Blog Posts

When I wrote Am I Blue? following President Obama’s election in 2008, I was jubilant at what appeared to be an enormous step for Civil Rights in this country.  With the 2012 election just days away, I am again personally invested in the outcome.  In this election, there is even more at stake for all minorities—especially women.

Too many times in my psychology practice, my young female patients say, “I’m not a feminist.”  They say it like “feminist” is a four letter word.  In the late 20^th century, the feminist movement became associated with rage and radicalism.  I’m fully supportive of the “third wave” focus on overall acceptance of a woman’s choice to be whatever she wants to be and fighting against oppression based on gender identity.  But feminism has always been about EQUAL RIGHTS and CHOICE.  Too many of us have become complacent, taking for granted the rights women fought for starting in the late 1800’s.

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Tuesday night, November 4, 2008, I watched as Barack Obama was elected President. While returns came in from various states, there was television coverage of the crowds gathered at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia. There was an interview with Andrew Young and shots of the parishioners singing and praying. I was praying, too. I prayed that Georgia would go from White-Undecided, to Blue-Obama. I felt it would be redemption— of some sort.

Although I’ve lived in Chicago for 29 years, I’ve never been able to get past the shame of being a white daughter of the South, a granddaughter to the Klan— a daughter of the Confederacy.  I am the great-great-niece of Nathan Bedford Forrest. He was a General in the Confederate Army, famous for his brilliant military strategies— infamous for founding the Ku Klux Klan.

Unlike my brother who lives in Texas, I’m not proud of my great-uncle’s military expertise. Instead, I carry my mother’s shame and sorrow at the connection to a man who was such a powerful and outspoken proponent of hate. I, too, carry her vague memory of sheets found bundled in the attic when she was a little girl in Georgia.

In the South there is a tradition of giving daughters their mother’s, or some other female ancestor’s, maiden name as a middle name. My mother was named Sheila Davenport Forrest, Davenport being her paternal grandmother’s maiden name. My parents went all out and named me Sheila Forrest, a double honor, or double whammy— depending on how you look at it. Being a female “junior” was always awkward. I was Baby Sheila or Little Sheila for most of my life. So in addition to carrying my mother’s first name, I am burdened with the name Forrest. For me, it has always been a heavy load.

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As a child I was irrationally afraid of parties.  I’d stand on a front porch wearing my party dress and carrying a brightly wrapped gift, terrified that the door would open and I’d be told that the party was “next week” or already over.  Often I refused to budge from the car until I saw other kids arriving.  Whenever I gave a party, I was always afraid no one would come.  Neither thing ever happened—until recently.

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I didn’t realize what a daunting task it would be when I decided to write my very first blog in October on the topic of breast cancer.  The original idea came from a celebratory place—on Friday, September 28, I had my yearly diagnostic mammogram and was declared cancer free.  I am now a 10 year survivor—which puts me in the 82nd percentile of women who make it this long.

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