CHAPTER 7: TRYING TO BE THE
PERFECT WHITE PERSON

C:   It had already been a long day at work by the time I walked into the rehab all-staff lunch meeting. Since we had to cross the street from the outpatient clinic to get to the meeting, a couple of colleagues and I were a little late. We grabbed some seats along the side wall just as the first slide appeared on the screen:

DIVERSITY, EQUITY, AND INCLUSION TRAINING

Presented by (wait for it) some white dude.

We began with a one-minute guided breathing exercise so we could “prepare our souls for what was about to happen.”

I despise breathing exercises.

I can’t slow my thoughts. Instead, my brain spins with questions like:

What am I breathing for?

What am I meditating on in this setting?

Can the person next to me hear my nose whistling from the booger lodged in my nostril?

Needless to say, I was not in the best frame of mind for what was about to happen.

In fairness, the discussion started off okay. The guy leading it talked about how in a medical facility we need to be prepared to adjust to people’s needs. He talked about etiquette for using an interpreter, which was especially relevant since we were in a part of town with a large percentage of Spanish speakers. He encouraged us to learn at least basic Spanish so we could connect with patients more effectively.

He brought up attempting to understand a patient’s financial situation while we’re giving recommendations for their recovery. It doesn’t go over well to advise someone to get a gym membership if they have difficulty buying groceries for their family.

The basic idea he was conveying was that our treatment of other people is most often a derivative of our own culture.

Makes sense, I thought.

He clicked the button, and the slide changed to: “When have you seen something that showed how important knowing culture is?”

One woman raised her hand. “We should ask how to pronounce a patient’s name!”

Okay . . . kind of related to the question. Adaeze talked about the importance of names a few chapters ago. Yes, it’s a great way to start honoring a person and their culture by learning to pronounce their name correctly. However, in a setting where we worked with people of all different cultures, backgrounds, and ways of life, I hoped this was a bare-minimum expectation.

Seemed like a pretty trivial example to me.

As one of the few—if not only—people in the room with a fair amount of personal experience interacting with different cultures outside work, I felt a strong pull to raise my hand and tell some stories.

I could have talked about the cultural distinctions between Adaeze’s family and mine or about how patients of various cultural backgrounds tend to have different emotional responses to pain. I wanted to share my own examples of the importance of understanding another person’s culture so we can understand their needs as opposed to superimposing our needs onto them.

Instead, I stayed quiet—in part because I wasn’t sure my opinion would hold much weight with a group of relative strangers. They didn’t know me or my story. I was just the guy who showed up late and sat on the side of the room. Plus, I had a long list of patients with challenging situations I needed to see that afternoon. I chose to save my emotional energy.

The next slide popped up: “Tell about a time when you’ve seen a positive or negative impact of ethnocentrism.” The leader talked about the importance of trying to stay curious so we could understand each other more fully, and then he opened the floor for discussion.

Sidenote: he put the word ethnocentrism out there without a bit of context or explanation. I think half the room was doing a quick Google search on their phones after the word appeared. Use common English, man. Or at least a definition would be helpful.

One coworker talked about a time she was working with a Spanish-speaking woman who uses a wheelchair and was astonished that the patient’s primary goal was to get on the floor so she could play with her kids. She enthusiastically exclaimed, “Who knew that playing on the floor with kids is so important in Mexican culture?”

My first thought was What does that have to do with Mexican culture? She’s in a wheelchair and has children. Of course she wants to be able to get on the floor and play with her kids again!

Now I felt an even bigger pull to speak up. I wanted to tell them about the time I had a female patient who was Muslim. Her husband came with her to the appointment and stayed right by her side as we spoke. Sensing some tension, I asked a few questions to get some of her story, but she was very short and to the point. So, rather than asking more questions, I decided to address the elephant in the room.

“I just want to admit that I don’t know much about your culture or your religious beliefs,” I said. “So if there’s anything I do during this exam that is uncomfortable for you, please let me know, and I’ll be happy to adjust.”

She smiled and said, “Thank you for that.” With an obvious sense of relief, she continued, “My religion does not allow you to touch me.”

“Okay,” I said. “We can make that work.”

At that moment, I saw the couple take a fresh breath. They were much more relaxed. I modified my approach slightly, and the appointment went just fine. I simply had the woman’s husband do what I would have typically done while I observed. It wasn’t the most thorough exam, but she felt comfortable. I was able to initiate a plan for her and get her a follow-up appointment with a female therapist so she could have better care.

