November 2016: I Can't Breathe

A picture is worth a thousand words they say.  But I'm speechless. It's because I am shocked beyond words or sound at that. All I can do is write. And draw. And pray.

When I found out the result of Donald Trump becoming our 45th President of the United States, I was speechless. After doing the math countless times and finding ways to calculate how in the hell he was elected. I called one of my friends to talk to about this and tried to continue to wrap my head around this. But no matter how much thinking I did, it still didn't make sense to me.

I cried.

This is the first time in a while I cried about anything political. I've cried plenty of times about my future such as getting a job, graduating on time with my Master's degree. But this type of crying was a whole lot different.

My identities are on the line.

My friends' identities are on the line.

Many marginalized identities are on the line.

We already live in a society where the marginalized are overlooked and told that their problems aren't relevant or valid. We're even forced to sit with the fact that we're destroying ourselves and the ones in power.

The speechlessness continues.

I can't breathe.

I can't breathe at all.

I feel sick.

My anxiety is getting worse.

I feel helpless.

As much as I would love hope to be instilled into my heart, I can't process at all. I continue to cry. There are a lot of thoughts running through my head like "Where do we go from here?" and "How are we going to make it?" and even "Am I going to live another day?"

Here's a tweet I posted last night:

To all of my friends who are allies of PoC, LGBTQIA, people of Islamic faith, etc., we need you. We need you to not be bystanders. #SAGrad

— Elenna, MSED to be. (@ElennaMGeffrard) November 9, 2016

Please be supportive of your marginalized friends everyone, no matter who you voted for. A lot of us are hurting right now. We need for you to not only provide comfort, but also to fight with us. We need your help even more than ever.

But this is the start of a revolution everyone. I don't know what it will entail, but it will be something big.

Until then, continue to be involved in your communities. Promote intersectionalism and be fair to one another. And one more important thing:

Stop telling the marginalized to sit with the results and give our government a chance. We've already done that for centuries. We're sick, tired, and sick of being tired.

Stay safe out there everyone.