathy and made her a better doctor. She also explains the impact of racism on how a person of colour experiences impostor syndrome and why empowering black and brown girls should be prioritized. In addition, she described the role of where one lives in a person’s life outcomes.
Nuggets of wisdom in this episode
It's good to plan, but it's also good to be flexible in life
We've experienced a lot of prejudice and racism, and empowering girls that look like us is a way of transferring the hurt, the pain
Prophylactically empowering young black girls, young brown girls will help them be confident and increase their trajectory for success
It's hard for your brain to release creativity if you are scared that you’re not supposed to be in that space
There's no race better than your race
There's a correlation between confidence and performance
There's a role for non black people to be allies because allies help create equity
References in this episode
Your body language may shape who you are
Martin Luther King Jr’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail where he talked about the guilt of the silent majority
To learn more about Dr. Ebere Azumah’s work and connect with her, visit Love Your Menses and Azumah Solutions.
Join the Messy Can't Stop Her Sisterhood at https://www.facebook.com/groups/3204395256540448/
If you would love to share your story on the #MessyCantStopHer podcast, click here to let me know.
Thank you so much for listening.
Music Credit: https://indiefy.me/wanted-carter
JKO: Dr. Azumah is in the house this morning and we're very happy to have you.
Dr. Azumah: Thank you so much, Judith, for this warm welcome. I love your podcast. I'm excited that you thought of me. I mean, it's just humbling to be with you because you're such a positive force. Everywhere you go, you make us laugh. I remember working on the book project with you. You were just funny. You were just transparent. You were just real. So you know what? All your listening viewers, you guys are in for a treat. Not just on today's episode, but following episodes as well. As you said, I'm Dr. Azumah. I am a women's health physician. I have a big global passion and interest. I'm a board certified OB GYN. I'm also a public health professional, and I consider myself a community educator. I have other passions, and one of them is empowering young girls. I'm the president and co founder of Love Your Menses. It's an empowering program that's global now. We started off in Boston with using the menstrual cycle to empower girls, and we've moved on so far. So I'm very excited to be here. Thank you, ma'am.
JKO: Thank you, Dr. Azumah. So on this podcast, we go back to the mess. And though the messes don't necessarily stop, but there's an experience in our life or a period of life that changes our trajectory, that changes our perspective on life, that changes the way we see life. And sometimes those are really painful periods of life. So we'd like Dr. Azumah to go back to that mess and share it with us.
Dr. Azumah: Wow. Yes. Mess exists. Once you become an adult, especially when you leave your parents’ house to go to college or to begin working, you realize that life is filled with messes. There are plenty of messes I've gone through going through. However, one that sticks out that I'm going to share with you today is my experience having been burnt. Right. So my experience getting burnt, so my whole body was burnt. And how did that happen? It happened because someone was drunk and decided to drive. I still remember that night in July whereby I had just helped some friends clean an office, right. Because their job was cleaning offices at night. And we're driving and before I knew it, someone hit the car and the car had somersaulted and caught on fire. I truly thought that was going to be the last day of my life, you know? And I remember saying, you know, my final prayer, like, God, thank you, receive me into your hands. So it's so interesting that I did not die. I saw myself coming out of the car. I know coming out of the car. And when I came out of the car, the two people were in the front seat. So I go to them and I was trying to wake them up because as your physician, we have this added advantage of being trained, even if they don't like passively, to undergo not trauma, but to respond when there's tragedy or something. So that kicked in. So I was, like, waking them, making sure they get out. So once they got out and people were gathering in that area, that's when I realized that I was hurt. I didn't know I was hurt. I guess this adrenaline rush endorphins really works. So immediately I knew they were fine. I started screaming, something is happening. My skin. My skin is burning. And then I could literally lift off my skin like this. I didn't know that the epithelium lining can, like, lift off. And I started screaming. It took the EMS a long time to get there. You know, at that time, I had the impression that the EMS gets here, like, five minutes. No, it took, like, forever. So finally when they came, I started screaming. I'm like, I need help. I need help. I'm burning. I'm hurting, like, all of my nerves. You