But again, I decided on silence. I just didn’t have it in me to speak up that day. My tank was already empty, and I wasn’t even at the end of the day yet.

To my surprise, that was the extent of our diversity training for that session. I don’t know what, if anything, people took from the meeting. It’s not that it wasn’t well-intentioned. I do applaud them for realizing that different cultures have different needs and for wanting to create awareness about that. It’s just that, from my perspective, it wasn’t very helpful.

For the rest of the day, I felt a restlessness in my soul telling me I should have contributed something to the discussion. When I got home, I told Adaeze what had happened.

A:   After I listened to Chad tell the story (which didn’t have the side commentary of him not having the energy to say anything), my first question was, “Did you say anything?”

C:   “No.”

A:   “Why not?”

C:   “I don’t know. I wasn’t sure anybody would actually listen. I didn’t know how much good it would do, and I’m not sure how people would’ve reacted.”

A:   “Oh.”

My mind was racing, trying to fill the silent and rapidly growing space between us. His biggest concern seemed to be who in the room would “get it.”

I couldn’t help but wonder, If I was in that room, would I have been enough of a reason for you to speak up? Would the countless people of color you treat have been enough of a reason?

Then a thought hit me that I didn’t feel I could say aloud: Or are we only convenient to speak up for when you aren’t in a room full of white people?

I felt ashamed for thinking that way.

Then I felt ashamed for feeling ashamed about feeling that way.

It was a learned reaction I’d been forced to pick up in order to survive being the only Black person in predominantly white spaces: protect the white person from my emotions.

The next thing I knew, I was having an argument with Chad, entirely in my own mind: You were literally the only person in that room who could have made some actual change, and you chose passivity.

You chose the easy way out.

You chose comfort.

You chose your white comfort.

You chose easy silence.

Because you can. Because that’s your white privilege.

You’ll notice how one-sided this was.

The reason I felt like I couldn’t say any of this to Chad was because I didn’t want him to feel like a failure—which he is not. Or feel like he couldn’t do anything right. Which is also untrue.

I felt stuck. The one person I wanted to share these frustrations and feelings with was also the one whose actions had unintentionally made me feel like the scum of the earth.

C:   I knew my wife well enough to know that the spiral in her head had begun. And I knew it was about me not speaking up. I was feeling very defensive, which, in turn, led to my own argument in my head.

So I just have to be perfect? I can’t have an off moment?

That doesn’t seem fair. I wouldn’t have a problem if you did the same thing.

Apparently, my capacity doesn’t matter at all.

Much like Adaeze, I was doing all the talking in my head.

We sat there in silence for a few minutes, lobbing our own private accusations. Then, because I could tell she was upset, I said, “I’m sorry I didn’t speak up.”

A:   I knew he was apologizing only because he could tell I was upset, so I asked, “Why are you sorry you didn’t speak up?”

C:   “Because I know I carry a burden to speak up in these situations, and I knew it would hurt you if I didn’t.”

A:   Burden? “So you feel obligated to speak up?”

C:   “I do feel an obligation. For one thing, I was one of the only ones there who could speak into this. I also feel an obligation to you because you’re part of me, and speaking up would have been defending us.”

A:   “Well, thank you. But you don’t have to apologize.”

[Awkward pause.]

“I’m gonna go use the bathroom.”

C:   [Awkward pause, part two.]

“Okay.”

I knew we were not done with that conversation. My husband-senses were tingling. Either I was in the doghouse, or Adaeze was wrestling with emotions I didn’t fully understand and she needed some time to herself to sort them out—aka, I was in the doghouse. So I did the natural husband thing and sat down to play Madden while she went to the bathroom.

A:   Wait . . . when I do that, I make you feel like you might be in the doghouse?

C:   Well, yeah. Whenever I say or do something that forces you to deal with your emotions, even though you may not be telling me I’m in the doghouse, it’s kind of implied.

A:   Good to know! As soon as I got upstairs, I locked both the door to our bathroom and the door to our bedroom so I could be alone. I was subconsciously hoping I could lock out my emotions about the situation. I had a lot to process, and I wanted space to do it without having to tiptoe around Chad’s feelings.

I made a beeline for Chad’s bedside table and grabbed a turquoise journal that I’d gifted him on our wedding day. Sometimes I write to him in it, as I’ve learned I can be most honest with him in those pages—especially when I don’t feel confident enough to be totally honest with him in person.

