Blog - Dr. Donna Oriowo, Sex Therapist

When you’ve had to get ready for a job interview, how many times have you gone to the hair salon the day before for a quick blow out or spent all night trying to flat iron it so you can look as “professional” as possible? No need to be ashamed I’m sure we’ve all done it at some point. As much as the natural hair community has grown, one space that the acceptance of natural hair is still lacking is the workplace. Black women’s natural hair is still looked at as unkempt and unprofessional and it’s not uncommon for a Black folk with locs or kinky twists to be told they need to choose a new style, because it “doesn’t represent the company.”  Hell, if you google “unprofessional hairstyles” nothing but pictures of Black women appear in the results. So, I was definitely pleased when the CROWN Act was passed.

 For those of you who don't know the CROWN Act is also known as Creating a Respectful and Open Workplace for Natural Hair Act. What I love about this act is that local government is actually taking steps to make sure there is inclusion, pride, and choice in the workplace. They’re making sure (well, trying) Black folk can remain Black folk even in places of business. With the help of the CROWN Act my hope is that we can change the rhetoric that Black hair is not professional. 

California signed it first with Senator Holly Mitchell and then it went on over to New York, where they signed their own version into law. I’ve heard New Jersey may be next, but I'm just waiting for the DMV, specifically Maryland since that’s where I live. But, the District as well as Virginia need to adopt this law asap because some of the businesses and schools in the area seem to have a problem even though they don’t want to admit it.

 Regardless of who signs it next, what I like about the Crown Act is that we're putting a ban on natural hair discrimination which means that businesses and schools are going to be required to take a second look at their policies to make sure they are being a bit more inclusive and less overtly racist.  Because we all know usually when someone says you don't look professional, what they really mean to say is that you don't look white enough and it makes me uncomfortable.

 While everyone with a some melanin in them should be just as happy as I am, this type of law is really going to impact the darkest and kinkiest hair of us. We’re the ones that will truly benefit the most. Now I know some of y’all like “why she even bringing skin tone up, the CROWN Act is really about the crown, your hair.” However, one thing I know for sure as someone who has studied and done the research around colorism and texturism is that they are very inextricably linked in white supremacist beauty. When a woman is dark skinned with “good hair” she gets treated better than somebody with the same dark skin but a kinkier texture. Then there's light skin women with kinkier textures who gets treated better than I, and women who look like me, would ever get treated because her skin tone “saves” her from the undesirable hair texture. It’s as if 4c hair texture somehow looks better on her simply because she’s lighter - and I’m not for that.

 While some of us will reap the rewards more than others, what I don't want is for any of us to get complacent just because this law may be making its way around the country. I feel like I can see it now, somebody, somewhere is going to talk about how we're in a “post colorism, post texturism” world. The same way some of these fools were talking that nonsense about the country being post racial, and I’m going to need ya’ll to get it together because we are not. As long as racism remains, so too will colorism and texturism. 

 No law is going to take away the experiences many Black girls, Black women, Black mothers, and Black children have already lived walking around with their hair texture and skin tone. While the CROWN Act makes it law we need other things in place that will make it practice. This need for PRACTICE, is why I do the work that I do. 

 I’ll be doing a training at the Diversity In Parenting Conference on Friday, September 13th that addresses how parents talk about hair texture with their kids now, and how they can be more intentional in this work. While many of you may feel like this isn't an important conversation, it really is. Think about all the things that get passed down from one generation to the next, things that our children are presently learning and taking in. Think about it, great grandma was told she was nappy, unkempt and she can't go out the house like that and she told her daughter that. She told her daughter that she gotta fry, dye, lay her hair to the side to make sure she can walk out the house and be considered acceptable, never beautiful. And mom, while she’s trying to break that curse and not pass it on to her child, she hasn't worked out her own problems or addressed her own narratives. Often times we think these comments don’t really matter so we think we've let them go, forgetting how much these things hurt us. In reality, we live our hurts, and hurt others based on what has gone unnamed and thus unresolved. We forget that how we value others, their hair texture, skin tone, and how it presents in public and if they are acceptable, is based in the same white supremacist rhetoric we received when we were young. 