know, your skin is filled with nerves. Oh, my goodness. But I was grateful. I was grateful. I wish I shared pictures with you, because after I went and then they suddenly took me to the bed. I see you. First, they took me to one hospital. The hospital wasn't big enough to accommodate me, so they had to send me to a bigger specialist hospital where they take care of burn victims. Oh, my doctor was so sweet. He was an African American trauma surgeon that specializes in burns. I was happy. You can see my face all bandaged up, but my teeth. I was so happy still. And I was happy because I was alive. I really think I was going to make it. And then one added advantage was I was Hawaii my feet. Oh, my goodness. However, during that time period, I do not have health insurance. So I remember that even though I was healing, I was thinking about, how am I going to pay for my bill? Like, how will I pay for my health care bill? Because I didn't have insurance. Why did I have insurance? There's something at the time still now called Cobra. So when you transition from one job, you're waiting for another job. You buy insurance in the meantime to cover you before you start the other job. At that time, the insurance was going to be $600. I did not have food to eat. I was not going to pay $600. What will I get the $600 from? So I do not have that. $600. I do not have that. So I opted out. So I didn't. So I sat down there worried, like, how will I pay my bills? Thank God. One of my friends called me. She's an insurance agent. She's just brilliant. She used to be one of my roommates when I was in medical school. Very sweet. She called me. She's like, do you know that there's a time period before your cobra expires. You need to call and see if your Cobra has not expired. Like the period to buy your Cobra because you might have chance to buy it, like, to backtrack and buy it. I was like, oh, gosh, I don't have the money. Then one of my nurses from residency decided to do a Go Fund for me, and she was able to raise about $10,000. And the day that I called them was the next day was the day the Cobra period to buy it was going to expire. You know what I mean? It's like a 30 day period. So I called them on day 29. That's how I was able to get the insurance to cover for my health. I was so grateful because at that time, I've already had a lot of student loans. I still have them, but I was like, oh my goodness, another bill that I have to pay eventually. But God found a way. I mean, I can't choose what wig he will find or which prayers he would answer. But he sure helped me that I was able to get insurance. And the insurance took care of my $550,000 bill. I am so grateful and thank you for this podcast because I need to thank God more because I could have been in debt. $550,000. And it would be more if you don't pay all at once. Yes. So with that for the Lord to help me with that $550,000, you become an empath. I was already baseline empathetic. But you become more because you understand. You understand his grace. You understand his favor. You understand eventually he recuperated, started work, and that's about it. And you know what? I feel like some people are always in a mess because even starting a job was messy. I don't know if it's legal or not, but I'll still share it. So while I was recuperating, I got an email that says, we are going to tell Dr. Azumah that we are going to receive a job offer letter because we need someone to work. And they mistakenly sent it to my email. See, it's called divine intervention. So, like, I tell people, like, you know, I'm a strong believer of Christ because God is my source. He always redeems and helps me. I'm not apologetic for my faith because I've not found anyone that has my back like Jesus. Once I find that, I might consider revoking it, but there's no one. So Jesus made me see that email. That email mistakenly was CC’d to me. So immediately I got it. I called them and I said, I just got that email saying, you guys are going to rescind. Signed it in before they even sent a letter. So I said, I got the email saying, you're going to rescind my offer. I can stay somewhere, but I can work. I will work. I want to go start working. Today I was healed, but I could stay home longer if I could, but I needed my job, right. I lost my job. So I went and I started working. So I was like, thank you, God, again, you did it. Life is messy, but God always sees us through if we don't give up. Not giving up doesn't mean you have to be stoic like, okay, everything is fine. You can be like, oh God, I don't know how I'm going to do this, but I'm going to trust in you. I'm going to take 1 minute at a time and then graduate to 1 hour at a time, then graduate to a whole day at a time. So that's what I've been doing. And you know what? That job was the best job ever. I loved it. I loved it so much. I got like, my close friends there, my mentors. Like, I feel like I learned more from that job than even a residency. Wow. So that job was almost going to be snatched away from me. They put in place tools to help me.
JKO: I know this is an aside. Yes. What type of dogs do you have?
