Black Silence Speaks Louder After Leaving The Home
CHICAGO-- “What goes on in this house, stays in this house” could be a card you were dealt in your youth. This phrase is a predominant narrative in the homes of people of color. Coining the term Black silence, 24-year-old beauty enthusiast Daijah Spiller has heard this saying all too often in her past and even now as a young adult.
Black silence inconveniently happens in many African American households, which leads to the pain festering from unresolved matters such as: rape, sexual assault, housing insecurity, domestic violence, and a multitude of other traumas. A domino effect then proceeds between adult life to the sparring next generations if the victim does not resolve the internal matters.
Spiller, having more than one of the following experiences above, recognizes the residual now of how hearing “don’t be telling everybody our business” has created a significant hole in her development.
She said, “It does create a sense of fear, anxiety, a sense of insecurity, a sense of loneliness, and a sense of untrust. Not being able to trust certain people, I feel like it has negative effects. There’s one thing to be private, but to be more so like secretive or silent, it is a little bit more damaging”.
She finds that family, today, will even force her to reencounter the oppressors of her past and not show signs of empathy. This results in a trigger that is commonly associated with war veterans and outbursts.
According to the Mental Health America network, not only does this create anxiety, as Spiller said, but there is a serious development of post-traumatic stress disorder, also known as PTSD.
“African American youth who are exposed to violence are at a greater risk for PTSD by over 25%. Along with PTSD, anxiety can also come along, and a cause of both of these can be black silence in a household, as the events that are engraved in the child’s mind, are told to be “kept in this house” Stigma and judgment prevents Black/African Americans from seeking treatment for their mental illnesses”.
Spiller’s next steps are to heal from the painful memories.
“Right now, I’m in a process in my Christianity where I want to be transparent, and I want to get deliverance from any transgressions or issues I’ve had in my past,” she said.
However, this process, for Spiller, comes with the price of disassociation of certain family members.
“Even now as I’m older and certain people [family members] may know what happened, it was a thing of well… just don’t shut them out; just talk to them; well they’re still your family”.
As she intends on having children with her recent fiancé, later husband, she said she will not allow her children to fall victim to Black silence.
“It’s ok to be transparent, but I need to know everything whether you’re feeling nervous about something, scared about something… there needs to be a lot of transparency growing up with my children.”
To delay these detriments in your home, Spiller said, “It needs to be a deeper level of connection within a household; it needs to be discussions had, boundaries and guidelines talked about, and just moments where we can vent in a way where it’s non-chaotic or confrontational. We don’t actually treat each other like family; we just treat each other like people in our bloodline that we sometimes get along with and sometimes do fun things with”.