When the Season is Over, Close the Chapter

Length: 32:59

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

rebecca, birth, people, work, happening, ebb, black, year, doulas, dei, call, black women, organization, relationships, feel, leadership, families, part, doula, talk

Denise Bolds

Hi, everybody. I'm Ravae Sinclair. I am Denise Bolds.

Ravae Sinclair

And we're here to help you, Doula That!

Denise Bolds

Oh, yes.

Ravae Sinclair

ng our feet back wet with for: 2024

Denise Bolds

Black History Month and from: 2020

Ravae Sinclair

No, they're not a Walmart. They're in Target, though, because Target has made a commitment to have an high and promote that Black vendors throughout the year. They are literally committed to the 365 Black. But in general, in general DEI professionals are being released from corporations left and right. Because remember, in the pandemic, everything was DEI DEI DEI because we watched George Floyd be murdered by a white police officer right in front of our faces. We watch it over and over and over again. And people were wanting to read a book, let's get a book club. Let's get some stuff together. And I was supportive of that effort to be like, Oh, you actually want to know like, maybe this is the reckoning, right? This is the time that white folks are really going to try to figure this out and really dig in and every year, every year it just wanes and wanes and wanes. To the extent that I remember saying last year, where's the wahala? Where's the hoopla? Where's the corporate ads, the sales, the sponsorship around Black History Month gone? They've nobody even said anything about Juneteenth day, like they were done with Black folks. Right. And this is I think the erosion, I think white people have the privilege to walk away. They have the privilege to not pay attention, because it's not them. And so we watch people be very commercially invested. And then not it's it's actually it's really interesting, and it definitely happened in the birth world. I have people who are wanting to be in a DEI group, and then they were canceling their subscriptions and it just fell off. Nobody wanted to read the book anymore. Nobody wanted to gather. So you know, I know ya'll listening where you're at what happened on your own. Are you still homeschooling your children and unschooling them about colonization and, and all the lies because this is the Trump effect. Trump told lies. He was bold enough to total it. This goes back to our last episode about accountability. Y'all let him run amok. Y'all let him say things. And now it's not being checked. It's not being checked by your your you're not checking your children. You're not checking your husband. The racism isn't in check. And so now the focus, the DEI, it was a trend. It was just the thing. Yeah, affirmative action isn't a thing, like all the things, all the protections that we had to have, because of the way this country was created and set up, including the hospital system that our Black bodies keep going into and not coming out of. Because of the way these systems were set up. We had to have systems in place to do course corrections, to force equity, to force, the acknowledgement that we are people we are humans, we're not three fifths, although the Constitution still has language in there. We are whole human beings.

Denise Bolds

And we feel pain, hello, pain, managment They're not-could'nt keep it up. could'nt keep it up.

Ravae Sinclair

th, and this year of our Lord: 2024

Denise Bolds

It's a hard. It's a hard thing. It's a hard thing being Black

Ravae Sinclair

and they have the privilege to walk away and we can't,

Denise Bolds

I can't walk away. And so on February 13, and Black History Month, two Black women basically released two of the top evidence based birth, Black doulas Black childbirth educators from the evidence based birth brand. And I'm sitting here like

Ravae Sinclair

and Rebecca called herself an ally, right? She was---

Denise Bolds

Rebcca is supposed to be woke as fuck. she's supposed to be really woke up out here. And meanwhile not a word came from her. There hasn't been an acknowledgement from her a phone call an email, nothing to my colleague and I on this situation, we're still doing the work. We are still working with the sponsor to provide a childbirth ID access to black and bipoc families so that they can turn around this health illiteracy and really empower their birth experiences. So I'm really happy about that. But the thing with Rebecca is, you know, we had this relationship long before the pandemic. And we did a we did a Black maternal health disparities video for her. This colleague and I, we've done so many things to really help move the brand for her. And now, it's just Okay. Done. And that's okay. Because, you know, I've outgrown things, and I've moved on to other things, too. But it is just very, very interesting. How people regard relationships.

Ravae Sinclair

Well, first of all, let me just say this is a very DONA-esque it sounds like a repeat of what happened two years ago. Yes, like maternal health league when they released us with an email and still no explanation, no talk. No. Nothing. Yeah, it sounds very DONA-esque. And it's interesting, because Rebecca really touted herself to be something different than that.

Denise Bolds

h evidence based births since: 2018

Ravae Sinclair

and it stings, it does it stings. To me, like you're like you have no idea what I've done to make it possible for you to sit in the seat. And while I don't need the recognition, what I want is for you to treat me in the proper way, don't just send me an email saying You're dismissed.

Denise Bolds

Not when you said we would we would pick up this conversation when you come back off of your of your medical leave.