 Do you remember Easter Service as a child, and the night before when your mama or auntie blew out your hair or permed it and put into a cute little style that was acceptable for church? What about when picture day came around they broke out that same hot comb and flat iron and told you to sit down after so you don't mess up your hair that they spent all afternoon doing? What about constantly being told how tough and thick your hair is, and how hard and difficult it is to manage. This is rhetoric that gets ingrained in us, this is rhetoric that hurts us, and these are the thoughts that we hear when we think about our own hair as grown adults. Without hesitation we repeat this same narrative to ourselves and others about how our hair texture isn’t manageable and how it’s hard to maintain. After two hours in and only half a head done, we have these fantasies about going back to the creamy crack because we know how to deal with straight hair - but baby girl that's only because that’s what you were taught. You weren't taught from a young age what kinky hair is, you weren't taught how to manage it, and you damn sure weren't taught that you should be proud of it!  So instead of positive thoughts about our hair, we continue with this tired ass rhetoric of our hair not being “good” hair and wonder how our six-year-old babies pick it up. When the truth is, we gave it to them. We gave them what grandma gave us or somebody gave grandma. And so forth and so on.

 Now does us having work to do mean white folk and some of their prejudice butts, especially in this Trump Nazi era are absolved? NO, they are not absolved. The work they have to do is incontrovertible (Happy Potter Vocab!) They are first in line to combating racist rhetoric which also helps push back against colorism and texturism based rhetoric. But I'm not talking to them, I'm talking to us. They may have built the house of white supremacy, but we have been helping to maintain it. The CROWN ACT is one step, it gives a voice. Our work, the work we have to do on ourselves, will help to give it teeth. Because as long as Black folk continue to recognize the microaggressions that others are receiving around their hair, but do nothing about it, or worse give that “advice” about changing up to make white others comfortable and see you as a professional, the CROWN Act won’t have any impact. We cannot continue to say that Black women’s natural hair is unkempt and a hot mess, and pushing our own internalized white supremacist’s beauty standards on our sisters because of our lack of comfort. And because we have yet to address our own narratives and do our own work.

 Don’t let the Crown Act make your ass complacent, make sure that you continue to do the work. The CROWN act makes hair inclusivity law, but resources like Cocoa Butter and Hair Grease makes it practice.

Have you listened to Beyonce’s new single Brown Skin Girl? It’s putting a smile on my melanin sisters’ faces, and they are out here living their best life to this song as if it’s the new Black girl anthem. It’s like dark skin Black women can’t believe Beyonce, Queen B, actually made  a song for them and they are giving her a standing ovation, but I don’t know if she deserves it. Don’t get me wrong, I like the song and I can get down with the beat, but I find myself disappointed. Not because of what she said, but because of what people will do with it. All my melanin sisters are walking around with a new glow and confidence because they received external validation through a song, and I can’t help but wonder why Beyonce needed to say Brown skin girls are beautiful and worthy for them to believe it!

We are constantly seeking for a seat at the table, forgetting that it was made by and filled with white folk. White people who don’t feel our skin is beautiful and often provide disingenuous praise towards Black women for their own agenda, yet we still seek their validation to prove our lives are worthy of being seen and heard. And the same can be said about Brown Skin Girl, it’s the same situation, the only difference is instead of looking to white people specifically, Black women are looking to a privileged light skin woman of color. By doing this we as Black women are putting ourselves in a dangerous situation, because we are constantly seeking for those who have power and privilege to validate our existence.

Now don’t get me wrong, it’s not uncommon to seek validation from outside sources to some degree. But the question for me is always: to what degree? How big of an impact does this validation have on your self-esteem and self-love? Outside validation in small doses is one thing, I mean who doesn’t love a little recognition and celebration from those outside of our “bubble.” But if external validation is the air you breathe, you will suffocate when they move on from you or no longer sing your praises. So, the therapist in me can’t help but worry about all the dark skin girls feeling beautiful now because they’ve got a song dedicated to them who will eventually begin questioning and doubting their beauty once the song is no longer in rotation and #brownskingirl is no longer a hashtag. 

Beyonce is not the first, second, third, or fourth person to have a message about Black women’s beauty, but when Brown skin folk sing about us, we ignore it. When those around us who look like us, validate us and give us accolades we brush it off as though it isn’t good enough. Black women are out here giving any and everyone who isn’t Black (but have a little power) all the honor, praise, and glory when they recognize our beauty as if it’s never been done before. When in actuality this recognition is only important because they have power and privilege. Because you feel that if someone who is not Black says that you’re cute then it must be true. Think about it, why does this same message not mean as much, if not more, from your mama, your auntie, or your friends when they express it? Why isn’t looking in the mirror and affirming your beauty not enough for you to believe it, but a woman who looks nothing like you is?

You may not recognize it but you are putting the opinions of the powerful and privileged on a higher pedestal and you’re giving their thoughts about your beauty more weight than it deserves. External validation can be damning, especially if there is a part of you which is functioning on using it as validation of personhood and being valuable. You have given power over your self esteem, value, and worth to people like Beyonce - and it’s time you take it back!

