Out Here Tryna Survive
This podcast is a trauma-informed, hope-oriented, safe space. It is a warm hug of solidarity for Black women 35+. It is a celebration of our resilience thus far & our determination to not only survive but THRIVE.
Join me, Grace Sandra, a Mama, author, advocate/activist, storyteller, for some good ole self-love shenanigans.
We are braver than we believe✨
Out Here Tryna Survive
Epi 33: Losing SNAP but not Losing My Mind
The headline said SNAP might pause, and my stomach dropped. Not because of theory, but because of dinner. What follows is a raw, grounded look at who gets hit first when social safety nets fray—women-led households, elders, disabled neighbors, and children—and how Black women absorb the shock long before it makes the news. I share what it felt like to pencil out November with nothing extra, why “just get a job” ignores reality, and how pulling millions from local stores drives grocery prices up for everyone.
We go deeper than policy. I talk candidly about mental health, perimenopause, PTSD, and ADHD—and how these shape work, parenting, and capacity. We unpack the Strong Black Woman myth and name the invisible load so many of us carry in silence. Then we get practical: a simple breathing practice to steady your nervous system, small manifestation routines that help your brain find a path, and the boundaries that keep your energy from leaking away. Softness is not surrender; it’s a calibrated form of strength that lets us remain human while the system shakes.
You’ll hear the story of growing up hungry, the first years of overeating when food was finally accessible, and why food insecurity leaves fingerprints on our present. You’ll also hear how community care shows up in real life, why asking for help is strategy not shame, and how the Soft Girl Survival System gathers tools—grounding, self-advocacy, and daily energy audits—for women who are tired of being everyone’s backbone. If this conversation lands, share it with someone who needs proof they aren’t alone, subscribe so you don’t miss what’s next, and leave a review with one practice you’ll try this week. Your softness is a strategy. Your joy is resistance. Let’s protect both.
So there is a moment that keeps replaying in my head lately, and it is of a few weeks ago when the news dropped that Snap Benefits were potentially being paused. It was not like a foregone conclusion yet. And it was all about, you know, the government shutdown. And I'm scrolling TikTok, looking at different TikTok accounts that talk about the things that I think about a lot. And same thing on Instagram. And I'm just scrolling that, almost doom scrolling, trying to find out more information, realizing like how many people this impacts, etc., including myself. And then I'm sitting there trying to plan out my own little money and figure out what I'm gonna do for myself because my finances are tight as hell. I'm in school right now and I'm graduating this year. Thank God I'm graduating in just a little while, depending that I get all my work done, y'all, because I've been a little bit trifling. I ain't gonna lie. But I'm starting the process of applying for work now, including the fact that I will have this degree on my resume. And just wondering, like, is there even going to be work for me? And I was just thinking about how I've heard statistics about over 300,000 black women have lost their jobs in this calendar year since the orange demon was elected due to various DEI programs and all sorts of things being shut down. And this is something I've thought many, many, many times. But it occurred to me again that day, like black women really do carry so much more of everything that's going on, and we feel the impacts of it first. It seems like a lot of times when we get hit with the inevitable hardship, there is a much more of a you'll figure it out kind of mindset when it comes to black women more than any other demographic. And I feel the weight of that. I feel it often, but it really occurred to me again a few weeks ago because I'm like, damn, this is really going to impact me, particularly if it's November and December. And I remember thinking like, okay, finances are tight, I can do gig work, I can donate plasma, I can do all these things till I graduate. I just gotta push through till I graduate and get this job and get this money. But due to me being who I am and where I'm at, I do feel a sense of kind of like, your grace, you'll figure it out. And it's funny because I think more and more as I've healed and become more whole and healthy, I think more and more people see me as strong. And I'm like, y'all, are you you're kidding, right? Because like, yes, I'm strong, but like only to an extent. Like, yes, I can figure stuff out, but like only to an extent I need help. I do need help. A lot of women need help, and I'm not talking specifically about the snap benefits, but that's really true about all of the women-led households who are going to be affected by these benefits being canceled. Elderly, disabled, and children are a large majority of who SNAP benefits. It's not about just go get a job. Do you want someone 85 years old to just go get a job they can't? Do you want a disabled person who's already not able to work to just go get a job, they can't? A three-year-old, a four-year-old, a seven-year-old, you want a seven-year-old out here flipping burgers at McDonald's so they