Ravae Sinclair

Yeah. So some of this is about and I'm gonna fault Rebecca, that I'm talking about leadership is when you bring people in, you need to build a team. There's training, there's a whole whole classes and books, I got about 15 of them on that top shelf. How do we communicate? I got them, okay. There's conversations about how do you lead? How do you build relationship and rapport, you bring in leadership over old people, older people not age older, but I'm like older in terms of your investment in the organization. And the new in the in the older have to get acquainted, especially if the newer folks are going to be in leadership over the folks who have been there doing foundational work. And as you know, one of my feed bits of feedback around this when we were just doing our girlfriend chat about it is, listen, in my experience, my years of experience, the people who build the foundation, typically are not the people who can take the work forward. There is a transition in most organizations. And if anybody is like your everybody wants to have an organization, but do know how to lead one? Do you have any education, go read a book, really spend some time on this. Because organizational development, oftentimes that transition, you have to transition out the foundational people and transition in the new people who often have the vision, the energy, they're catching what you lay down, and that's okay. But it sounds like this transition was not led properly. There was not a relationship building, there was no rapport for communication. And so it's this transactional what you all had in the meeting that took two years to get to was a transaction Hey, I don't like what you said. And you did. This isn't working. We're gonna release you. If there was a relationship then it wouldn't, it might have been different, it might have still resulted in the release. But it might have been different, it probably would have felt different because it's like, Hey, we are, we we appreciate we respect what you've done. We respect everything like without you, we couldn't have had x, y, z. And so what we want to do is have a transition, where we transition you out of this central role, and ramp you down to another place where you can be more in an advisory role or to leave altogether, because it's time for new wind to blow in. It's to say that, but how you say it and how you do it really, really matters. No,

Denise Bolds

I agree.

Ravae Sinclair

It's unfortunate, because it's really frustrating to put your time, your blood, your sweat your tears into an organization, largely as a volunteer because of the work that you're trying to do. Because of what how many people you're trying to expose to the crisis, how many families are trying to gain access to reliable childbirth education, it's really frustrating to do that out of the kindness, the goodness of your heart time you're taken away from your family and friends, and only for you to get a door slammed in your face by a very abrupt email, and you immediately be taken being taken out of the database and passwords being changed. As though you weren't a contributor, as though you weren't a friend as though you weren't a loyal, loyal, loyal part of this community.

Denise Bolds

Mm,

Ravae Sinclair

y'all, this is what's happening in the birth world. This is the this, we've spent three episodes now talking about the mistreatment, acknowledging, Hey, we gotta do better. This is a call up. There's not a call out, although some people may take it like that. This is a call up, we got to do better. And I'm citing specifically, I'm inciting specifically leadership.

Denise Bolds

Absolutely. Because, you know, for me, I was able to pull Rebecca to the mothers of gynecology for her to buy a brick for the Black EBB instructors. Right, you did, right. So I did that for Rebecca, you know, and that those are those connections, that this young Black new admin has no idea how that foundation really does help build on things to come. Okay, so you know, Rebecca, you know, I wish her well, I wish her you know, whatever she's doing in her life, I wish EBB well, but it's just time for me to move on. Because I think I've outgrown it at this point, if I can't be acknowledged, I'm just gonna go where I can continue to do the work and be respected and acknowledged and appreciated for what I'm doing. Because I know what I bring to the table. I know the influence I have, I know the connections I have with people. I know the connections, I have a birth workers and I wrote quite a few letters of recommendation for people to take the EBB training and be certified. And pull, you know, all my mentees. I mean, a lot of people so you know, if they can, if they can move forward, go go for it. But I will not have my influence my flavor there. And that's totally okay. My mother always said, go where you are wanted.

Ravae Sinclair

Absolutely, absolutely. I think we're getting, you know, more and more we're having these experiences where we're being transitioned out of spaces, and you know, I'm saying being transitioned but being released from spaces that we have overstayed and we probably it's time to grow and go, and that's okay, that's interesting. You just gotta watch the patterns that happen. But I also feel like there's some lessons in this like one of one of the things my takeaways when we were having because you're gonna get in the girlfriend chat, like, the way it happened, because you know, some GUURRRRL! Oh, What? For real?

Denise Bolds

for reading out of this, it was

Ravae Sinclair

No They Didn't! , it was all of that y'all for real. But we have to, you know, make it we have to contain it for the podcast at some level. But one of the takeaways was definitely be mindful of how you build and who you build with.

Denise Bolds

Yes.

Ravae Sinclair

Okay. As you're doing your business and you're in this birth space, who are you building relationships with? What if you have a company? What's your company culture? Are you nurturing relationships? Do you know how to nurture relationships? Relationships are everything like, newsflash, they're everything, how you treat people, you talk to people, you interact with people, and you want to be intentional. You want to be very intentional. I am very intentional about who I don't talk to right now. If you if you aren't heard from me, it's intentional. And not saying no, and I'm not saying that it's bad not it might not be specific to you, but it's I'm intentionally interacting with certain people because they helped me maintain my level while I'm really investing a lot of my energy into building you know, there's a lot of recording happening, a lot of writing a lot of a lot of product creation is happening. I don't have capacity to talk to everybody. So there it comes in seasons. Some people --as a result of how everything has unfolded and been revealed to me last few years, I'm not talking to you.

