26 BLACK WOMEN
When You’re Fighting for Your Life & Still Showing up
Didi Hairston
Didi Hairston had spent years living with severe depression while still doing what needed to be done. She worked, raised her daughters, managed a home, took medication, went to therapy, and kept telling herself she could push through whatever came next.
But depression in Black women doesn’t always look like disappearing from life. Sometimes it looks like continuing to function until there is nothing left to function with. Didi had already been out on disability more than once, but she still believed she could keep going until the day her mind and body both gave out at work.
LISTEN TO DIDI’S STORY
“I always thought that, again, I can be strong enough, like you can do this, Didi. You could do this. You could take the medicine, go to therapy, you’ll be okay.”
WHEN BEING “STRONG” FINALLY BROKE HER
Didi had spent years pushing through depression, motherhood, work, a harmful relationship, and the expectation that she could keep functioning no matter what was happening inside her. She kept telling herself she could handle it. Take the medicine. Go to therapy. Keep going. Be strong enough.
But the pressure had been building for years. Eventually, her mind and body stopped cooperating. At work, she reached a point where she could no longer push past what was happening. She passed out at her desk, lost control of her body, and had to be carried out.
For Didi, that moment made something impossible to ignore. Being “strong” had not protected her from breaking down. It had helped her keep going long after something inside her was already asking her to stop.
WHEN LOOKING STRONG MADE IT EASIER TO MISS THE PAIN
Didi had spent years functioning through depression. She worked, raised her daughters, managed a home, took medication, went to therapy, and kept moving through a life that still required things from her even when her own mind was making it difficult to stay present in it.
From the outside, that could look like strength. But for Didi, being called strong often meant people saw what she was still able to do and missed the fight happening underneath it.
She described depression as something she battled every day, something relentless enough that she gave it a name: the monster. So when people praised how strong she was, they were often seeing the fact that she was still standing, not what it was taking for her to stay here. There were times when the fight was not simply about feeling low or overwhelmed. It was about resisting the urge to take herself out.
“The monster is trying to take me
out every single day.”
WHEN SHE STOPPED MAKING “STRONG” THE REQUIREMENT
Didi had spent years treating strength like something she was supposed to keep proving. If she could still work, raise her daughters, take her medication, go to therapy, and keep moving, then some part of her believed she should be able to handle whatever came next.
But living through severe mental illness changed the way she understood that expectation. Being able to function did not mean she was okay, and admitting that something was breaking her down did not erase everything it had taken for her to still be here.
Over time, Didi began making room for a different response to hard days. Not pushing harder. Not hiding what hurt. Not performing strength for the comfort of everybody around her. Just being honest about who she was and what she needed in that moment.
“You have to be who you are in that moment. And if in that moment you need to sit down and cry, then that’s what you need to do.”
WHEN SUPPORT MEANT SOMEBODY CHECKING THAT SHE WAS STILL HERE
Didi has people in her life she loves and trusts, but even with years of friendship between them, saying exactly how bad a day feels can still be difficult. The fear of being judged, misunderstood, or having nobody know what to do does not disappear just because the relationship is close.
So some of the support she relies on is much simpler than a long conversation. A few of the women in her life check on her regularly, sometimes with nothing more than a text asking whether she’s here and how she’s doing. On the hard days, Didi can tell them the monster is acting up. She doesn’t have to explain the whole fight again. They already understand.
Those small check-ins matter because there are days when support is not about fixing what is happening. It’s about somebody noticing, reaching for her, and making sure she is not alone with it.
“The texting is really just for them to make sure
that I’m still here.”
WHEN SHE REALIZED SUPERWOMAN HAD TO GO
Didi’s experience with depression eventually forced her to question more than her own habits. She began looking at the way Black women are expected to keep functioning through illness, pain, family responsibilities, work, and whatever else life puts in front of them, often while the people around them assume that continuing to perform means they are okay.
That became especially clear when she began speaking more openly about her mental health. In one women’s group, Didi shared what she was dealing with and found her inbox filling with messages from other women asking how she knew she was depressed and what she did about it. Women who had been talking with one another regularly were fighting for their minds without the people around them knowing.
For Didi, that made the problem bigger than one woman learning how to ask for help. It became about what happens when Black women are expected to be superwomen in the first place, and how dangerous that expectation can become when pain and illness are mistaken for something we should simply push through.
“The superwoman must die in order to
save the lives of Black women.”
ABOUT DIDI HAIRSTON
Didi Hairston is a mental health advocate and the creator of Diva with Depression, a platform she started in 2014 to talk openly about living with severe mental illness and to help make mental health information and resources more accessible, especially within the Black community. Her work has grown from blogging into public speaking, conferences, and advocacy rooted in her own lived experience. Didi Hairston (1)
She is also the host of Breaking the Mask of Depression, where she talks about living with mental illness, parenting while managing mental illness, and raising children who have their own mental health needs. At the center of Didi’s work is a commitment to saying the things Black families and communities have often been taught not to say out loud.
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