Delayed, Dismissed, and Still Expected to Be Strong: Why Too Many Black Women Continue to Suffer in Silence
When the Story Becomes Personal
May was Women’s Health Month. This article was supposed to be published then. Instead, life had other plans.
What I expected to be a month focused on awareness became a month focused on my own reality. Health challenges that I believed were largely behind me suddenly demanded my attention again. Questions I thought had already been answered resurfaced. Plans shifted. Priorities changed.
The result was a delay. Looking back, that delay now feels appropriate. The very reason this article was postponed is the same reason it needed to be written.
Recently, someone close to me suggested that most people handle their health struggles privately. For a moment, I questioned whether I should continue sharing my own experiences. Then I asked myself a different question.
Have these issues been swept under the rug long enough?
Part of my healing journey has been learning to talk about the things that matter. I do not share everything. Some experiences are still difficult to discuss. Some wounds are still healing. What I have learned, however, is that silence rarely creates understanding.
Sharing my story has been therapeutic.
More importantly, it has reminded me that none of us are as alone as we sometimes feel.
Over the past several months, I have been navigating challenges related to fibroids, anemia, chronic fatigue, and the emotional weight that often accompanies prolonged health struggles. Those experiences forced me to confront a reality that millions of women already know well.
Women often become experts at functioning while suffering. They continue showing up for work, caring for loved ones, meeting responsibilities, and supporting others while carrying burdens that few people ever see.
My experience is not unique.
For many Black women, it is painfully familiar.
More Than a Medical Issue
According to research from the National Institutes of Health, Black women are significantly more likely to develop uterine fibroids than women from other racial groups and often experience them earlier, more severely, and for longer periods of time.
The impact can be profound.
Fibroids can contribute to chronic pain, excessive bleeding, anemia, fertility challenges, pregnancy complications, and significant disruptions to daily life. What begins as a medical condition often extends into every area of a woman’s life.
Research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also continues to highlight significant disparities in maternal health outcomes. Black women remain far more likely to experience pregnancy-related complications and maternal mortality than women from other groups.
Statistics tell an important story.
The women living behind those statistics tell an even more important one.
Many spend years searching for answers while trying to convince themselves that what they are experiencing is manageable. Some are told their symptoms are normal. Others are encouraged to wait. Many simply become accustomed to suffering.
The Cost of Constant Strength
The conversation surrounding Black women’s health is often framed through a medical lens. The reality is far more complex.
Health is influenced by access to healthcare, economic stability, support systems, community resources, and stress. Chronic stress deserves particular attention because the human body was never designed to remain in a constant state of survival.
Yet many women spend years carrying responsibilities that leave little room for recovery. They care for family members, maintain households, pursue careers, support friends, serve their communities, and often become the person everyone else depends upon.
The expectation is rarely that they be healthy.
The expectation is that they be strong.
Strength has become one of the most celebrated qualities associated with Black women. It has also become one of the most misunderstood.
Strength can help a person survive difficult circumstances.
Strength is not the same thing as wellness.
Strength cannot lower blood pressure. Strength cannot eliminate chronic stress. Strength cannot resolve untreated health conditions. Strength cannot replace meaningful support.
Somewhere along the way, many Black women inherited an unspoken expectation that they will simply figure it out.
Many do.
The question is at what cost.
The Weight No One Sees
Loneliness often becomes part of that cost.
Many women find themselves navigating health challenges while simultaneously managing careers, finances, family obligations, and emotional responsibilities. Some spend so much time being there for others that they discover very little support is available when they need it themselves.
Research consistently shows that strong social connections contribute to better physical health, improved mental health, and reduced stress.
Human beings were never designed to carry life’s heaviest burdens alone.
Support does not eliminate illness.
Support reminds people that they are not fighting alone.
Moving Forward
My own journey has reinforced a lesson I wish more women understood.
Pain should not have to become unbearable before it is taken seriously. Exhaustion should not be viewed as normal. Chronic stress should not be accepted as a permanent lifestyle. Suffering should never be mistaken for strength.
The goal of this conversation is not to assign blame.
The goal is awareness.
The goal is compassion.
The goal is action.
Women deserve to be heard when they say something is wrong. Women deserve access to quality healthcare. Women deserve support systems that allow them to heal rather than merely endure.
Most importantly, women deserve lives defined by more than survival.
As I write this, I do not know exactly what the coming months will hold. Like many women facing health challenges, I am learning to navigate uncertainty one step at a time. What I do know is that healing is rarely a straight line, and strength should never require silence.
That realization is what inspired this month’s theme: Finding Joy in the Journey.
Perhaps the journey is not always about arriving exactly where we planned. Perhaps it is about learning how to keep moving forward when life takes an unexpected turn.
What would change if we gave ourselves permission to acknowledge our struggles without allowing them to define us? What would change if we measured success not only by what we overcome, but by how we care for ourselves while overcoming it?
Those are questions I am still learning to answer.
Perhaps you are, too.
Part Two will explore what it means to move from survival toward healing and why finding joy in the journey may be one of the most important forms of resilience we ever develop.