Denise Bolds

I agree.

Ravae Sinclair

And you're not talking to me. It's a mutual thing. There's no There's no heat. I honestly have no heat with virtually anyone, especially in the birth space. I don't even have energy for that. So whatever that old stuff, most people I don't even think about from day to day. I don't even remember what it was child. It's all good. But I just think it's important to be mindful of who you're building with and reassess that year over year. Like I reassess as the year came on. I was like, okay, so am I still invested in that? I'm still gonna be a you know, Denise, I sent out a couple of resignation letters.

Denise Bolds

You did,

Ravae Sinclair

I decided to resign from some projects from some boards, because I think I had done the work that I was called there to do. I have learned not to overstay my welcome.

Denise Bolds

Yes, yes.

Ravae Sinclair

That whole thing with DONA showed me. There were signs for years to go. People don't get you. These people don't respect you. They have no idea what you're bringing to the table. These people are not your people anymore. In the beginning, they were in the first four or five years. They were the last three years. They were not right. Right. People who smiled in my face. Were stabbing me in my back and multiple people wasn't even just the one. It was multiple. Miss LA. Miss Tallahassee. It was several several okay, There were several.

Denise Bolds

Even your mentor, the one who trained you --My God

Ravae Sinclair

Miss Wisconsin, honey. You know, I gotta give them nicknames Chile, because we can't even you know, be invoking.

Denise Bolds

But y'all y'all listen, because y'all listen to the state you and we meant that. They love.

Ravae Sinclair

They love to hate me. They know exactly who they are. And the whole point of it is you just outgrow people. And guess what? Every single one of them I just named, none of them had a closing conversation with me. I didn't call him up and cuss him out. I didn't tell him I'm done with you. I just walked away because I just recognized it was over. It was over.

Denise Bolds

It was over. It was over.

Ravae Sinclair

There was yeah, there's no point in like bringing it up. So but it's a work that you do on your own. Be mindful of who you're building with. And when the season is over. Close the chapter. Yeah,

Denise Bolds

I close the chapter with quite a few from DONA my damn self and don't look back. And I can't I can't tell you anything. But you know, the way God is because my god is an amazing God. When the when the revelation comes through and look is 333. When the revelation comes through, it's like, oh, look at them. Oh, because I'm too busy. I'm too busy fulfilling my life and soul's purpose. I don't have time to look back at you. But I know myself last year, I resigned from several people and several organizations that I was working with, because it's just time for me to move on. Let someone else take the seat. Let someone else put in the time and energy and work. I've I've made my contribution.

Ravae Sinclair

Yeah. That's my tip for those who are finding themselves, hey, I'm finding myself in these situations as well. I think it's just the season. It's a season when you start growing, you will outgrow people you will outgrow relationships and connections. And it's okay. Just take care and go you don't have to have like I said, you don't have to have a closing conversation. Sometimes you do. But most times you don't. You can just shift and everyone. Everybody recognizes the shift and it's okay. And so in this situation with EBB and just feels like it was time to shift

Denise Bolds

It was time to shift. It was time to shift. But you know, it was just one of those things like Well, where is Rebecca? Why isn't she responding at all when we had such a great rapport with her over the years, personal phone number email access, we had all this stuff with her and then she just just totally ghosted us and no rhyme or reason to that. But you know, when when God moves, he wipes things away so you don't have to look back you don't have recall on that person's name or or the incident that happens, and he always moves you into something better.

Ravae Sinclair

Yeah,

Denise Bolds

that's exactly what's happening to me right now. So it's like, yeah, you know, I had a great run with evidence base birth I had a fantastic time with them as an instructor, but it's time for me to move on because to elevate sometimes you have to separate and that means that I have to, you know, definitely go over here to do black women do VBAC. I've separated from several things in order to move myself up because I've put in the work I've put in the time. I have taught so many evidence based birth courses. I have put in hours and hours of work so now it's I could move forward because I've done the due diligence I was supposed to do. Yeah, I'm okay with

Ravae Sinclair

it. It is important to understand the way closure shows up for you. What are those signs for you? You don't have to wait for people to put you out your you can leave you can just leave on your own. But you got to start to recognize part of maturity is recognizing when those signs show up for you. It does. I'm sorry. It took me listen. That they were done a really

Denise Bolds

girl took me a long time because I kept my head off when I tried to tell you, but that's okay. But