can make it work because their food stamps were lost? I think that some people aren't really thinking when they say stupid, silly shit like that. The impacts, and also someone like me who's also trying to do so many things already to try to bring in income, there's no time left when you're already doing four jobs and you have kids and you have school-age kids, and you gotta drive them to school, and all the things that all the women like me, I just happen to be in school myself, looking forward to just getting a job. But in the meantime, before this announcement happened, I was like, Oh, I'm so relieved because finances are so tight. I'm so relieved that at least I know I have the ability to buy food for the kids in November and December. I literally had that thought. Had that specific thought. And then the announcement came and I just felt such a punch in the gut. It really depressed me. It really depressed me for a day. So if you know me and you've watched my channel, I also practice manifestation practices pretty hardcore, y'all. I'm pretty hardcore. I do the Joe Dispenza meditations. I have a couple of his books, I do visualizations, I do scripting, I do affirmations, I do affirmations, I do chanting. I mean, I do a lot of stuff. A lot of it has worked. Some of it works sometimes, some of it doesn't work sometimes. In a lot of ways, I have literally been able to manifest enough money to stay afloat for these last three and a half years that I have not worked full-time. I've been working hard while I'm doing that. I just haven't been working in a full-time salaried position with medical benefits, etc. Additionally, the unemployment rate for black women has gone up since this administration started in a horrible economy. While grocery prices are going up, by the way, SNAP benefits when they are lost, when$90 million of money that would go into the local economy is lost, grocery prices are going to go up to make up for it. It's not that Aldi's or Walmart or Meyer or whoever else, Kroger CEOs, are going to say, you know what, in order to absorb the cost of$90 million not being spent at our stores in these next few months, we'll take a pay cut. That's not going to happen. What's actually going to happen is that the prices are going to go up for everyone. So if you think that you're safe because you're not on Snap Benefits, you're not, boo. There are 41 million families who are going to be affected by the Snap Benefit shutdown. It's just really sad. We don't want to feed the kids that we are forcing women to have. That's crazy work. It's fucking crazy work. So I would never tell anyone, just be strong. Just be strong. Just try to stay positive. I would never tell that to anyone else, even though that is what I'm trying to do. That's what I'm trying to do for me because I feel like I don't have another choice. But the truth is, a lot of black women don't have that choice. A lot of us don't have that choice. Forces us into a role where we have to figure out how to be the strong one and absorb it into our bodies, into our nervous system so that we can just keep going. One thing I always try to do, y'all, is I really try and I've worked very, very hard to protect my peace. Now, part of the reason that I have done that is because as I have learned more and more about manifestation techniques and principles, if you know anything about it, if you know a modicum of anything about it, you know that remaining in a flow state of homeostasis where your nervous system just feels good is really important to attracting good things. But also, if you know anything medically about the kind of stress that a woman feels when she's going through perimenopause, when a woman is single parenting, if you're out here going through an enormous amount of stress because you're trying to raise your kids and take care of your older parents, or because you're financially unstable, or you've just recently been through a divorce, or you're a domestic violence survivor, or all of the things that impact middle-aged women, who my primary audience is who's listening to this, all of those things you know that stress, continuously absorbing stress medically affects you, that it can lead to health causes, IBS, your hair falling out, it can lead to a higher incidence of stroke or heart attack or whatever. I mean, we know, we all know kind of at a base level, like we should not be carrying around an enormous amount of stress and whatever we can do to de-stress is really, really important. So I just want to share a few ways today that I'm trying to protect my peace and my sanity, given that this all hurts so much. If you're an empath like me, like it just feels so heavy. I feel so much pain when I think about the idea. Oh, it just makes me feel like I want to cry right now. But like when I think about how stressful this month is going to be for me, how much more I'm going to have to do this month, how much tired I'm going to have to be to make up for that$500. But I'm capable and able to do it in part because I am in school, so I'm not working 40 hours and adding an additional thing. But I think about all of the women who are just legitimately scared right now, or they're like me, they don't have family. I don't have anyone in my life that can say, Hey, can you see me through this fully? Aunties and uncles, or both my parents are not alive. I'm not close to my siblings because they