Dominican | Irish

Born in South London spent most of childhood in Peckham with my Irish grandma. I grew up very rebelliously.
I played in some punk bands at 16.  Went to University in Scotland, Aberdeen. There was one girl at University with me, we were both tall, mixed race and from London, we were constantly mistaken for each other all the time.  It was funny but a bit ridiculous. I definitely felt quite alone.  People would say, I sounded white which I felt was most insulting, because that by itself, it associates this, this sensibility, this thing. Whether or not you are academic or not, you sound a certain way, that by itself, its associates that with whiteness and people don't realize how damaging that is.

I have finally embraced the fact that I can speak the way I want, look the way I want, and do whatever I want to do with my hair and I can still be a black woman without being constrained by anyone else’s views.  In relationships, their needs to be an element of a shared experience, I dated a boy in Glasgow. We were both from very different backgrounds he was raised in a Catholic household and I in a convent school. We came from different environments but there were just so many deep similarities that gave us a bit of a shared understanding, of what it meant to have our cultures distorted in a way. We were used to having loads of assumptions made about of us so we shared perceptive, I think that is what drew us closer together and that is the sort of thing I look for more than any particular background mainly because the older I get the more I realize that spiritual connection with another person permeates, race, gender sexual identify, It more about seeing eye to eye.  I went to schools with white girls, even in Scotland.  I have occupied white space for so much of my life that when I was little, I wanted to be blond, white skin and blue eyes. Not realizing until I became a woman, how messed up that was because the idea of being comfortable in your own skin is absolutely invaluable. I would struggle to want to come back as anyone other then myself. The journey of self-acceptance, I would not trade that for anything else, it’s priceless.