Dr. Azumah: Oh, thank you. I have two dogs. I have a golden doodle. His name is Obioma. Like Obioma. (JKO: Oh, good heart.) Yes. And then I just adopted another one called Chike. Again, God surprises us, right? Because I never knew I'd be a dog mum not to talk of two dogs. Right. So Chike is a friend's dog and he was going through a lot of stuff like divorce, moving, and he wanted someone that can take care of the dog. So I got the dog from him. Yeah. So that's how I have Chike and both of them have been a blessing. But to be honest, it's good to plan, but it's also good to be flexible in life because I've planned a lot that I haven't seen come yet. And the things that I do not plan, like being a mother of two dogs, like really big dogs. My house now is, like, extremely protective. But any time I see my dogs and how protective they are of me, it reminds me of my relationship with dad. How, even though invisible, he's always present protecting me because my dogs are so protective, especially Chike. You can't come near me when he's around. And it's just that imagery sticks. That really with God, no one can come near me. And I need to keep on moving forward knowing that God has my back. That's like my pact that I have with Chike.
JKO: That is really nice and I think Chike is the louder one. So thank you so much for the background story about the mess. So you said that that experience made you more empathetic. Can you delve a little bit more into that?
Dr. Azumah: Being in the hospital bed and instead of me thinking about how will I heal, how will I go forward, I was thinking about how will I pay my bill? I don't think it's a healthy way of doing it. That's why I love to work with people that cannot afford healthcare or quality care or whatever, because I know that feeling. I know that feeling. And if you see my reviews from patients, they would always say, Dr. Azumah understands, which I really do, because I know how it feels. I know how it feels to be on that sick bed wondering what is next. And I was grateful. There were people that gave me hope. Now I drive, but I didn't think I would be able to drive again. Like, it was scary, you know, it's a process. Recently, I was having a conversation with a dear friend of ours, and we are talking about God's individual will for our lives. And the key in that conversation was His individual will for us involves collaboration by us. And what does that mean? And you guys wanted me to drive again, but he didn't choose to come down from heaven to help me. He needed me to collaborate. He needed me to make that decision that says, God, I will trust in you, that you would protect me. Do you know what I mean? Like, so that's the difference between his general will and his individual will. His individual will include us bringing that desires he has for us interpretation. And I say that because it took me a while to let go of fear in driving. You know, the drunk driver, yes, he drank that night, but he definitely changed someone's world. I'm very grateful that I am still able to do exactly what I need to do. My fashion style has changed. I love when Michelle Obama was our first lady because she got both arms. You know how she's always showing them off? That was me before my fire. Right now, I haven't got into that state step of showing off because I don't like the way people look at you. Like, they want to ask, but they don't know how to. And you see in their eyes, they want to know what happened. So I try to distract. I try to decrease that uncertainty and this empathy or pity, by not even wearing short sleeves. So my wardrobe style has changed in that sense. But that's all that has happened, and I'm very grateful. You know, I watch other burn victims, and some of them, their burn is really bad, like, really deforming mine wasn't. Some of them are very traumatic and traumatized. Some of them don't do anything. Some of them can't cook because, I mean, I smell smoke from afar. Like, if something is burning miles away, I don't know if it's that residual sensation I had in my mind. You know, like when there's a fire far away, I can smell it. So my heart starts palpitating and beating. Wow. I have this thing with fire that I can quickly sense. But the good news is I'm one of those people that can say that God has really tried us literally by fire.