Now on the one hand I’m concerned for Black women, specifically dark skin women, seeking validation from the privileged and powerful, but on the other I’m annoyed that when you are not in the space of being praised, when dark skin women are celebrated some of ya’ll act like the world is ending. See this is the problem with external validation. Because you didn’t get it this one time, your feelings are hurt.

To all my light skin sisters pouting and throwing tantrums because you don’t feel included in the song, I just want to let you know your internalized Eurocentric beauty standards are showing (that light fragility) - and I’m going to need you to put them away. As a light skinned woman, white folks have made you the standard of beauty for the Black community, so you constantly see women who look like you on magazine covers, tv shows, and in the music industry. And just like white people, despite seeing yourself on every damn media platform, the moment you don’t receive recognition you throw a fit. Now I’m saying this with love, I constantly talk about how much representation matters, but let’s be honest it’s not as much of a problem for you as it is for our darker hued peope. Darker skinned people are still fighting against stereotypes that relegate dark skin people to being stupid, dirty, and unattractive. Therefore, we’re the ones that should be upset, because we are hardly represented like we should be. So much so that we jump for joy that a 4 minute song recognizes us. 

When society needs a Black woman to be the face of anything they turn to you first, and we accept it with a smile as we think “well at least she’s Black, it’s progress.” Our little girls are rarely seen by society as gorgeous and we hardly get any praise. So why can’t you be happy for us that we got one 4 minute song celebrating our more melenanted sisters? There’s no need for “Light Skin Girl” covers to be created because the moment this song ends every other song will be right back talking about you. You’ve been validated time and time again - why don’t you want the same for dark skin women? This colorism within the Black community needs to come to an end and light skin folk need to do their part and play their role in making sure it happens.

Light skin folk have a responsibility to fight colorism wherever they can, it is an unearned privilege founded on white supremacy. We require white folk to do work and I require light skin folk to do the same. Those with privilege (in any circumstance) have work to do and are not absolved from that work because they don’t participate but benefit from the white supremacist status quo. 

Now I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again - I like that there is another song about the beauty of Brown skin women and I will be sure to add it to my playlist that includes India Arie, Nina Simone, and D’Angelou who also have reminded us that dark skin women are gorgeous. However, as you listen and dance to this song I just want you to remember that people who look like you and me have already validated us. And while I appreciate my light skin sister for helping spread the message of our beauty, I ask you to remember that she isn’t the only one and her opinion isn’t the only truth you should already be aware of!

If you’re ready to start your self-love journey through hair and skin and you want to be make sure you are doing that internal self-validating, giving yourself that love so you can look at external validation as just extra, then get your copy of Cocoa Butter and Hair Grease today today!

In this one we talk about a workbook to work through the narratives relates to colorism and texturism. It’s called Cocoa Butter and Hair Grease: a self love journey through hair and skin.

There are a few folk mentioned in here as to where you can learn a little more and even find a therapist for yourself. You can google them, or tap the organization and find your therapist today!

1. Melanin & Mental Health

2. Health in Her Hue

3. Therapy of Black Girls

4. Therapy for Black Men

Imagine this, you and your boo thang are capping off a romantic date night in the bedroom. Ya’ll have rolled around the bed for the past 20 minutes, you’ve each had your tongues and fingers everywhere imaginable, and now it’s time to get busy. The entire night you’ve been anticipating this moment, you’re on your back looking at your partner, they smile at you, giving you that “it’s about to go down” look and you stare back, but instead of bracing yourself for what could be the best sex of your life you’re wondering if your fro is mushed or if you’ve sweated out the twist out you spent 4 hours doing yesterday.

WTF?! Instead of living your best life and focusing on having what could be some bomb sex, you’re really worried about what your partner thinks of your hair! Spectatoring ain’t shit

The sad truth is, as you were reading what could be the start to a great novel, you thought of a time where instead of mentally bracing yourself for mind altering sex, you were more concerned with what your hair looked like or if your partner will be turned off from the rolls you get in certain positions. This is what we sex therapists call spectatoring or cognitive distractions.

Spectatoring was first introduced by Masters and Johnson, the same duo who found that sexual response is divided into four phases:

1.Excitement

2.Plateau

3.Orgasm

4. Resolution
(You can read more about sexual response in my post,Gettin' It: Consent )

In the 70s Masters & Johnson suggested that spectatoring is a process that occurs when a person (aka you) focuses on yourself from a third person perspective during sexual activity, rather than focusing on the sensations and/or your partner.  

To keep it simple, spectatoring takes you out of enjoying the moment or moments (if your partner knows what they’re doing) and instead of enjoying the sex for what it is, you are worried about what your body and hair looks like to your partner. It can be described as an out of body experience, you’re aware of what’s going on but, distracted and can’t focus.

