After a series of false starts and deferred dreams, I didn’t have much motivation to write anymore.
I consider myself a good storyteller. People tell me I’m funny, too.
When I was 19, I ran a few blogs that I considered successful. And when I say they were “successful,” I just mean that I wasn’t the only person that read them. I would title my blogs after songs that were stuck in my head at the moment: The Cookie Monster tune ‘C is for Cookie’ birthed The Crumbly Cookie blog, a collection of music reviews that no one ever asked for, and my profound nineteen-year-old thoughts on a random assortment of topics. I had about ten regular readers. I enjoyed interacting with them.
But soon, I decided it was time for me to buckle down and focus on my education, starting college full-time in the fall of 2010. And somewhere between then and now, I lost my love of writing.
In the summer of 2018, I quit my first post-graduation full-time job and moved from Long Island, New York to Charlotte, North Carolina to pursue a Master’s degree in Mental Health Counseling. It had been almost three years since I received my Bachelor’s degrees (in Psychology and Africana Studies) and after much consideration (but not enough prayer!), I felt that it was the right time for me to make that power move.
When I touched down in Charlotte, I struggled to find a full-time position, but managed to keep a rotation of a few per-diem jobs. I usually never had much trouble finding full-time work and not securing it was eating away at my confidence. In addition to not finding sufficient work, I was not adjusting to graduate school too well, either. I turned to the arts–mainly painting and writing–but the magic that I felt before when I used to create was no longer there.
A spirit of sadness had taken over me. I didn’t want to talk to anyone about how I was feeling. I didn’t understand how I was feeling; I didn’t have it in me to make people laugh anymore and I didn’t want to create at all. I was depressed and I was beginning to use unhealthy methods of coping to deal with all these new feelings and anxieties that I had. Every night after class I would travel the half-mile down University City Boulevard to Target and cruise the wine isle before buying my $5 bottle. In addition to my new drinking habit, I found myself involved with someone I knew I had no business dealing with simply because I was lonely. The interaction, despite being unhealthy, still felt good.
A few weeks into the first semester from hell, I found out I was expecting. A baby.
I returned home to New York after being offered my old job back. But the opportunity was full of empty promises, countless excuses, and unexplained hold ups to my start date. By the time I started receiving call backs from the other jobs I had applied for, I was well into my second trimester and very visibly pregnant. It seemed as though no one wanted to take a chance on me.
My relationship also had gone up in flames during my pregnancy. My son’s father ultimately stood me up at our baby shower, later leaving me at 9 months pregnant for his lesbian best friend, and moved to the other side of the country with her to pursue a rap career.
Around noon on July 28, 2019, I spoke with my aunt and told her I’d be arriving to see my grandmother after a doctor’s appointment later that day. Instead, just two hours later, my grandma would be gone.
A little over a week later, I gave birth to a beautiful and healthy boy after going into labor at my grandmother’s repass. I named him Jré. Even though I was ecstatic to be a mother, my reality was cloaked in mourning; I didn’t feel any better. In fact, I felt way worse than I had ever before.
I had changed. I was becoming angry and withdrawn to everyone but my son, who got rainbows and sunshine from me at all times. I knew I needed the help, but I feared the repercussions of reaching out for it. My son’s doctor–who had also been my own pediatrician–noticed the change in my demeanor and had me take an assessment to screen me for depression. I did not believe that I was going through postpartum depression because I couldn’t attribute any of these negative feelings to being a mother or to my newborn. I was wrong. I decided that I had to go to therapy.
While therapy went well, I still felt as though I was in a slump, especially concerning my career. My original plan was to begin working again when Jré was six-weeks-old. My six week deadline turned into nine weeks, then 12, then 15 and soon, I began to realize that the plan I set for myself was honestly turning to crap.
After talking with my therapist, I realized that for the last two years I had not made a vision board or a create box. Surely this is why my life was in shambles, right? I got to making the board and box—a myriad of photos and random notes pieced together that illustrated the life that I wanted to manifest for myself and my child in the upcoming year. I filled my board with words of affirmation, many images of Ciara and Russell Wilson’s family, and prints of black fathers and sons. Being able to visualize the goals I had set made them seem more attainable than ever. Seeing the life I wanted on oaktag ignited a drive in me that I had not felt in a while. I began to work intentionally towards my goals, because while I do believe in the power that the vision board holds, faith without works is dead.
Fast forward to March 2020, and I finally landed an interview in my field that not only was full-time but also had amazing benefits. I would be working with at-risk youth with mental disabilities, helping them to smoothly integrate into society after graduation from their live-in programs. I could finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. But the light turned out to be just a lantern.
I interviewed on a Monday morning and received a call-back on Wednesday. I was told that I would be receiving an additional call the following day to schedule a date and time for me to come in and fill out paperwork before I would officially start. But literally the next day, all hell broke loose: Covid-19 was here and New York was going into full lockdown; all new hires in my soon-to-be company would be on hold indefinitely. I was devastated. Everything that I thought was finally looking up just came crashing back down. I felt as though the world was getting a good laugh at my expense.
But I didn’t get angry or withdrawn this time; history has proven that that was highly ineffective for me. Instead, something urged me to write. Putting all my jumbled thoughts down on paper helped me to feel a little better. I journaled about the letdown I felt from having the job snatched out from under me. I journaled about the fear that I had concerning my finances in the coming weeks. I journaled about me needing to exercise my faith. Writing was helping me troubleshoot life’s malfunctions again and it felt great. I pulled it together and tried to map out what the coming weeks were going to look like. Coronavirus or not, baby still has to eat, and let me tell you this child can eat.
During this time, my cousin asked me to write a piece detailing the struggle I was experiencing as a new mom trying to reenter the workforce for her networking organization’s website. It was an easy task for me, the words just flowed out on the paper. I sent her the blog post after a few rounds of proofreading, and she loved it, suggesting I share my story more widely and reflexively, I wondered whether there were too many blogs already on the internet. But something felt different. I didn’t quite believe there wasn’t space for me. I began to research how to start a blog ten years after I had ended my last one.
I looked into domains, website builders and of course, thought of names. One night while journaling, it came to me: I’d call it “On the NsiX,” named after the N6 bus route that connects Hempstead to Jamaica, Queens, my hometown.
Since, On the NsiX has been my Covid passion project, a safe space for people to read and connect with me on various topics.
Am I afraid to put myself out there again? Absolutely! Oversaturation or not, I have a life worth sharing and a story that is worth telling. I have always been afraid of failing when it comes to just about everything, honestly but at this point, what do I have to lose? I have taken so many losses in the last two years that I know a win has to be coming. How can I win if I don’t even try, though?
I can’t say that Covid-19 itself inspired me to get serious about putting myself out there again and write, but the events surrounding it pushed me hard enough to make me tune out that voice of fear I have been listening to for a while now. Oversaturation isn’t an excuse anymore because I recognize there’s room for me. Even if it isn’t readily available, I’m going to make room for me. I understand that I will not yield results quite possibly for a long time, but I am so excited just to be able to share, make people laugh again and write. I’m hopeful for my future again and all that it may hold.
Chenille Cooper is a born and raised New Yorker with a deep love for all things North Carolina. She is a crime documentary enthusiast with a passion for mental health wellness. The best thing she has ever done was become a mommy to her beautiful baby boy, Jré. She graduated with two Bachelor’s degrees in Psychology and Africana Studies from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and currently has a love/hate relationship with working towards her Master’s Degree in Mental Health Counseling with a focus in Substance Abuse. Connect with Chenille on Instagram at @CheButtahBaby/@OnTheNsiX and on Twitter at @CheButtahBaby.