JKO: You're one of the very few. So there's something I just want to say. (Dr. Azumah: Yes, ma'am.) You said something that when God wants to do something specific to us, for us as individuals, he needs us to collaborate. And even when we are scared, like you were scared of driving, I mean, this messy situation, this situation, I can't find a way out, and I'm confused, and I don't know what to do. I don't have confidence. Even in that situation, we still need to say yes to God, knowing that his will for us is for us to do well. So if we can say yes to this will for us to do well, that's a form of collaborating with Him. Saying yes to positivity, saying yes to goodness, saying yes to a future that is bright. I don't know who is listening to us. And you're really sad, and everything looks dark. There's no way around it. While in this darkness you can say yes to a future where light shines brightly. A previous podcast guest said we can ask God, I know I'm in this situation, but I know that I am meant to bless people, so please lead me to where this brightness will shine and help other people. You mentioned that as a physician, you help your patients because your experience has made you more sensitive to the financial trauma that could be in a person's life, even when they need medical attention. Now you started the organization, Love your menses. I think it's a very wonderful organization, because as a young girl, I remember myself a teenager. We used to talk about our menses, about how we hated it. I thought, Why do I have to go through this? And then for many young people, it comes with menstrual pain. I read about an organization, an office, where, when women are in their period, they don't have to come to work. I feel that what you're doing is really, really good because young people are embarrassed by menses. And I have been stained several times. I remember walking through my club. Can you imagine? I was a member of a club in Lagos, country Club. Wow. And I walked to the club, stained, the length of the club, and I was with someone working for me, and he was by me throughout the journey. Eventually, he couldn't help himself. He had to tell me I was stained, and it was a big patch that I had to go and wash, wash, wash. And it didn't get clean. And I was so embarrassed. I never did any work with that person again. And I'm sure he, too, was so embarrassed and relieved to not only have to see my face the next day, what you're doing is work that is needed. What led you to this place of, I want to help young people to be proud of this natural experience?
Dr. Azumah: You're embarrassed about having that menstrual stain because menstruation is still stigmatized, right? If we normalize it, then it wouldn't be a big deal. I have always done medical missions, right? So I've always done global medical emissions. I've been to Haiti twice at the time as a medical student. And then I've been to Nigeria, Ethiopia. So I had this global background. I've just completed my public health degree which I did that after becoming a physician, because I wanted to understand population health better. So during that time, I went to an event where they were looking for volunteers, like an ecological event. And that time my co founder of the organization had a menstrual event, wellness event for girls at the time. So during my participation, I had a vision. I had a vision that we can expand this program with my experience in global health organization formation. We can bring this to the country, to the world. So I met with her and I said, your idea is great. Come with me. I can advance it. I can create a mission, just creating strong organization, and we can make this a strong organization. This young lady, Bria Gadsden, said, oh yes, let's do it. I trust you. So we sat down, came up with the vision, the mission, the value proposition, and then we did our second event in my home area, that was in the DMV area - DC, Maryland and Virginia. It was also a success. And then we just started doing work on menstrual empowerment. And then we started doing pad distribution. And to be transparent, I would say we are one of the leaders in the menstrual space. And why do we say so? We are because most things that we do, other companies are now doing them. For example, we are the ones that started in a large scale, the menstrual kits that we gave out. And that was motivated during the COVID period because we were concerned about how will people now get pads if most children are staying at home, they don't have access to transportation, the cost of pads. So we started distributing it. So now we see organizations doing that. We also started the Postpartum Care kit, whereby we also empower women that just had kids. And lastly, we started the Love Your Menses Ambassador program so that we can empower people in the late teens, 20 to 25. So we would nurture them and coach them. So that's basically in a nutshell, how we started it. We started it as an event. That's how we've done. We even have our app. It's called our flow. The Flow app was created by our teenagers. They were between ten to twelve years old, ten to 14, that sat together weekly in 2021 from January to about May. And they learned technical skills because we tried to close any gap that’s there. And our organization focuses on black and brown girls because we felt like that message needs to be thought to them. We want to bridge that gap so that we'll have this is what I always say, my signature statement so that we'll have more Bria Gadsdens in America. Basically, we just want to bridge that gap. So we sit down and say, Technology. There's a gap. There's a gap, especially after and during COVID where kids cannot go to school and parents are working so hard. So there's something going on. So how can we bridge that? So that's how we started the application. We feel we've experienced a lot of, at least myself, we've experienced a lot of prejudice and racism, and that's our way of transferring the hurt, the pain, by making sure girls that look like us are doing well. So that's a victory for us.