Up until that point, most of my entries had been niceties and love letters, even the ones about some difficult situation we’d been through. This would be my first entry that was this raw and personal. I needed to get it out somewhere.

I ended up writing seven pages.

Guess I had more feelings than I thought.

C:   I knew this situation was more serious than I had initially realized. Adaeze had locked herself in our room only a handful of times before, and none of them were because of something good. Worse, most of these times, if not all of them, were my fault.

The real tragedy, however, was that I really needed to use the bathroom.

I knew I needed to let Adaeze just get it all out, but I needed to get it all out too. We only had one porcelain stool, and I was locked out.

Pull it together, Chad. Get back on topic.

I was also feeling a little defensive myself. I knew I should have said something at the meeting, but I also felt like I deserved the right to stay quiet in moments when I simply didn’t have the capacity to deal with it.

Unsure of what else to do, I kept playing Madden.

In hindsight, this may have been the wrong move.

Eventually, Adaeze opened the door, and we started getting ready for bed. We didn’t talk. We just said, “I love you” and “We’re on the same team.”

But I had to ask, “Are we okay?”

A:   I knew we needed to talk, but I didn’t want to make Chad feel even worse. Besides, I had pretty much resolved not to say anything else about it, instead leaving it in the journal for Chad to read later.

In hindsight, this wasn’t the healthiest thing to do—for me or for us.

Once we were in bed, lying with our backs to each other, I said softly, “It really sucks to hear that you didn’t say anything. I didn’t feel defended, and that hurts. But I love you. And we are on the same team.”

C:   This was the closest we’d ever come to going to bed not happy with each other.

A:   Over the next couple of days, I did my best to act like everything was normal, but I was still hurt. This was unfamiliar territory for me. I don’t like being upset with Chad for any reason. I’m also not the type to hold a grudge or to hold something over his head as punishment.

The longer we went without talking about it, a little voice in my head began telling me, You don’t deserve to be upset. You don’t deserve to have someone speak up for you in that way anyway. You’re asking too much.

I kept going back and forth in my mind: Was it asking too much of Chad to have him always speak up about race? Was he never allowed to sit one out if he wasn’t feeling up to it?

C:   This situation reminded me of something that happened a few months into our relationship. I was driving home from work, and I called my parents for our weekly check-in. Naturally, my parents were very interested in how things were going with Adaeze. However, instead of simply checking in on a new blooming relationship, they asked questions that were mostly about the interracial piece. Granted, this was uncharted territory for them, and they had some valid questions and concerns. For some reason, though, that day the weight of constantly having to answer these questions felt particularly heavy.

I can’t even remember what the conversation was about. They may have been asking if I had thought about how hard it was going to be raising mixed kids. Or maybe they were explaining the pressure they were dealing with from other family members who weren’t thrilled with our relationship. Or I could have been trying to explain how Adaeze felt about the racially charged climate that characterized 2020. Regardless, I was tired.

What my parents didn’t know yet was that I was already thinking about proposing to Adaeze. In the wake of this new uptick in questioning, I had a moment of revelation.

I was fighting hard for my soon-to-be fiancée.

Yes, it was emotionally taxing.

And, yes, marrying Adaeze meant that I would likely be in this fight for the rest of my life.

So . . . if I was already tired, what were things going to look like in five, ten, or twenty years?

For that matter, what right did I have to be tired already? Adaeze had been fighting this battle since the day she was born. And unlike me, she didn’t have the option to just step out of it and sit on the sidelines when she got tired of dealing with it. I hadn’t even been in this for a year. How could I be so selfish that I already wanted to throw in the towel when I had just entered the race?

My best friend needed me to be strong and fight for her. And she deserved to be fought for.

[Looking at wife in wonder.] Honestly, babe, how do you do it?

I understood at least some of what Adaeze was frustrated about. I also understood that I had chosen to opt out, while she does not have that luxury. And I was starting to have some sort of understanding of why Adaeze was hurt by my silence.

OKAY, NOW I’M READY

C:   A few days later, we decided it was time to have a “come to Jesus” talk about this. I had a feeling Adaeze did not want to initiate it, so I did.

“I’m sorry I didn’t speak up. I wanted to. I just didn’t in that moment.”

A:   “Why not? Like, really. I want your honest answer.”