are not safe people for me to be close to. I don't have that kind of family support. I do have best friends, and we are all struggling in our own unique ways trying to get our lives together. So, some of us, if you're like me, I'm assuming there's a lot more people like me who just don't have that kind of support. And it feels scary. And when I think about all of the women right now who just don't have any of the things that would make up for this loss, how fearful, how scary it feels to be a mom and not be able to provide for your kids is so intense. It's such an intense feeling. So I have had to purposefully just not think about it. Like, whatever I can do to just not think about it and to, I know this is gonna sound delusional, but if you believe in law of attraction or law of assumption, you literally have to be a little delusion. And that is honestly how I've lived and how it's worked for me for a little while. So so I can tell you this does work. But I do have to tell myself every day, like everything's gonna work out, everything's working out for me, I'm gonna figure it out, I will find a way, the money will come somehow, I'll be able to provide somehow. Through literally just convincing yourself that those things will happen. You know, I tell myself, I'll figure something out that I hadn't thought of before. There'll be an opportunity that I didn't have before. I just kind of tell myself in an ideal way, what would ideally get me through this? And I tell myself that, and I just live in that delusion. So if you were to ask me right now, like, well, what are you gonna do? How are you gonna make this work? I don't know. It's October 27th. I don't know. November 1st is right around the corner. I'm literally a case study, and I don't know. I don't know. I do not have access to any other money in any other way. I mean, on that tip, if you want to donate to my Patreon, which is basically like kind of paying me for doing social media work, which I do. I try to do as much as I can, but I have my limits. But yeah, you can donate to my Patreon and it's not just donating to me, it's actually donating to me, continuing to do my podcast, really, because my podcast doesn't pay me. I still try to remain in my delusional, positive, everything's gonna work out like soft girl era, you know? I try to remain soft because I know that that doesn't mean I'm weak. I know that crying doesn't mean I'm weak. I know that being sad about losing this big thing doesn't mean I'm weak. I know that me feeling empathy for all the other kids in the country who are going to experience hunger this month doesn't mean I'm weak. By the way, I'm a kid who did experience that. I'm a kid who grew up experiencing hunger quite often. I remember feeling hungry a lot. It was a predominant feeling of my childhood. I remember feeling like, dang, I just wish we had food here. I remember thinking that quite a bit. I wish we had something else besides like a potato, you know, like I could put in the oven or something. Like it just was a feeling that felt frustrating. I also used to go over my friend's house a lot because my friend's parents would feed me, could have dinner with them. I just knew I was gonna be able to get food if I went over to my friend's house. This was starting in like probably sixth grade all through high school. And then when I got married, I got married really young. I was like 22 when I got married, and I was the primary one responsible for like buying our groceries and buying dinner, and I would I would make like a dinner for like four people and then just put half of it on my plate and half of it on his plate and just eat so much. Like I just started overeating so bad. I was overeating so bad when I first got married because it was just the first time I had access to a grocery budget and had access to food. Because y'all, I was so hungry all through college too. And if you're wondering why, it's because I was living primarily only with my mom. My mom, who who was, she has she's gone now, but she was a diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic and she died with dementia. But while I was living with her, which it was just me and her in the house from like six, sixth grade on or so, because my brother, my brother was with us, but he went to prison at some point. But I can't remember how old I was exactly. I think I was like 13 when he went to prison. But anyway, it was just us two in the house, and my mom was just really losing her ability to care for me by the year. And by the time college hit, there was just no food. I don't even know what my mom was eating. I I don't even know. There was just no food. I was always hungry, I was always scraping by. I was in school, I was living at home, going to school. I was a nanny, and I was constantly taking food from my the house that I was nannying for and just constantly hungry. I remember one time, this is such a I'm off topic, but I remember one time visiting my boyfriend who I ended up marrying, and like he had a bunch of quarters on his desk. I was like, Oh, I could get McDonald's on the way home. Like when I left one time afterwards, like a day later, he's like, Did you take all those quarters on my desk? And I was like, Yeah. And he's like, Why? I was like, just so I could get some McDonald's on the home. He was like, You took like seven dollars worth of quarters.
unknown:I was like, I'm hungry.
