HOLD ME; A WHILE
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Jamaica sits in with her baby in one hand, with a picture of her Mother in the other.
Jamaica now looks at the photo of her mother; she spoke of how this experience has been without her.
Jamaica changes positioning of her hands and then peers past the photo of her mother to say, "I wish she were here."
A moment of stillness followed.
"No matter what I'm doing; I keep dreaming... I am always leaving somewhere where my mom was, like we're packing up and we're leaving; wherever she was. She's never there physically there. But it's like her house or her work, I don't know. I've been trying to figure out what does that dream mean, what kind of sign is that"-Jamaica
"So um, I have to actually contact my job to see what will go on from here because I still have about two more months -because I wasn't granted maternity leave. I wasn't working there long enough they said, but I do need some time to like just rest a little bit after the baby. But the only thing about that is it doesn't guarantee me the security of my position. It's so frustrating."-Jamaica
"It hasn't been nice because my job is short staffed and they were trying to have it to where I didn't get any breaks. I had to take my personal days just to get off my feet and care for myself." - Jamaica
"Are you okay in there?" She asked as she took her breathes between turning the pages of "Where The Wild Things Are"- a book she brought to read to her little one. "I just want you healthy and happy."
"I think I had like like this perfect picture of what a family would be -that American dream. A Mom and a Dad. It's been hard but I'm embracing the family I do have. " - Jamaica
"But I feel like my grandparents made it. Like, they just fought so hard to have this white American Dream. Like they work their ass off to like, have the house but we then find out things until later on. I didn't know my grandpa was a cotton picker. He didn't have an education. I mean, I thought it was like the smartest person.
"My grandmother would wake us up out of our sleep, she would think people were whispering or people were on her front lawn. Now you think about it, what did you have to have seen in your life or what does your body remember to know that trauma."- Jamaica
I don't want my kid to be that black kid where it's like, oh, cool. Nothing can happen to me... To not be aware. And I mean, I guess you know, most people are just like focusing just on joy and love but also shoot..you have to be real about it for their safety."-Jamaica
"Sometimes depending on the dream, they can be like overly intense where it's like we're like protecting our space, right? Like somebody is going to try to keep my kid away from me." - Jamaica
"All the immediate family that we grew up with are all gone on my Moms side. So my aunt died first. But she was the youngest side out of all of them. She had lupus. And then six months later, my grandpa died. And then six years later my grandma died. And then five years ago is when my Mom died. The whole side of my maternal family. Yes, and my Dad's grandmother died when I was like really really young."- Jamaica