C:   “Honestly? Because I’d already had a long morning leading up to that meeting, including a patient who told me they’d just lost a family member and they were planning a funeral. And I knew my afternoon was going to be full of challenging patients. I wanted to say something. I had information that I thought was relevant, and I thought I could provide a perspective that wasn’t being represented. I just didn’t have the energy, and not saying anything felt like self-preservation.”

A:   That’s where I was struggling. On the one hand, it’s not fair for me to expect Chad to always be on, when I know I also need a break from time to time. The problem is that means I can’t always count on being spoken up for. It feels like a lose-lose situation.

C:   I could tell Adaeze was struggling, and I knew my next statement could either send us spiraling or bring us back together.

I began with affirmation.

“First off, I’m sorry that I made you feel like you’re not allowed to be hurt. I also want you to know that my response has nothing to do with your ability to be a good wife to me. I see how this is a crappy position for you to be in. To be honest, I let you down in that room. I want to be discerning and give my energy where I can and where it’s needed, and I want to be honoring to you in speaking up when I should. Here’s the hard thing for me with all of this: What do I do when I’m running on empty?”

A:   I realized in that moment how much pressure Chad puts on himself—especially when it comes to being my protector. So for him to confess to me that he didn’t have the capacity to speak up was pretty big. I never want him to feel that insane pressure from me.

“I appreciate all that. That is exactly what I didn’t want you to feel—like you can’t ever be running on empty or that you have to be superhuman. I sometimes feel like you have to suffer because you’re married to a Black woman, and I don’t like feeling that way. I don’t know what the fix is. I can’t change who I am and what I feel, and I love my Black woman-ness, but it’s also not fair for you to feel like you can’t protect your capacity. I don’t want you to always feel like you’re not doing enough for me or to always feel like I’m asking or expecting too much of you. In a way, it makes me feel like we are proving all the people right who are against interracial marriage, and I hate that.”

C:   “I don’t ever want you to feel that you are asking too much of me. And I don’t ever want you to feel that you aren’t important enough for me to speak up for. But we’re definitely not proving the doubters right. The fact that we can have conversations like this is proof that we’ll be okay. The fact that we missed each other is just a testament to the reality that we’re married, and this stuff happens.”

Let’s zoom out a little bit for a second. We’ve been talking about these concepts as they relate to marriage because Adaeze and I happen to be married, but the concepts apply on a broader scale too. Adaeze and I got into a little bit of an argument there, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing—in a marriage or in a friendship.

The closer we draw toward others, the more opportunity we have to see things differently. That friend, that colleague, that neighbor—each of them has a story that will challenge our view of the world. You may even enter a disagreement when your backgrounds bump against each other. That is the time to lean in!

It’s like Jacob wrestling with God (Genesis 32:22-31). Jacob may have walked away with a bad hip and some scars, but he dug in and stayed in the fight. It was after this event that God changed Jacob’s name to Israel, forever altering the trajectory of the people of God. The blessing came after the wrestling.

I’m not saying you should force a conversation with someone who is unwilling to dive in with you, but there is something special—almost sacred—about honestly struggling with someone to find common ground. Adaeze and I have made the most significant strides in our relationship during these wrestling moments because they force us to go to deeper places than we’d go otherwise. We come out on the other side with more understanding, more love, and more respect for each other. As a white man, I know my skin color is the living embodiment of a huge part of her pain. Her willingness to engage with that is precious and deserves respect.

A:   Likewise, Chad’s humility in understanding what his skin color represents in these situations and his willingness to engage with me while treading intentionally also deserves respect.

C:   In that moment, Adaeze needed me to come to her with humility and honesty, and she needed to be able to share her feelings without fear of judgment. For my part, I needed to be willing to accept that I could be wrong. I also had to accept that—despite all my perfectly valid reasons for not speaking up—there was still pain in that for her. Adaeze needed me to hear that, not just because I am her husband but because we’re best friends.

All close interracial relationships will eventually hit deep, choppy waters like this. When they do, we need to be honest and allow honesty from the other side. And in order to fully understand, we need to be able to listen without taking personal offense.

A:   I realized I needed to be better about making space for Chad’s capacity and be willing to acknowledge that some of these conversations can be just as emotionally draining for him as they are for me. I need to recognize that one instance of him staying silent does not negate all the other times he has spoken up for me.

