Adiba Nelson

Enter: Lemonade. [...] Beyoncé reminds us that she is as real a woman as the rest of us. She is a strong woman, yet made even stronger in her ability to start anew.

Want to go on a carbs and wine tour of Italy? Break out the leggings and go for it. This time is yours.

Apparently, we Black women have a smell. And it’s been bottled and labeled and is being offered up for consumption by Sunflower Cosmetics. Yep. You read that right. There is a legitimate company out there who is selling a perfume called “Black Women.” If my girlfriend hadn’t posted a picture of it in a local shop, I would have called her a damn liar.

Remember how I told you about the nasty little trolligans (trolls + hooligans = trolligans) that felt the need to show their racist behinds in response to a picture of Aamito Stacie Lagum, a Black model, modeling MAC’s new lipstick? And I slightly hinted at the Instagram clapback on the MAC photo feed. Well, what I didn’t tell you is that there’s an Instagram clapback, and then there’s a BLACK Instagram clapback. The two are worlds apart, and baby I promise you, you have seen nothing until you’ve seen a Black Insta-clapback.

He opened his mouth and time stood still. My pulse quickened. My heart raced. My eyes filled with tears. And I. WAS. PROUD.

Black women were branded as sexually promiscuous and immoral, which in turn was used as justification for sexual trauma/rape.

"I will peer relentlessly into every cop car I pass with a young black man in it, stretching my neck to make sure that it’s not my son who’s been arrested for driving while black, walking while black, or breathing while black. I will hold my breath while listening to every news report of another black man that has been arrested, beaten, killed, and made an example of."

This was how my eating disorder began. This is when I first consciously ate my emotions. THIS is when I said, “I don’t need you to love me. I don’t need to love myself. I don’t need to feel or be felt. Hear or be heard. See or be seen. I just need to eat. I just need to eat because food will never judge me. Food will never leave me (unless I make it leave me, which I did. In college. A LOT.).

Dark brown girls should never ever ever ever EVER wear frosty pink lipstick. EVER. I don’t give a rat’s ASS what Cosmo says - just NO.

This book is real, folks. As well it should be –– it was written by one of the realest women on the planet.