SPEAKER_00:Like, I don't really think anybody knew, honestly, the kind of food insecurity that I grew up with that I was like constantly hungry. So when I first got married, I gained so much weight in the first like few years of us being married because I just was not used to being able to eat so much every day all the time. It's funny in hindsight. I'm just trying to tell y'all, like, I know that feeling. I know what it feels like, and it's such a terrible, terrible feeling. It's so uncomfortable to be hungry. I mean, just think about when you go to a restaurant and you're hungry and you're mad because they haven't served you yet and you're waiting for what, a half an hour? And that is what we are doing to 41 million people in the next month or two, denying people the ability to buy food who have who are dependent on it for valid reasons. This feels like a really good time for us to take a deep breath if this conversation stresses you out, but you're still curious where I'm going with this. Let's just take a deep breath. That always helps me. It's a grounding practice that I use a lot. So we're gonna breathe in for four, we're gonna hold it for four, and then we're gonna breathe out. All right, let's inhale for four. Hold for four. This time, when you breathe in for four, you're going to tell yourself that you're not alone in this. And when you breathe out for four, you're going to again repeat, I am not alone in this in your head. Alright, here we go. Breathe in for four. Hold for four. And breathe out. I am not alone in this. Hopefully that was helpful for you. That is something I do quite often. You're not crazy for feeling overwhelmed, and you're not crazy, or nothing is wrong with you if you're like me, where you just feel really heavy for everyone else. You're not crazy or something is wrong with you if you feel like you need rest, more rest than usual, because we're literally in the middle of a fascist takeover. And these systems are just not built with black women in mind. As a matter of fact, it's built to tear us down. And that is a reality that I am fully aware of, fully acknowledging every day, and fully accepting of at this point, like this is where we're at, but I have to figure out how to survive it myself. That's exactly why I created a system called the Soft Girl Survival System. And it's for you if you just feel very overwhelmed with life, very overwhelmed with all these things going on. It's a toolkit to help you hold yourself together first before you try holding everyone else together. And it's for women who are ready to take care of themselves because you're kind of tired of being everyone else's backbone. It is linked in my stand store. It is$27. Given everything that's going on, if you cannot afford it at all, just let me know and I'll send it to you. I mean, yes, I need money, and yes, if you can pay for it, pay for it. But if you can't, I also feel like I'm not for holding someone back who would benefit from the resources that I've created and the knowledge that I create, which is why I do my podcast because I do want people to benefit from the things that I have learned because I done survived a lot. I done survived a lot, and I want you to as well. All right, so let's talk about this invisible load. I I've been thinking about it, it comes up quite a bit. I was thinking about it while I was watching this latest season of Project Runway. And if you notice, there's a scene where I forgot his name. He's a drag queen. But anyway, there's the scene where he hugs this black woman. I believe her name is Miss Joan. This is the latest season of Project Runway. I love Project Runway, by the way. Who else loves it? Anyway, and he's crying about something and she pulls him in her chest and she just holds him. Then they talk about when she's getting voted off, like how much Miss Joan was a mothering figure for so many of them. And I was thinking about how earlier this year I created this TikTok. Pop quiz. If you're ever in trouble, always ask a who. That's right. The TikTok shows me asking my daughter, if you're ever in trouble, if you ever need help, who do you ask? Who do you find? And she says, a black woman. And I went through a lot of teaching lessons with my daughter earlier this year, telling her, if you're out and about and you get lost, find a black woman. Do not ask a white man. Do not ask a white woman. If possible, find a black woman. Earlier this year, my daughter is nine, by the way, she just turned nine in July, and we went to Six Flags with me and my kids and her Girl Scout troop. And I said, if you get lost, I want you to try to find a black woman and tell them you're lost and you need help. And I had already told her that like earlier in the year at some other point. And I just said, at any point, if we're ever anywhere and we're out, find a black woman, probably an older one who looks a little bit older, because she will help you and she will make sure that you're safe until you get help. At the same time that I understand, like black women are always asked to do everything and we're always asked to be responsible. There's a reason why is because we are, in all humility, we are morally superior. I mean, there has been some studies done on this, and actually, like based on real things like crime rates and things like that, black women are not the ones who are any majority of any crime whatsoever. And if anything, we are almost always the ones who are trying to make sure that everyone is fed, that everyone is helped, that everyone is on food stamps who needs it, that everyone gets the health care they deserve, that everyone is being treated fairly. And that includes everyone in the LGBTQIA family, everyone. Black women are because we experience racism, misogyny, and we experience the effects of the patriarchy, and we experience all the effects of being a woman and all the things that go with that, and because we are