I Spent 30 Years Trying To Be The 'Right' Kind Of Black Woman At Work. It Almost Killed Me.

<div><img src="https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/68e956691500008168269f18.jpg?cache=nIqnpxZfGs&ops=scalefit_630_noupscale" alt="The author in April of 2022." data-caption="The author in April of 2022." data-credit-link-back="" data-credit="Photo Courtesy Of Ragan Mozèe" />The author in April of 2022.</div><div class="content-list-component text"><p><span style="font-weight:400">The glass conference room looked out onto the parking lot, Lake Shore Drive, and in the </span><span style="font-weight:400">distance, Lake Michigan. The sun was already high, and the heat of the day had pressed in. </span><span style="font-weight:400">Rachel, my supervisor, sat across the glass table. I eased into one of the conference chairs, </span><span style="font-weight:400">careful not to let it roll out from under me.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight:400">Rachel had scheduled the meeting on my calendar just 15 minutes before I arrived at </span><span style="font-weight:400">work. It was titled “Going Forward,” one of those vague corporate phrases that never bodes well.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight:400">She had only been with the company for eight weeks. We hadn’t yet established a strong working relationship. It wasn’t our first one-on-one, but it was the first that showed me what was coming. </span><span style="font-weight:400">It marked the beginning of a tense dynamic that chipped away at me until, a year and a half later, I found myself at my desk, wondering if I had to completely break to have someone recognize the harm I was carrying.</span></p><p><span style="font-weight:400">“As a woman,” she said, “I will no longer let my voice go unheard.” &l