C:   Thank you. And I always want you to be free to say what you need to say. I realize that sometimes it’s not easy, but I really do want to support you and be with you. So please tell me what you’re thinking. I may not always understand or even get it right, but I’ll never stop trying.

A:   Deal.

HAVE A LITTLE GRACE

C & A:   Because of our histories, we have different capacities when it comes to dealing with racial issues and conversations. Where Chad’s capacity is like an oil lamp that occasionally runs out and needs to be refilled, Adaeze’s capacity is more along the lines of a totally burned-out wick. And you know what? Both are valid and okay.

In the same way that we have different capacities when it comes to dealing with the race conversation in general, we also have different capacities when it comes to how we respond to the race conversation at any given moment.

A:   I used to have way more capacity to fight and teach others, but I’ve learned that I can’t be responsible for teaching everybody. Frankly, I’ve become a bit exhausted from the pressure of feeling like it was always expected of me. Sometimes all I can do is hope and trust that someone else will have enough capacity to make up for what I might lack on any given day.

C:   I have not faced the same expectation to teach others that Adaeze has, and while I may not be as exhausted from the constant engagement with it as my wife is, on any given day I might be too emotionally spent from dealing with other things to willingly jump into a conversation about race.

A:   Just like I would want others to give me grace when they expect me to be the voice of reason/truth/empowerment and all the other things, and just like I desire understanding when my capacity is too low to engage with it all, I want to have grace for Chad when he is caught in a similar situation. Just because we don’t share the same history doesn’t negate his feelings or make them less important. Both can—and do—exist.

C:   Ultimately, being the perfect white person really comes down to having the humility to understand the sheer impossibility of that achievement. We simply are not “all that and a bag of chips,” and no matter how hard we try, we never will be because there’s a limit to what we can truly understand. Not to mention that, as human beings, we are also inherently fragile and self-centered. We are quick-tempered. We can be manipulative. We like to stay where we feel comfortable. Simply put, we are all broken people, and that’s okay as long as we’re willing to admit it. If we march into the storm with an understanding that we’re flawed, it’s much easier to have grace for others.

My encouragement for anyone wanting to be the best, most supportive white spouse, friend, or coworker you can be is this: stay real, listen fiercely, stay vulnerable, and have patience. The more you keep your walls down, the fewer walls will go up in front of you. And be gracious when the other person isn’t ready to talk. Remember, it’s not your story to hear—it is theirs to tell.

C & A:   This is why we need to follow Jesus’ lead, to really lean in and see the depths of one another, like He did. In Jesus’ day, the cultural norm between Jews and Samaritans was hostility or, at the very least, avoidance. The Jews considered themselves superior to the Samaritans because, while the Jews were the direct descendants of Abraham, the Samaritans were a mixed race that resulted when Jews from the north intermarried with Gentiles from other regions (yes, this kind of racial nonsense has been going on that long!).

The two groups hated each other so much that when Jews were traveling, they would go miles and sometimes even days out of their way to walk around Samaria, just to avoid running into a Samaritan. Of course, Jesus, being completely without prejudice, had no qualms about visiting a Samaritan village. But when the Samaritans were, shall we say, less than hospitable toward Jesus and his followers, James and John asked Jesus to “call down fire from heaven to burn [the Samaritans] up” (Luke 9:54). Needless to say, Jesus was not having it, and he put James and John in their place.

Later Jesus shared a parable with His disciples about a Jew who was traveling alone when he was attacked and robbed by bandits. They beat him up, took his clothes, and left him on the side of the road to die. Both a priest and a temple assistant came along and saw the man, but instead of helping him, they passed him by. Then a Samaritan approached. He not only tended the man’s wounds but put the man on his donkey, brought him to an inn, and took care of him the entire evening. The next morning, he gave the innkeeper two silver coins and said, “Take care of this man. If his bill runs higher than this, I’ll pay you the next time I’m here” (Luke 10:35, NLT). The Samaritan didn’t look at the man on the side of the road and see someone “different” to be despised or avoided. He just saw a fellow human being who was in need of care and compassion.

That’s what Jesus calls us to do: take care of one another and love one another—even if the person in question is not one of our “own people.” Nobody made in God’s image should be left in their dirt alone.

So when the going gets tough and we’re not sure what to say, what to do, or how to respond, that’s not the time to shut down or run away. That’s when we need to hold on tight and fight even harder for each other. We might not always get it right, but we can’t stop trying.