responsible for giving life to humanity, there is a sense of we have all of these experiences and we have empathy for almost everyone. That is why there is a popular hashtag and a movement, black women warned me, or black women told you so, because we have been out here trying to be healers, helpers, responsible, and all manner of things for everyone. And that is in part all of those demographics that I just mentioned are why I am such an empath. There is a video I saw like a few years ago. I don't know if you guys have seen it, but it's like a few people who are taking video of what happens when a guy who pretends he's blind goes up next to people and like just takes their arm without asking for permission or consent. So it's a little problematic. But you get the point. This white guy does this. He's got his stick and he's got the glasses on, he's pretending to be blind, and he just walks up to people. And someone's filming him walking up to people, grabbing their arm, and the white guys are just completely enraged, just enraged. Half the white women help sometimes. Some of them are just like, don't you can tell, they're like, don't fucking touch me, bro. And half of them are like, uh, okay. Usually the older ones are kind of like more relaxed about it. The black guys were for the most part helpful, but you know who helped every single time? Every single time without hesitation? Black women. There's a reason why I told my daughter, if you're ever in trouble, if you're ever out, ask a black woman. But I I meant that in general. Like if you're ever in trouble in general, ask a black woman. But I I'm your first one. Always ask me. I'm your first one. I will never, ever, ever treat you in a way that would scare you or harm you because you're in trouble. So I'm your first one. But if I'm not there, find another one. Here's the black women in my life who are safe for me. My daughter knows that. And if you're ever out and about, find a black woman. Find one, and she'll help you. And do you know that that happened? That that has happened twice since I told her that when we were at Six Flags, that happened. I left her with her brother, her big brother, by the way, my big older son, who's well, he's 20 now, but he was 19. We went to Six Flags, so don't be like, why would you leave her with a child? I left her with my 19-year-old son so that me and my other son could go ride a ride. And then, like, he texts me halfway through, like, I can't find Revy. I'm like, Bro, you are too old for this. To lose a child 10 years younger than you. She did. She asked a black woman for help and then, and we found her, of course. And then later on, this is the first year she's taking the bus home. The bus got back to the bus stop where they get let off quicker than I could get there. She walked around her apartment complex crying, and she finally found a black woman. The woman literally asked questions, helped her figure things out, and then took her back to the bus stop and helped her problem solve. Like, if your mom's coming to pick you up here, she'll probably be here soon. And I'll just wait with you. And she was literally waiting with her to make sure that I came, just in case I hadn't gotten to a car accident or had a medical emergency, in which case she was going to care for her until some somebody came home, until her dad came home like a couple hours later. I mean, we're just beautiful, wonderful people. And that's why I think sometimes I get so offended and have such a hard time when black men continuously demonize us and fault us for every damn little thing when we have gave them life and continue to advocate for them. But anyway, it's heavy. That's the point I'm trying to say. It's really heavy to have so much hatred coming at us for so many different reasons when we already feel like we're trying to caretake and warn and be responsible for and be strong and be resourceful and love on so many different people and circumstances. It can feel really heavy. And when you add on this data that so many over 300,000 Black women have lost our jobs this year, that the unemployment rate for Black women has gone up so high. We're trying to work hard, we're trying to do everything right, and we're still facing so much stress and pressure, it's like disappearing your mental health. It's like disappearing your confidence, disappearing your stability, just disappearing it in a snap. And I felt that really heavy last week or whenever it was that I realized like, yeah, I'm definitely gonna lose my snap benefits in November. I just I felt so heavy. Like if me, a college-educated woman who has a car, is able to do gig work, and still has mental health issues, but I'm doing so much better, which by the way, this is true for a lot of women too. Part of the reason that I have not been able to work full-time for three and a half years, is not because I just didn't feel like getting off my ass and doing something. It's because I have been dealing with very severe mental health issues. Very severe, very severe anxiety, very severe depression, complex PTSD that was a result of being in an abusive marriage. I mean, I think probably more accurately, a lifetime of trauma. I probably already had complex PTSD from childhood, but being in an abusive marriage that was very severely narcissistically abusive and very severely verbally abusive. I'm not just throwing around the word severely. I was so traumatized coming out of that, and I had complex PTSD really bad. I still have it, but I'm able to manage it better. And then I came into perimenopause around 42. Okay, I'm 48. So I'm on year six of perimenopause, which really threw me into ADHD like I have never had in my life. The combination of depression, anxiety, peramenopause, PMDD, complex PTSD, and ADHD. How does one work through that? How? How honestly, y'all, I could barely do what I was doing just trying to do gig work here and there and take