One stitch here, another there

By Fatimata Jabbie

One stitch here, another there, and one on the heart. “Stitch my wounds in the best way possible, the most discreet way”, these were the words of Tasha, a colleague and long time friend. A Bronx native girl of Dominican heritage who finally decided to unveil the childhood traumas she lived for years. Being born to a Dominican mother who spent her weekends cleaning for hours upon hours and fussing about the smallest deeds. She was a formidable woman in every way. Jenny wanted to instill the Dominican culture in her children from a young age, especially her daughters. From cooking lessons in the kitchen in the early morning to hair perming every other month Jenny had it out to turn her daughters into the perfect Dominican women. One that cleaned even the slightest places and cooked native cuisines while blasting merengue and bachata for the world to hear without a care.

On a rainy Saturday afternoon Tasha,age 21 and a sophmore at Hunter College met me in our usual spot, "Hook and reel cajun seafood" in the Bronx and after a few crabs and shrimps we dived into her childhood. For starters, Tasha is a very talkative woman willing to open up her feelings to anyone who will listen. Growing up in the Bronx her mother, a middle aged woman born and raised in the Dominican Republic was the epitome of a Latina woman. From every angle she was the ideal example, the ideal wife, the ideal daughter, the ideal woman. So it’s no coincidence she would want her own daughters to be the same way. From the tender age of 11 mama Tasha, who’s real name is Jennifer laid out the foundation for her daughters on how to be the ideal wife, the ideal mother and overall the ideal woman. On weekends when most children looked forward to a day full of fun Tasha and her older sister looked forward to a load of house chores and chaos. When the sun rose the sisters were sure to rise too each going to their respective duties. This included the routinely deep clean of the house, the cooking of multiple meals a day and of course the occasional arguments which has become habitual in the Hernandez household. I mean the sisters were not just taught to cook and clean at a young age, they were expected to do that for the rest of their lives while their two brothers lay freely in the house. The boys didn’t have to clean after themselves, they didn’t have to cook anything, and they definitely weren’t expected to wake up early each weekend to engage in a cleaning marathon. This might seem like a blessing to the boys but it was actually a misfortune, one that hindered their basic culinary and cleaning skills.

You see, the double standard in the Hernandez household was beyond basic gender roles; it was the misogynist ideas and thinking that put the icing on the cake. For example, Tasha retold the narrative of how her mother would always tell her no man would want her if she didn’t know how to cook and clean as if God placed her on Earth to be a domestic staff. Time and time again mami would say, “How can you be a wife if you don’t know how to cook'', again cooking is an essential life skill but making it seem like it's a woman's job only adds more to the issue of gender roles in our society through every culture. To add insult to injury the traumatic experience of the girls never bothered their mother. For years, the girls were seen as a failure to their mother for the slightest mistake, never getting the chance to just be human. Deep emotional conversations were out of question in the Hernandez household because again Mami didn’t believe that depression was real. Honestly, to her the girls were exaggerating when all she was trying to do was shape them into the ideal women.

Furthermore Mami took it upon herself to give the girls a “woman talk” where she repeatedly emphasized the importance of the girls maintaining their virginity until they met the right one. Again, protecting your children is a priority of every parent however to constantly insist on the innocence of the girls without questioning the boys is very sexist and misogynistic. Tasha stated. “My mom was very keen on me and my sister maintaining our virginity as she believed in waiting till marriage, she really believed me and my sister should wait till marriage to have sex while she cared less what my brothers did”. Being a girl is hard in any society of the world so it’s no surprise Mami Jennifer would carry some of those sexist ideas throughout the years, being raised herself in a poor area in Santo Domingo. Time and time again she embarked on a self-titled mission to train the girls and this “training” would go on for years eventually until Tasha’s big sister Emily, would turn the page of the traumatic family cycle and move to another neighborhood in the Bronx. This was the beginning of a new leaf for Tasha, as she too would start on her journey to independence by getting her own apartment at just 20 all while still prioritizing her education. Overall, everything she and her sister has gone through made them wiser, more brave and most importantly through the lessons learned from their childhood they have taken it upon themselves to be better mothers to their children and break generational curses in their family for the wellbeing of everyone.