Four Years Later, I Still Can’t Breathe Deeply

November 8, 2016

Donald Trump was elected by our electoral college system. Many people will mark that as a day in history when everything changed. My wife and I got the alerts on our phones that he was likely to win as we were walking to the celebration party for the brand-new Senator Kamala Harris. We were so excited about voting for her, her campaign, and her political future and we somehow lost all of that as it begun to sink in that Trump won. Despite telling anyone who would listen that I was sure he would win, it still hurt. It didn’t surprise me that white people chose whiteness over reason and, in many cases, their own self-interest, but it still hurt. At the time, I struggled with the anger and fear of knowing that it was a historic day when things would change — but also a day where so much would stay the same. I remember talking to my white wife as she panicked through tears and lamented this state- and voter-sanctioned acceptance of white supremacy and racism at a level never before seen in this country.

I did not shed a tear; I just calmly added an addendum to those thoughts of despair: never before seen or believed or accepted — by white people and people who treasured their proximity to whiteness and power more than listening to the Black people, Muslim people, people with disabilities, queer people, immigrants, women, and other oppressed groups of people who have been living our whole lives knowing all too well what this country is built upon.

I went to bed that night struggling to fully catch my breath. I knew the next four years would be full of anxiety, tense anticipation of what could come next, and unfiltered hate. I wanted to do my breathing exercises, calm down, and be wrong about it all. But I knew I wasn’t. I will never forget the panic attack I had that night — like many nights since — I just could not breathe.

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