care of my kids. I could barely do that. Barely. Mental health stuff and how that impacts women, single women with kids, and our ability to work through that is not talked about enough. I've tried to talk about it here and there. I try to keep sharing these stories to let women know, like, if you feel like you can't do it, it might be because you just can't. I literally felt like I was going crazy the last full-time job I had, which ended in the summer of 2022. So it's been three and a half years. I was not able to. I'm finally at a place now where I'm like, okay, I'm ready. I think I'm ready. I feel like I can go back. But I also have a lot of different resources in place. I also am treated now for paramenopause. I also have HRT, which is a hormone replacement therapy, for those of you who don't know, which greatly helps you balance out in perimenopause. I'm also now treated. I have medicine that I can take not every day, but I can take for anxiety when I have severe anxiety attacks. I have medicine for antidepression. And now I finally, for the first time in my life, am taking medicine for ADHD, which is also really helping me to focus and deal with some of the other things I'm struggling with. I also now have better resources like DBT and CBT and behavioral things that I have started to practice over the years so that I am able to self-regulate. But that is with all of the resources that I have and all of the things that I've done and all the things I had time to do because I haven't been working full-time. What about everyone else who doesn't have that? So when all of these things happen, it's not just about losing income. It's about losing rest, it's about losing safety, it's about losing your footing, it's about setting you back. I feel so set back in life because of so many things. I can't even imagine where I would be if I hadn't actually married someone who was so severely abused himself and became such a severe abuser to me. Part of that again is the result of two traumatized people from two traumatized communities marrying each other. I think in some ways the emotional infrastructure underneath a lot of us black women is crumbling and going to continue crumbling under an administration that literally hates us, especially if we're poor. Especially if we're poor. So if you're like, damn, Grace, this is hopeless as hell. Like, what are we supposed to do? When it comes to our country, when it comes to being American, I do not have a half-glass full perspective at all. I never saw us becoming an anti-racist society. I mean, you can look back at stuff. I say, like, yeah, I'll go back on my Twitter. I was never one of those that's like, oh, we're in a post-racial Obama was elected. I was never one of those. I was always like, yeah, shit's gonna get worse. It's crazy because even though I always thought shit was gonna get worse, I never thought it was going to get like this. Even I, who was a pessimist about America and our ability to outgrow the genocidal, murdering, slave-owning asshats that this country has been, I still didn't know it was going to get to this. Like, damn, damn. I didn't know that we would get to a point where they were trying to legalize slavery again. I didn't know that we were gonna get to a point where white men were saying on podcasts in October 2025, if you're a Christian, you need to become more comfortable with the idea of slavery. I didn't know that there was gonna be laws passed in September of 2025 that would make it okay for a rogue terrorist organization called ICE to basically drag people out of their homes. I didn't know that 170 citizens, US citizens in the year 2025 would be detained, beaten, abused, and held against their will without any sort of due process due to this rogue terrorist organization being empowered by our racist ass president. I didn't know that we would be back to the point where there are black people being lynched again in September and October 2025. I thought it was going to get bad, but I didn't think it was gonna get this bad. And this is the tip of the iceberg because what happens? This is what happens when social services are removed. When social services like SNAP are removed, crime goes up. This is not rocket science. People are going to steal food, people are going to steal more food, and then when Medicare is removed and all the other benefits are removed at the top of 2026, there's going to be less help for all manner of things. On top of all that, now we have, and it's so sad to say, there are black American men joining up with this rogue terrorist organization called ICE that the president is funding to the tune of whatever billions of dollars. As that organization continues to round up people who are not terrorists, who are not violent, who are mostly farmers and all sorts of other things, it's going to get really bad. It's going to get really bad. And more black women are going to be saying, I told you so. It's honestly so painful because you know that this country hates black people and a black woman so bad that they chose the literal dumbest man on the planet who has a sixth grade speaking level. I think it's sixth grade, it might even be fifth grade, who has been openly mocking people who have issues mentally, who is a rapist, who is a pedophile, who has 34 counts, felony counts, who has been bankrupt several times. Like there's literally nothing redeeming about this man except that he appealed to the white supremacy in 33 million Americans who voted for him. People hate black women so bad, they chose that over a competent black woman. We all know that we would not be here right now crying about our food stamps ending, feeling sad about all of the horrific changes that have happened, all of the families and all of the pain that's been caused in just 2025 alone, in just 10 months, of this demon, absolute demon becoming president. If Kamala was elected. Now, I'm not saying