Masters and Johnson were not thinking about Black women when they spoke about spectatoring, but as your resident sexpert who specializes in texturism, I’ll tell you how it relates. Spectatoring relates back to Black women and natural hair because often times we Black women find ourselves worried about our hair pre, during, and post sex. We put A LOT of time, money, and effort into styling and maintaining our hair, so it makes sense that you would worry about everything staying intact. It also doesn’t help that we’ve been conditioned to think by every f*cking one that our hair defines us - and one strand out of place can easily take us from a confident sexy Black queen on a glow up to an “unkempt” basic bum b*tch.

But, the truth is spectatoring about your hair robs you of living in the moment, experiencing sensations, and ultimately the opportunity to orgasm - which is why you wanted to get busy in the first place, right?

Instead of blissfully recouping with your partner and catching your breath from a wonderful night - the only thing on your mind is where the closet mirror is.

We all want to look sexy for our partners, but honey, if ya’ll rolling around in the bed, the kitchen, or wherever you prefer, it’s okay to assume your partner thinks you’re sexy and will think so regardless if your hair getting a little messed up!

Now some of you are reading this like, “nah sis, I can walk and chew gum,” and you feel that being worried about your doesn’t affect your sex life - but the body doesn’t support that notion. As great as we think we are at multi tasking the brain really isn’t a pro at it. When multi tasking something will suffer, and in this instance it’s your sex life.

In order to live in the moment and stop worrying about your body and hair you must practice mindfulness. This means disengaging from outside distractions and solely focus on what’s occurring. There are two ways that I encourage you to practice this:

1. Masturbation

Masturbation is a great way to practice becoming more mindful and enjoying the moment. Somehow you allow yourself to zone out and only focus on you. So, I want you to ask yourself,

• What do you do when you are alone with yourself?

• How do you love on yourself?

• How do you touch yourself?

• How do you get yourself to a place that allows you to experience an orgasm?

Whatever it is that you do, you need to bring those same efforts to the bedroom when you’re with your partner.

**Side note: I have a book recommendation by Afrosexology's Dalychia and Rafaella called Solo Sex. It's on their website: http://www.afrosexology.com/shop/solo-sex-workbook

And yes, I have a copy. Not to mention as a Sex therapist in the Washington D.C. area, I have recommended it to more than a few of my clients, both single and with their partners

Masturbation also helps because knowing your body means you know what you want, and don’t want, which allows you to teach your partner exactly what to do to please you. By being both the teacher and the receiver you are more able to focus on the present because instead of worrying about how your hair is laying, your attention is focused on where their fingers are. In some instances, this can be another form of spectatoring but once they got it, you can lean back and enjoy your work.

2. Meditation

Getting your mind and soul right can also be practiced through meditation. While this isn’t centered around your vulva and may not end with a moan, it can help you practice living in the moment. You might be surprised what 5 minutes of meditation a day can do for you. And once you’re able to do this on your living floor, you can take what you’ve learned to the bedroom.

Here is a video, for those of you who are new to meditation.

Spectatoring is real and is holding you back from a brag worthy sex life! So, right now, and I mean RIGHT NOW I want you to declare that you will mind ya business about what you like (in the bedroom!)

PS - Check out my post, The Gaps to Your Orgasms for more tips to reach “O-Town”

Guest blogger Candace Clarke of Kandeaux, joins AnnodRight to share her wisdom with us! In this blog, she speaks about food, sex and wellness as a way to fend of depression. Candace is a food Agri-vist (Agricultural Activist) speaking about the nature of the food we grow and consume and how it is often used as a way to continue to oppress people of color. Learn more about Candace and the work she does at Kandeaux.com

#Message!

I mentioned Therapy For Black Girls in this episode, so go on over check it out and leave a message for your future therapist!

As spoken about in the blog, Get your #RelationshipGoals Guide right here, for FREE!!

Photo by nappy from Pexels

In all my excitement for the holidays and for how I am planning on growing and changing in the new year, I almost forgot that I wanted to write.

I feel like there is a constant whirlwind lately where I talk about Blackness and beauty. Where I think about, discuss, and consider the lightness and darkness of skin and how that is read by others based on eye color and hair texture and hair length. It’s funny to me that this should feel like my life, when this WAS my life when I was in the midst of writing my dissertation almost 3 years ago. It seems like I’ve run a full circle of not having to think much about it, in the academic sense, to coming right back into thinking about in the mental health, relationship, sexuality sense...which I guess is all academic anyway. 