Ravae Sinclair

I was like, No, they just need more time. No, it's okay. And that was hard to watch. It's hard to watch. Or it was also it was hard to watch. But it was hard to experience as well. And I will tell you, this God will also hide you, He will also protect you while you're in the store. And I didn't feel the heat the way they was trying to give it to me. That's the one thing. I look back. And I'm like, What is such a shame of what they could have gotten? And it's so funny because you think about all the all the opposition from the different people, I just laugh because I'm like, I don't even remember their names. I when I see them. I'm like, oh, yeah, I guess she is in the birth space. It's interesting to me, but they're really of no consequence. But the other takeaway, I want to say, and I remember saying this to you. Part of what happens is a betrayal. When people shift, you're like, wait a minute, we were friends. Wait a minute, I thought this, I thought that and it can take a minute for you to kind of catch up. Here's what came to me and I shared it with you. So I want to share with everyone else is when when you're doing work, you may trust someone, and you might be building with them. Over the years, what I've learned, what I've learned to trust is not necessarily the people, but I've learned to trust that relationships in business will change. I trust scripts and business will change. Because your business plan changes your business strategy changes, your business goals and focus change. Sometimes you've achieved the goal. And so you're done. Sometimes you're like, oh, it's not the strategy isn't working, I got to change the strategy. What I trust when I'm working with people, and my relationship has started, because we were working together on a project or an organization or a business, what I trust is that they will change. They're supposed to. Now, you might come into that that relationship, just join being business, comrades, and then you end up becoming friends. Now, then you have to make a conscious decision in both of you that the friendship is the priority and not the business.

Denise Bolds

Yeah, Right.

Ravae Sinclair

Those are the relationships that you can trust in. Now, those are the relationships you can invest in and expect that they might be with you for a long time. But honey, baby, unless you have had that conversation and made that conscious decision. It might feel like you're three peas in a pod. I remember, you know, we were like that me, Sherri & Ms Tallahassee--three peas in a pod, but things Change. Business relationships change, and you can trust that.

Denise Bolds

Yeah,

Ravae Sinclair

okay. It's okay. It's actually okay. It's healthy. It's healthy. And so I what I think I feel like, you know, you've heard the phrase, especially in the Black community, being "church hurt", or you're, you're volunteering you showing up and then somebody betrayed your trust or violates or, or did they just hurt your feelings, and now you don't want to come to church anymore, because that community, you feel like there was a breach or somebody didn't do you, right? Or they didn't say, and now you're not going to the very place. Not only that old building or community, but in any other church community, you're not going and getting what you need. Because you're staying in the hurt place. Let me tell ya, don't stay "birth hurt" don't stay

Denise Bolds

No, don't stay, don't stay hurt, keep it moving

Ravae Sinclair

Keep it moving! But understand some relationships really are just business. And what you can trust is that they will change.

Denise Bolds

Yes. And you know, I've moved on with a we are still serving black and brown families, I am so happy that the sponsor is moving forward with my colleague and I so that we can provide these childbirth ed access to their families to really empower them in making a much better birth outcome, and helping to dispel Black maternal health disparities. So the work is still going forward. And I'm really grateful about that. And that was my concern. When Rebecca went AWOL here, basically that you know, what's going to happen to these families we had we had an accord, what's going to happen with these families? And it seemed like, that was the most important thing to me, my colleague, but it wasn't the most important thing to EBB. So, it's like, do you understand how this is gonna help, you know, help families if we keep doing this? I also want to quickly because we're running out of time, but it is so helpful for doulas to be a part of studies, scientific studies, research studies contributing their information, data, because this really shows that doulas can really promote the policy changes. And I'm so happy to be a part of that child with that study, because it shows many positive outcomes when health literacy is supported. So I'm just really thrilled to be a part of that.

Ravae Sinclair

Yeah. And it's incredible. What you all learn was that you didn't need to do it through EBB and if you had never been put out, you would never learned how you could do it on your own. That's the growth.

Denise Bolds

Oh, yeah, I trust the higher power. You know, I wish Rebekah all the best and, you know, their staff has a lot to learn young black women. Um, but yeah, good luck.

Ravae Sinclair

Good luck, and it's it's great. So it's all good. But these are some lessons in leadership and in growth, and in recovering recovering from when things don't quite go your way. And making sure that you keep moving forward. Take care of yourself, you might have to pull back a little bit.

Denise Bolds

Oh, yeah,

Ravae Sinclair

take a break.

Denise Bolds

Take a break, regroup, he'll make me regroup a little bit. But you know, there's there's always something better down the road. And it really is, I'm having an absolute blast with black women do V back and it's just been an amazing journey. And it's growing. I mean, last year was 69 women, I was able to train and this year, we're gonna double a triple that amount. So I'm just really excited. Yeah,

Ravae Sinclair

yeah. So: 2024