she's perfect, but that's how much we hate black women. That's how much. Let me let me just move on to some helpful tidbits because this is this these are things that are helpful for me. Is one recognize that there is a load here that this is impacting us. If it's not impacting you directly, who's hearing me, it will soon. If it's not impacting Someone you know and love, it will soon. And recognize that these things are real, they're happening, and don't live in fucking denial, bitch. Don't live in denial. That's all I ask. If you take nothing else from this episode, do not live in denial of these realities that are harming people more than yourself. Even if you're well off, even if you make in six figures, even if you, if you're you or no one you know is on it, please understand that this is impacting the most marginalized and poor and hurting communities. Living in full view of everything, I try to do that, and then I can move to how does this impact me and how do I feel about how this is impacting me? But at first, I'm going to be honest about what the situation is. Secondly, naming where you're carrying it. You know, I'm carrying my fear for my kids, like mine might be I'm carrying my fear for my kids. I'm carrying the fear for kids all over the country. I'm carrying fear for the elderly who just suddenly have literally no way there's nothing more they can do to get any more money to provide food for themselves. Outside of someone knowing who they are and caring for them, but they could be alone in the world. They could not have kids, they could not have grandkids who care about them to make sure they eat or whatever. I'm carrying the pressure to stay strong. Whatever it is that you're carrying, like acknowledging that first and foremost. And then a big thing that I have done is I have created firm boundaries and I really do stick with them. That is one major growth area for me over this past year is these boundaries, baby. They are working. There's a book. I was looking for it to see if it's on my desk. I don't have it on my desk, but it is called Boundaries, and I will link it and I'll put the cover right here. I would highly suggest you read it or listen to it on Audible. Anyway, y'all start saying no to some people. Start saying no, that you cannot do everything. You cannot be everyone's savior, but decide whose savior you do want to be. And that for me looked like for my kids. Like I just decided at some point, like most moms do, they're the first and primary priority, and that I will not do anything that will compromise my ability to keep them housed and fed. The big thing that I hear for a lot of people, this is not necessarily true for me. I've always been somebody who's able to ask for help. I don't know if it's because I'm a lastborn, because I hear lastborns are quick. We're just quick to be like, Can you help me? I have always been like that. It might be because I'm a lastborn. I don't know. But I have some friends who are just like so resistant to asking for help. They are so resistant to it. And I've just never had that block. But sis, if you have that block and you need help, like now is not the time to be strong. I actually just was literally telling that to one of my best friends. She does have that block. And I was just like, girl, now is the time. Like she was telling me her situation. I'm like, now is the time. You have to ask for help. And she was like, I know, but I hate to. I girl, I don't care. I don't care what you feel about it. Now is the time. You are in a crisis situation, girl. Please, girl, please. And she did finally. Thank God. Thank God. She just listened to her friend who's smart once in a while. Another thing you can do is telling yourself mentally, like, I am literally done carrying this alone. Some of this stuff I'm carrying alone and I can't do it anymore. And I have done that a little bit. I've been more open to asking my partner for his help with various things. And I just I did feel a sense of like, mm-hmm, this feels really challenging to do. But he's just been very much like, hey, I'm here to help you. How can I help you with this? What can I help you with this? What can I do about this? How can I? He's just very much like he's always trying to figure out what are the ways that are stressing you and how can I address all of those things. And please lean on me and lean on me and just let me know. And how can I help you? He's just very so sweet. Yeah, he's so sweet. But he just goes out of his way to let me know I'm here for you in real, actionable, tangible ways, girl. Let me know how I can help you. And so I have been more often, even though I've been a little bit hesitant, but I've been trying to just be like, okay, fine. Like I can't do this alone. I need your help. Fine. Sometimes that ego be hidden. Now's not the time for the ego. It's really not. Now is really the time to protect your energy, not in acute, like, oh, I'm going into 2026, protecting my energy because I wasn't protecting my energy. Like, I feel like it gets kind of thrown around almost like it's not real, but it's real, y'all. Like it's real. Protecting your energy is a real thing that you have to do, and it's not something you make a decision for one year. You cannot decide at the top of 2026 that you're gonna protect your energy for the entire fucking year. You have to work on that literally every day, every week, every month, every hour. There's probably going to be a new opportunity to figure out how I can protect this energy that I have. And that is something that I don't play with anymore. I don't play about my energy. I'm old. Okay, I'm damn near 50 years old. Like, I don't have time to be playing about my energy. I do not play about me. I do not play about my energy. And I just don't give a lot of people a lot of time and attention who do not deserve it or who are not giving it back to me or who are not compassionate, kind, loving, good