JKO: On the issue of racism, I'm just going to ride on that because as a black woman who lives in Canada, mother of four, my children have experienced racism. And settling in Canada has been particularly traumatic because of racism. And it's not something that when people say you're living abroad, they want to come and live abroad. Nobody tells you that part about living abroad. And it's not the same thing as visiting. Visiting is not the same thing as living there. When you visit, you got your money, you're a tourist. You don't really actually feel those nuances, those things that are salient in the culture because you're not really immersed in that culture until you live there. So love your menses. I love it. All I think about when I speak those three words is empowerment of the girl child. And now you're telling me you're talking about girls of color. And they do go through a lot. There is a myth about girls of color being sexualized.
Dr. Azumah: We've come to realize that that's racism, too. But that's not true. Yeah, that's not. Like, I disagree with the data. And thank God I've worked as a gynecologist in different areas in the United States, and I had that conversation with a team of black physicians because I was at a lecture. They didn't know who was there, and they were saying the risk for sexually transmitted illness was higher in blacks. I was like, excuse me. No, that's not true. It's just not true. So I posted it on my Facebook platform that belongs to, like, black physicians, and we started telling our stories. They quoted differently. The question is asked differently. It's just done. Because I guess when you have grants from the government, the requirement is, okay, you need to ask this question. You need to screen so much. So it's like over analyzing data. I remember one time I was somewhere working in a place, I received grants, and a lady comes to get her next plan on remove, like the rod like contraceptive. And it's asking them, how many sexual partners have they had? I was like, how does how many sexual partners have anything to do with contraceptive removal? I decided to skip that. I was asking the questions. Then I looked at her. I was like honey, you don't need to answer all of this. How is that relevant? Do you know what I mean? It's going to be relevant. I don't even know what her name is. I don't think it's relevant anywhere. I don't think it's relevant. Like maybe it would be relevant if she has a sexually transmitted disease and we're trying to see who to treat, the network idea, then it's necessary. But for someone to just randomly come for birth control you asking them like how many sexual partners this this is different. When he says oh, did you use condom? So that we can be proactive and teach them to use it makes more sense. But asking them how many sexual partners they've had forever, like why do you need that data? So you see what I'm saying? So they over collect data in my opinion, my experience from minority population because as a gynecologist I know behaviors and have not seen where a black person's sexual habits is worse. I'm not a black person, I haven't. So again, I really disagree with that data. I really do.
JKO: I love it and that's why what you're doing with love your menses is so important. It's so important because you're empowering our girls to be able to go into those spaces where these myths are living to demystify or to unearth the truth. Because a girl that's empowered to believe in herself so she can go to school, study whatever and be able to add value. Like, I've been talking about something about the black children. Most people want their children to be doctors, engineers, lawyers, but we need social workers, we need political scientists, we need people who will do research. Because this data that has been collected is skewed actually by us to reflect certain things about certain populations. And as long as the people collecting the data are not those they are talking about, we will never know the truth about the data. But we send our children, we want all our children to only be the accountant, lawyer and the doctor. And the doctor that they are is all about money. Money doctor. If they are doing doctor, they are not the ones doing research and everything. So I think at this point if we really want to get the right data, the truthful data, not even the right one, we need to have more people of color in these spaces who are doing the research, conducting research. So like if somebody goes to university you have the opportunity to choose your research topic. We are not choosing research topics that are going to delve into issues that concern us. We want research topics that make me most buyable by an organization. So until we begin to think about our people, about how do I move my community forward, as long as we are still thinking like the countries we left to come to the white man's land. Because the leaders, they are thinking about their pockets. They are not thinking about the people. As long as we are thinking like them in North America, we will continue to be marginalized, stigmatized. Data will continue to be biased and should never be learned. So that's what I think about that. And I really love the fact that you're empowering girls. And so when we talk about girl child empowerment, why is it important? What were your experiences that made you feel that a girl child doesn't have to go through what I've gone through, especially in this space in the North America where we live? Or is it even beyond North America? Can you talk about those experiences and why it's so important to empower the girl child?