Blac Chyna is right now, the base of jokes, and name calling, and head shaking. We the Black folk delegation, who determine who the “good Blacks” are, have determined that Blac Chyna may soon need to be named White Chyna because of her pursuit of bleaching creams to be something, that ultimately she was not born to be. From plastic surgery to hair extensions, those things are fine, but when you cross the bleaching line, and want to take your wares across the sea and speak to others about and sell those products, everyone wants to disown you. It’s funny that this comes to light just on the heels of the white women who have been caught trying to pass as Black women and reaping the Instagram dollars from their lies. It’s ironic to me that both are being so heavily condemned by Black folk, and ignored by white folk like we are not all in this tea. We have decided we are somehow separate from the foolishness, and I want to go ahead and invite people back in to the home that white supremacy built that many a Black folk make sure to maintain. I want to make sure that we all recognize that not only do we have rooms in the house, but our names are written at our places around the table. 

WE ARE ALL TO BLAME FOR THIS! White folks gave us all white supremacy, so to me that shit will always be the root and the place to start. The idea that being white makes you better and inherently pretty and god ordained has definitely lead to a certain level of delusion for white people, and POC, have by and large accepted this as a truth to pursue in some ways. Please don’t get it twisted, I recognize and understand that for the sake of living we all do things that we feel we must in order to simply survive. Being Black is not so in right now, that actual Black folk don't recognize the constant danger we are in from the moment we step out of our homes. And let’s be honest, the fact that wypipo can come in, kill you, and your corpse will still be on trial for provoking it with your weed paraphernalia or because you don’t listen to randos who come into your house unannounced thinking they can boss you around where not one bill bears their name. I want you to know that I understand this. I want you to know that nuance matters and that I don’t forget or lie it down to close my eyes and pretend all that shit don’t matter. It does.

But there is also a combo of a blind want/need and a purposeful striving toward white supremacy for many of us Black folk. We are touting out degrees and bundles in the faces of others and showing how much better off we are. That we are the “right” kind of Black. That our blackness with our correctness, and grammar and Eurocentric names and mannerisms somehow makes us better. That we don’t do hard drugs, sell weed, or live in or near a trap house. There is a fear of some Blacks in being seen as too damn Black. Whether it's in behavior or in aesthetics. We are seeking the touch of other so that we can more easily slip into certain spaces or else be praised for how we are the right sounding and looking type of Black. BUT then have the audacity to wonder and be appalled by how wonder bread women slipped through the cracks with a bit of wheat bread dusting OR why a Black women could possibly want to mimic white bread toasted rather than be wheat or rye. Sorry, I got stuck in bread for a minute. But I think it's apt because of all the dough involved here.

The Black hair and beauty industry is worth BILLIONS people. It grows every time someone puts a weave on layaway or when someone decides they need the full Fenty line. We are the biggest consumers of product here. We dictate jobs and livelihoods. We are the bank that others, usually white others, try to find a way to lock down in a vault. So we make some big assed decision with where we put our money. 

This biggest funny to me is that with all these choices we are making, we don’t consider that we have also decided that there is a look to be sought. We are choosing to chase the ambiguous looking woman of color and are mad when some women want to make themselves more ambiguous. We have stated in our actions that if it's too Black we are not interested, that if the hair is too kinky with not one edge laid, something is amiss. We did that. We have called people cockroaches, bald headed bitches, nappy headed hoes, tar babies and the like and are now surprised when white devils find their way in through a spray tan, makeup, and the waving of their hair. We are dismayed because one of our own is all about her bleaching cream. Y'all, we are wild and out of line. 

We are in the time of Black beauty, and still in the throws of the natural hair movement. But don’t get it twisted, we still have some white supremacist leanings toward Eurocentric beauty standards. We are about baby hair and light skin. We are about laid edges, twist outs to obscure our hair texture, and stretching hair to prove we have length. We are about being the blackest we can be while upholding as much white supremacist beauty as we can get away with. This a monster of the creation of white supremacy which we maintain. 

that some hard assed looks need to be done inward before we continue down this road where we condemn white women for stealing shine and condemn Black women for trying to lighten up. Because right now, we are the ones calling for the most exotified Black beauties. We are the ones saying that if you are dark, compensate with your hair--make it straight, let it be naturally so, lay your edges and or have light eyes. We are the ones calling for light skin women to still try for “good hair,” but if they can’t to lay those edges and have green eyes. We are the ones who tell fat Black women that they have to have long hair to compensate. That afros and the like are not for their type. Yes, white maters built the house, and in our hope and need and prayer for safety and safely getting through, we maintain the status quo and let it seep in unchecked to our spaces. We can’t create beasts and then be mad. We must learn to stop creating beasts. 

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