April 24, 2026

The toll of holding space (emotional + physical)

In 2015, the toll I paid for holding space was emotional and physical, dramatic and demoralizing.

During the early stages of the #RacismIsASickness project, I felt hopeful that my own assumptions about the work might be challenged or even debunked. I thought there was a possibility that the patterns I expected to hear wouldn’t actually show up the way I imagined them.  But after sitting down with one person after another, hearing their stories, I quickly realized that they began to sound familiar. Not identical, but resonant in ways that became difficult to ignore.

Once I recognized that pattern, something shifted in me.  Fatigue set in. I was overstimulated by the end of each conversation. Not just emotionally impacted, but saturated in a way that made it harder to stay fully present as the work continued.m. I began to understand that carrying these stories beyond the moment they were shared became a strain.  I noticed I didn’t have much attention left for other parts of my life. My sleep wasn’t as steady. I wasn’t building in real transitions between listening and returning to myself. I was immersed in the work in a way that gradually erased the boundaries between it and everything else.

At the time, I accepted that as the cost of doing the work the way I had structured it.  But the cost was already showing up in other ways—frustration, anger, and a quiet sense of helplessness that I wasn't ready to fully name at the moment.  

There was also a point where, internally, I reached a limit. I wouldn’t have said it out loud then, but looking back, I can see it clearly: I don’t want to hear these stories anymore. I’ve heard enough.

Not because the stories weren’t important. But because I had reached the edge of what I could hold without a way to release what I was carrying.

And then, during that same period, I lost my hearing temporarily. That's right.

There wasn’t a dramatic warning for it. At the time, I didn’t immediately understand it as connected to the work itself. The loss registered in my body as fear—fear that it might not come back, fear that something in my body had shifted without permission, fear of what it would mean to move through the world without access to sound in the way I was used to.

***

How I gathered stories rooted in pain 

As part of my planning process, I developed an interview protocol for the #RacismIsASickness project.  I thought the structure would function as a kind of shield.  I felt that if I could stay consistent in the questions, if I could move through each conversation in the same way, if I could hold the frame steady enough, then I could remain objective in the middle of something that was deeply emotional and deeply human.  The questions were designed to open memory in a specific way:  

• Describe your earliest recollection or memory of race:  What happened?  How old were you? Who were you with?  How did it make you feel?  I would also ask participants to bring an object connected to the memory—something tangible that could hold or represent what they were describing.

Then I would move into another set of questions about the most painful race-based experience they had lived through.  

• What happened? How old were you? Who were you with? How did it make you feel? What object did you bring in that represents this moment, and how does it connect to what happened?  Did you ever get over this experience? If so, what did it take for you to heal?  If not, why not? And at this point, what, if anything, might help?

I thought the questions would protect me from the fallout or the aftermath of what I already knew would be highly charged and emotional responses.  I believed that if I stayed inside the structure of the protocol, I could remain steady. That the repetition of the questions, the consistency of the format, would keep me from being swept up in the intensity of what people were sharing with me.

In theory, the frame should hold, right?  I would stay on one side of it, and the stories would stay on the other.

And yes—I am someone who is highly attuned to other people’s emotional states. I can feel when something shifts in a room, when someone is moving toward a place of memory or pain. But at that time, I didn’t always use anything beyond the interview protocol to support myself in those moments.

I relied on the structure more than I relied on my own internal tools for staying grounded. In practice, the structure didn’t create distance the way I expected it to.  It opened the door to something else I didn’t anticipate. 

People didn’t just answer the questions. They moved into them. They remembered through them. And I was sitting on the other side of that remembering, holding the frame, thinking I was separate from it because I had designed the container.

These were not abstract questions. They were structured invitations into memory. That wasn’t the issue.  What became the issue was how much of those memories—and the underlying pain and grief—would become mine. My body had a definitive answer for that, one that I didn’t anticipate and certainly one I wouldn’t welcome or like.

***

How I still gather stories 

I still gather stories as part of my practice as a photographer, writer, teacher.   But what I learned from #RacismIsASickness was that hearing people’s stories—especially stories rooted in race, memory, and pain—requires more than structure or protocol.

It required and still does demand a way to take care of myself through the process itself.  That realization changed the choices that I made and how I chose to move after my hearing came back.

It might look like leaving the stories and the energy they carry in the spaces where I worked, instead of bringing them home with me.

It might look like building breaks into the transition between the end of a day of listening and the beginning of my return to my own life.

It sometimes involved sitting on a bench with a trusted friend just to decompress.  Other times, it took me taking deep breaths before getting on a train or bus or driving home. Sometimes nourishment in the form of a quick snack or grabbing a meal with a colleague helped to replenish energy that has been fully spent.

These are not incidental pauses. They are part of the work now, because I understand something I didn’t fully understand then: I am not equipped to move through these stories without a way to discharge what they carry.

***

What I learned

What I learned through this work is that holding boundaries is a way of showing care to myself and others.

Care is not limited to offering a smiling face or a soft tone. It is not just how I present myself in the moments of listening. Care is also about knowing when to stop. It is about checking in—with myself and with the person across from me—and not pushing either of us beyond what we can actually hold.

Listening is not only about hearing what is being said. It is also about deep processing. It is embodied work. It moves through the nervous system, not just the ears. But as I learned, the ears are a sensitive portal and can fail, or in my case, resist.

And because of that, I require rest.

Other times, I must step away from the work and return to myself before continuing.

I learned that it is okay to pause. It is okay to take a day off, or more, if necessary. It is okay to not carry everything forward in one continuous line.

In some ways, the temporary loss of my hearing forced me to understand that more clearly than anything else could.

It made the pause unavoidable.

And over time, I began to understand that what I thought of as interruption was actually part of the practice itself.