Dr. Azumah: It's a beautiful question. And again, we talk about the intersectionality of being a woman and then a minority woman. So we're in a special space because we do know that women are marginalized in some countries, better off in the north (America), where they recognize the importance of women. But if we look at that layer and go deeper, black women are marginalized. So we have this double, double marginalization. So we are in such an interesting space. So, like I said earlier, I've experienced prejudice, I've experienced discrimination, still experiencing it. It takes a while to change anyone's mindset. But I do believe in Generation Z. I do love them. They're more open. I just hope they will continue on that. Because sometimes, once you get money, your youthful enthusiasm fades away because money becomes a power, right? Because you need money. It's hard. But I hope they will continue to be the sweet selves that they are. So in my situation, I know it's very integral for black girls to be empowered. Because when they're empowered, then they will not be victims of lies. Right? They lie like you're not supposed to be there. Right? So we've seen data showing that minority women, in particular the worst minority women, have the more imposter syndrome, right? Because they tell us over and over we're not supposed to be in a space. It's hard for your brain to release creativity if you are scared that I'm not supposed to be in that space. So my goal is to empower them, to realize that there's no race better than your race. You have to believe in yourself. So walk into any space, I don't care how you got in, and be confident. Right now, I have the opportunity of interviewing future doctors, medical doctors, and I look at the grades of non black people. There are some that grapes are not stellar, but you will never know because they always made it seem like they had to compromise their grapes to accommodate black people. There are some of them that struggle, too. It's just important that I empower young girls. I have to empower young girls. I coach, right? Like you. And I do a lot of minority carrier coaching. And I've had students I remember coaching this. Student that is struggling and almost leaving medicine. And I was talking to her first year, I missed the dean list by point something, let's say zero six. Her second year, she's failing. So I said, what happened? Did you start doing drugs? Did someone die? How can someone that’s almost a Dean’s list just drop? It makes no sense. They were chipping at her. You're not supposed to be there. You're not supposed to be there. You're not supposed to be; we dropped the standard, you're not supposed to be there. And her confidence was going down. I really do believe there's a correlation between confidence and performance. I don't know if there's any data there. There is. (JKO: Oh, there is. Okay. There's a Ted Talk. I think I'm going to put it as a link on this. There's a Ted talk about it.) Okay. Yeah. So the one thing about discrimination, institutional discrimination, is they like mess people's, minorities, people's confidence. And how can you focus if you are told every day they might not verbally say, but their action, but if you're empowered, you're like, honey, I'm supposed to be there. And I want us to have more degrees. Because sometimes when you have the degrees, you realize that non black people are giving a pass.
JKO: But I have a different conversation. There's so many so many angles to this conversation. You know, one thing about this issue of empowerment and this conversation, I find that we have actually, women of color who are going through what you just described. You could get a job and be made to feel you're not supposed to be there. And though you were employed because you have these skills yeah, because you have been made to feel that way, you lose confidence and begin to not do well. You fall from the dean's list to failing. Correct. Now, this makes it even impossible for you to find another job because you've totally lost confidence in your abilities. And whoever you're working with isn't helping matters because they keep reminding you you're not supposed to be here. Can you see now that the quality of your work, now this proves that you're not supposed to be here. Meanwhile, it is that system that has done this to you. So with your knowledge and your coaching background, what can you tell someone who is in this shoe?
