#WomanCentered: NICOLE PEOPLES

How has having or not having children affected the overall trajectory of your life?

I don’t have children and it’s hard to say how that has affected the trajectory of my life. I never necessarily envisioned myself with or without children and so I can only make assumptions about the differences that may be a result of it such as constantly being able to redefine myself and what I’m doing. I recently was able to take the leap and completely change careers with no repercussions because I only had to think about myself instead of me and a family.

Do you feel pressure to fulfill an idea of womanhood that may/may not correspond to who you actually are? If so, please describe.

I would generally say no. I am moderately femme in personality type and seem to dress and act the way I want to, or what I feel makes my body feel most comfortable. When it comes to my career field, I have chosen a career in tech and make great strides to fight against what womanhood looks like in that sense. I come from a wonderful family of queer women who made it quite clear that I needed to define my own womanhood from an early age.

Do you have advice for other women regarding birth control methods that worked well or didn’t work well for you?

Not really. For a great portion of my life, I dated women exclusively and so birth control was not at the forefront of my mind, which was amazing. So I say, DATE WOMEN!!! Would be advice as well as a great birth control method. Though … I assume for those who do not cross the lines like that I have been fine with your run-of-the-mill “pill” contraceptive. It hasn’t changed my moods and has only really done one thing and that’s regulate the timing between my periods. I have done a lot of work to balance my hormones through my eating habits and so I often wonder if that’s why I’m less affected by the pills than some of my female counterparts.

In 2016, openly discussing one’s reproductive choices is still considered taboo, why do you suppose more women aren’t having these conversations?

It’s taboo to discuss most things that have to do with the vagina out loud in 2016, which I still find fascinating, including but not limited to periods, contraceptives, miscarriages, etc. I fully believe that globalization and access to social media will help with these conversations as women hear that it’s okay to be okay with their choices and their bodies. Being openly okay with the body and what it does seems to be taboo, kind of like Donald Trump bringing up Hillary going to the bathroom, who the fuck cares? We all pee, we all take shits right? If we can’t talk about simple things like that, then it’s just that much harder to talk about the choices we make with our bodies.

Though I do think we are talking about these, but it is still behind closed doors. Plenty of women discuss this stuff in their small groups, but when it comes to voicing their opinions and choices to the world that’s a whole different ball game. How do we open a global conversation? The few have to open it up for the many.

Where are you on the continuum of self-love? On a scale of 1 to 10 (10 being Kanye West), how much do you love yourself and how do you reinforce and/or improve this?

Side Note: Though he is often a dick I totally love Kanye’s self-love. A black man openly loving himself and being proud of his accomplishments is still something to write home about, though his narcissism is profound. Am I the only one that thinks he might be slightly autistic? I don’t think so.

As for my self love scale: 7 -8. Most days I wake up and think I’m pretty damn awesome. I recognize the places I need improvement in my self love, which mostly includes whether or not I’ve accomplished enough thus far in my lifetime as well as if my body looks the way I want it to. As I’ve grown older my love for my imperfect body has definitely risen. It’s not quite where I’d like it to be, but it’s getting up there.

How do I reinforce and improve? I find that eating well and exercising help me maintain mental balance. Nothing is better for my clarity than a day in the gym lifting weights or going on a run. The food I eat helps me to curb my anxiety and keep a positive outlook on life. It is absolutely key for me to maintain these. I notice quickly when I start eating sugars and falling out of exercise my self-love plummets, my mental acuity and happiness go with it.

If you could go back in time and give your younger self some vital information or critical education about your body, your overall wellness, or your reproductive health, what would your advice be?

I would tell myself to not eat a low-fat diet and to GD stop eating dairy. After finding out that health is so closely linked to food, I wish I could have told my younger self that it’s not the amount of calories but the quality of the calories. Would she have understood that? I’m not sure. Would she have understood that all of her joint issues and headaches were a result of dairy? Same question, not sure. She may have just written me off as a quack, because with time has come at least some wisdom.