people who do not bring me joy. I just don't, whatever it is, people, opportunities, whatever, I can't. I don't play. I don't play about my my my my energy. I don't play. I do not play. My inner child got me on her little pinky finger. And I'm like, little inner little inner child, what do you need? Because you have a greater sense of what I need. Anyway, the resource that I have, the Soft Girl Survival System, does cover practices for grounding yourself, how to protect your energy, and creating inner safety for yourself, um, especially when the external feels very uncertain. So, again, that is linked in my stand store. It's$27. And if you can't afford it and you'd still like to access it, please let me know and I will just give it to you for free. And if you want to sponsor someone and say, hey, like I'd like to send this to someone, I have some money, let me know, and you can buy one and I will send it to whoever you want me to send it to. More than anything, y'all, I just want you to know that as we head into this season, brokenness is not a weakness. Needing help is not a weakness. You're not failing because you feel tired. You're not failing because you feel tired, you're not failing because you feel tired. You are a human. You are not failing because you're tired. The world is literally falling apart. We are in the middle of a hostile government takeover. Fascist, dictator, xenophobic, racist, pedophilic, murderous, treasonous, dumb, dementia having, stroke having, nearly half-dead, sixth-grade level president. Okay, y'all, like, have some mercy on yourself. I just firmly believe that when the system breaks, we don't have to break with it. And the system is broken. The system is broken for black women. I firmly believe that we can pause, we can breathe, we can do our diaphragmatic breathing, we can meditate, we can take these spaces for ourselves, and we can protect our energy. We can choose softness in the middle of chaos, and that softness does not negate our strength or our resilience. Our already proven strength, our already proven resilience. Because if you are a black woman who's alive in this world, you have already shown yourself to be resilient. Just your aliveness, just your aliveness, just your getting up every day. I am very aware that me getting up every day and putting myself together and even sitting down here and filming this damn podcast is a sign of my resilience. It's a sign of my goodness that I'm still here, still a soft woman in the world, trying to be cute, you know, trying to put on my little wig and my little makeup, my little fake shein press-on nails, and get on here and talk to y'all about how to survive this crazy fucking world we're living in is a sign of my resilience. And the fact that I have fun doing it, my joy is my resistance. My joy is my resistance. I want you to tell yourself that you deserve to be treated well, that you deserve to be supported, and maybe repeat that over and over again. I deserve to be supported. I deserve to be supported. I deserve to be supported. I deserve to be supported. I deserve to be supported. Supported. I deserve to be supported too. I deserve to be supported too. Tell yourself that over and over again. Please, please, please, please, please, please. I don't want you to say it until you motherfucking believe it. Because yes, it's true that when the system breaks, women carry more. Black women are always going to carry more than any other demographic. A trans black woman is always going to carry more than black women are. The more marginalized you get, the more you niche down and niche down and niche down to the most marginalized people group, which is in America, I believe, a disabled black trans woman, the more that demographic is going to carry. We cannot keep living in denial of this shit. But what I have learned is that we also get to choose how we carry it, at least mentally. We can at minimum carry ourselves gently, even when no one else will. We can at minimum try to create mental spaces of freedom for ourselves. At minimum. If this episode spoke to you, I would love for you to share it with someone else who needs some of these messages. Please share it on your Facebook, but share this episode and please give it a like and let YouTube know that you're interested in hearing more content from me. And if you share this on Instagram, tag me on Instagram at either at OutHearTrying to Survive or at Grace underscore Sandra underscore. And tag me and let me know if there's anything that you're going to do or practice or affirm or breathe or do differently to protect yourself because I would love to hear your stories too. Just please remember, y'all, that your softness is your superpower. You showing up and being alive and being at peace and trying to find joy in this crazy fucked up world is your resistance and your resilience. And that is a beautiful fucking thing. And I thank you for spending time with me today because I know you could be anywhere out here on these internet streets. So if you're here with me, thank you so much. And as a quick little commercial break, if you like the kind of stories I tell, I am a storyteller and I wrote a book called Grace Actually Memoirs of Love, Faith, Loss, and Black Womanhood. It is available on Amazon. It's not on Audible, but I would like to make an audio copy at some point soon. This is a compilation of stories I wrote over the last, I think, six to ten ish years on Love, Faith, Loss, and Black Womanhood. I'm probably going to take it down soon, actually, off of Amazon. So you will no longer be able to buy it because I want to replace it with a more updated version that reflects me a little bit better. But in the meantime, this is available. I kind of write how I speak and speak how I write. So if you like what I've been doing, then you'll probably like this. Until next time, I love you. Please take care of yourself. Bye.