Dr. Azumah: The thing about these experiences, me as coaching kids, young people, adults, whatever age they cut across many times what works regardless of who is applying it yes. Or you adapt what you've heard to your situation. So can you tell us some of the things that were employed by these prospective doctors who were this spaces or other young people that you have coached who were in this spaces where they felt or they were made to feel like they're not supposed to be there? That in itself is a mess. It's a mess for you to be a school where you have made to feel you're not supposed to. Or in a job where you make to feel you're not supposed to them because of that you're feeling it's hard. I'm a preventative person, obviously. Public health background. I think prevention is always better than cure. We see that even when people have dysmenorrhea, like chronic dysfunctional, which is painful periods. I tell them, take your Motrin like a day before your period if your period is very consistent, like clockwork. Because I do believe that if you basically seal the pain receptors, it's not going to be triggered. Right. Because once it's triggered, it's hard to contain. Right. It's hard to stop. So the same thing in life, even the same thing with prayers. I actually believe in Prophylactic Prayer, like I'm a prophylactic person, is one word to describe you. That's why we believe in empowering the youth. Because I love when I see my youth in our organization know about their menstrual cycle. They know, like, the phenomenon is simulating hormones. The new things that I didn't know until I went to medical school. These kids are knowing it in elementary school, like, understanding how to think. Because once they know how to think, no one can talk to them. I remember choosing to move back to the Maryland area as I was raising my child because I noticed, like, the black people that grew up in the Maryland area, the GMB, DC, Maryland, Virginia and that area, they're very confident. You can't tell them anything. Like, they know themselves. You know, someone that has lived in different parts of America. I come even almost like an anthropology, right? Yeah. Anthropologist. I come in like an anthropologist and I'm like, this state has few black people. They're not as confident. This state, this state, Maryland people TMZ they are so confident because why? There's Howard University. There are so many educated black people. The mayor is black, so they don't have that inferiority complex. Like, they don't even think about their race as much because they are leaders there. It was intentional that I moved my child from where I was working to be in that environment, because I wanted to be confident that no one would ever make her begin to doubt herself. So I believe in prophylaxis. So let's go to those that have been brainwashed. It takes a lot of work. It takes a lot of work. It takes a lot of work. I remember one of my students that was struggling with his confidence because he failed an exam and he started feeling he was a failure. So I had to teach him and say, there's a difference between a failure and failing. Failure could have happened because that day you didn't sleep well. You could have missed something by one point. That doesn't mean you're a failure. It just means you failed. The failure is someone that gives up. So we had to come through, like empowering him and teaching him to be confident and saying, no to impostor syndrome. And then once his confidence was better, he was better able to present, better able to think. Then I was like, okay, let's get mentorship, someone that can mentor you and help you. So in the end, we met his goal and exceeded it. And then I was like, honey, I think we've met your goal. You don't need to attend more coaching sessions with me. So we see that happen. But there are some people, that doesn't ever go away. I have a friend of mine, she now has developed, maybe she had a basic mental illness, like severe depression, but now she has bad depression and anxiety because of that. Like, she does not have any confidence in herself. I don't know how she'll get through it. She's so smart. She's never failed anything coursework, but she feels like she can't pass the steps. She needs to study more. She needs to study more. And I'm like, you can do it, just do it. You've never failed, but I need to study more, I need to study more. And it's just people need to be nice. I do know the culture of medicine has not been people being nice amongst themselves with patients. We have to, right? But we could be bitter and mean and tear down people. But things are changing again on the table. Point is prophylactically empowering young black girls, young brown girls will help them be confident and increase their trajectory for success. But those people that are older and it's hard, it takes a lot of work. It takes work. I believe in prayer, but it takes a lot of work. Like, I showed you two case studies where one is doing very well, like just diagnosing syndrome, empowering very well, very well. And then the other one is not working, she's not doing as well, but hopefully she'll get it eventually. Yeah. So it all depends on the other thing that we found out about.
JKO: What can help when you're going through these things is therapy. Talking to people, even if they are just friends and just sharing what you're going through or even going to a therapist. Because as a black person, a black woman, christian therapy isn't something that you're encouraged to do. But the truth is that you cannot allow yourself to lose your mind because you don't want to lose your face. You have to choose one. Losing your face, you can always get the face back, but if you lose your mind, it will affect the face and every other thing around you. So it's better to keep your mind intact and whatever you need to do to keep your mind intact, do it. The truth is that our background affects us. Dr. Ebere Azumah just shared about location, how location can impact your confidence. I mean, this is so cool to me. It's exciting to me that where I live can determine how my children turn out. When I moved to Canada. I was wrongly advised to live in a particular area. And after the troubles for my children in the school, racism, child welfare system was brought to me by the school. A social worker told me this place that you people live is part of the problem because the people that attend the school, the population whose children go to the school, can affect how they treat your children in school. Like, I had a parent who was asking me if Africa was in Europe or something like that. At the school where we take the bus, my son takes the bus to school. So, you know, all the parents got there for their kids. And she's asking this question, I can't believe. Yes, because in Africa, we know about Europe and Canada. Every where. We know in Nigeria, but here Canada, where they are supposed to be more exposed. And a Canadian is asking me if Africa is in Europe. Africa is an entire continent. I never thought that I wasn't. These are people that lived where I lived. So people that have a particular way of thinking, so where you stay can affect what happens to you, your outcomes, too. And I actually was reading a research about this issue of location. And certain research has been done in recent times where they talk about how poverty is endemic in certain postal codes. If you're a migrant or a person of color, a minority you want to be thinking about. I said, well, you have children. You don't want your children to struggle or struggle too much. Because let me tell you, my experience in Canada has been quite a struggle because of lack of knowledge. This is such important knowledge, how location can affect your child. It's hard to be an immigrant of color. Sorry, listeners. It's hard to be an immigrant of color. So when you put your bag and you're coming to the white man's land, be prepared for these challenges. Racism is real. Racism is endemic. It permeates every level of society. Your children in school, in the hospital, even when you are doing good, when you're volunteering, racism can come and hit you in the face. But we can't stop as black people. We keep going. We don't stop because black don't crack. And that doesn't just mean in beauty. It means in resilience, in how we withstand situations. So, Dr. Azumah, I just want you to tell someone who might be in a deep, sad place right this moment as you're listening to us. Just give us a few things to take away. This podcast episode has been one of my most interesting because we talked about different things. But the thing that connects every conversation here is how the woman who is in a place of despondency can still look up and see the sun shining. There's hope for me.
Dr. Azumah: My passing words. Before I say that, I want to emphasize that there's a role for non black people to be allies because allies help create equity. And I'll give you a story. There's a girl that was in a residency program whereby the program director was mean to her. We don't know if it's because of the skin tone. We don't know what it is. But the girl was the only black resident in the program. Her peers stood up for her because they saw that she's being treated wrongly. Her nonblack peers went to the chair and complained that this girl is treated unfairly. Because of their unity, the program director was told to step down. (JKO: Wow.) The program director wanted this girl to repeat a whole year for no reason. The girl refused. He said, okay, six months. The girl is strong and empowered. But once the program director left, they told her she doesn't have to repeat anything. (JKO: Wow.) The new program director looked at the criteria and said that was not accurate. She's not repeating anything. But you see the importance of allies. Like, we all want the same thing, right? The person listening to us, don't be despaired. I know there are many non black people that want to help out. So you have room. You can help out. You can be like that girl’s friends, her colleagues that stood up for her. Because of them, she's not repeating her program again. I consider when there's misinterpretation of policies to hinder black people, fake barrier to entry. That's what I call it. They were able to call it out. So I guess it could be my passing words to those people that are non black. We need you. We need you to step up for what is right. I think Mandela talks about it right? Like the silent majority or Martin Luther King, one of them talks about the guilt of the silent majority. So my point is, silence will not solve things. Speaking up will help all of us immigrants, black, homosexuals, whatever it is to stand up for what is right. Because you never know. Tomorrow tomorrow you might be the minority.
JKO: Thank you so much. If you are the one at the receiving end of what is not right, don't use that to relate to others. So don't become a reflection of your bully. Don't become a reflection of your bully. Be the opposite of your bully.
Dr. Azumah: Yes. And that's the reason that I am the cofounder and president of Love Your Menses. I chose not to be a reflection of my beliefs. The pain that I've encountered, pain that I will encounter, I've turned it into a momentum to help empower others. Thank you. Thank you so much.
JKO: Dr. Azumah, Thank you so much for your time. This has been a very insightful conversation. And two of us will continue to do some more talking because what you're doing with Love Your Menses. I feel that many more black young people need to really hear about it to know that they are not alone. Because so many of them don't have who to talk, to the young black girls. They're sad, and they don't have who to talk to. But this program is an opportunity for a community to be built, a community of power around young black girls, girls of color, not just black, Hispanic, girls of color, so that they can be the next generation of changemakers and make our world a better place. Thank you so much for listening to this episode. I'm very excited to invite every woman who has a story. If you've been down in life’s trenches and you made it through, we want to hear your story. We need to hear your story. Somebody out there in the world needs to hear your story so that they can know that they, too, will be able to come out of life strangers. Thank you so much for listening.