When It Rains, It Pours- Reflection
“When it rains, it pours.”
My grandmother used to say it in Patois; her tone both weary and wise, carrying a kind of faith that didn’t need to be loud to be strong. My mother would say it too, in her own rhythm: “If it’s not one thing, it’s the next.”
Back then, I thought they were talking about bad luck or trouble. But now, I understand they were naming something deeper; a kind of ancestral theology, a truth about how life’s blessings and burdens often show up together. That when it rains, it doesn’t ask if you’re ready. It just comes. And lately, it feels like it hasn’t stopped raining.
Between 2024 and now, I’ve felt like I’ve been living in a downpour. As the Founder and Executive Director of Reuniting of African Descendants (ROAD), I’ve witnessed how the moral economy of social justice often disguises itself as “community” ; even as it depends on the unpaid or underpaid labor of Black people holding intersecting marginalized identities, especially Black trans people.
I’ve been asked to hold the vision, the logistics, the pain, and the people, all while trying to remember how to hold myself. I’ve facilitated healing for others while navigating my own fatigue. I’ve shown up with hope when I felt empty inside. I’ve led meetings with a brave face and gone home to silence that didn’t feel like peace.
When I was laid off last October, I told myself I’d rest. But rest didn’t come easily. Even when my body stopped moving, my mind didn’t. It kept looping around deadlines, expectations, and the quiet fear of being forgotten. I’ve learned that surviving the work doesn’t always mean surviving well.
Fatphobia, transphobia, and respectability politics shape how people see and support me; what they expect of me, and what they believe I deserve. My body, this full and sacred body, has been both altar and battleground. People project their stories onto me; inspiration, desire, pity, proof. They celebrate my strength but rarely my softness. They honor my leadership but often overlook the loneliness that comes with it. Still, this body remains home. It’s the place where I meet God every morning and whisper, still here.
I’ve also learned that currency isn’t just money; it’s time, energy, and attention. I’ve spent all three like I’d never run out, but I have. Over these months, I’ve received messages from community siblings all over the world; asking for help, protection, or support. I’ve wanted to say yes to every single one. But I couldn’t. And that broke my heart. Because I’m someone who wants to make sure everyone else is okay, even when I’m not.
It’s a strange kind of exhaustion, the kind that comes when the world keeps asking you to pour from a well that’s half-empty. The truth is, I’ve been learning that I am not a system; I’m a soul. And souls need tending. Souls need boundaries. I’m learning that saying no can be an act of love; that boundaries aren’t walls, they’re altars of protection.
Then, last Sunday, my bishop said I would be ordained in April. The church clapped. I was in shock; tears on my face, a half-cracked smile I could barely hold together. Confused. Nervous. Unsure. My body stood still while my spirit trembled. What most people didn’t see was how hard it’s been to get here ; how many nights I’ve questioned the call (still do) how often I’ve wondered if I was strong enough to keep saying yes.
Ordination is often imagined as the finish line, a moment of celebration and certainty. But for me, it’s felt like a mirror; one that reflects everything I’ve been carrying: the doubt, the burnout, the grief, the unfinished healing that ministry doesn’t make disappear. I’ve been struggling to keep up with readings, writing, and all the quiet, unseen work that comes with saying yes to a call this big. There are moments when I’m not sure if I’m walking toward destiny or just trying to survive it.
The applause was beautiful, but it didn’t erase the exhaustion. It didn’t quiet the part of me that whispered, God, are You sure it’s me? And yet, beneath the fear and fatigue, something in me still believes. Maybe ordination isn’t about being ready. Maybe it’s about saying yes while trembling. Maybe it’s about learning that holiness doesn’t mean invincibility; it just makes our vulnerability holy.
As my family prays for loved ones in Jamaica and across the Caribbean after Hurricane Melissa, my grandmother’s words echo again: “When it rains, it pours.” I hear them differently now. The rain isn’t punishment. It’s revelation. It shows what’s leaking, what holds, what can be rebuilt. It washes away the things we didn’t realize we’d outgrown. The downpour has become my teacher. It reminds me that what looks like drowning might also be baptism. That every flood carries the possibility of something new growing.
I don’t curse the rain anymore. I’m learning to listen to it. To let it teach me where I’m still clinging, where I’m still trying too hard, where I need to let go.
The theologian in me recognizes this as what womanist thinkers call the survival witness. James Cone said God is in the struggle for justice. Audre Lorde reminded us that self-care is political warfare. Emilie Townes wrote that evil hides in the everyday; including in systems that glorify exhaustion. Their words hold me like scripture. They remind me that my fatigue is not failure; it’s information. It’s my body telling me what my faith sometimes forgets: that I cannot be everywhere, do everything, or save everyone.
I’m not writing this from the other side of healing. I’m writing from the middle of it. I’m still drenched, still in motion, still figuring out what to keep and what to release.
These days, I’m practicing what it means to live in rhythm with grace. To rest before the crash. To listen when my body says stop. I’m learning that rest is not indulgence; it’s devotion. That boundaries are not selfish; they are sacred. That healing doesn’t always look graceful; sometimes it’s messy, public, and inconvenient. Sometimes it looks like crying on the floor and still deciding to keep going.
I am still becoming. Still softening. Still finding my way through the rain.
Holy Creator, You know this body is tired. You know the ways I’ve tried to hold the world together with spreadsheets and sermons, with laughter and lament. Be near to me, to my family, and to anyone reading this who’s standing in their own storm. Let the rain cleanse, not drown. Let it renew what we forgot was sacred. Let it remind us that survival itself is holy work.
And when the sky clears, may we rise; not dry, but drenched in grace. Not perfect, but still present. Still human. Still here. Still becoming.
Asé. Amen. So it is.
As this prayer settles, may this song carry what words cannot say:
🎶 “Still Here” — Dorinda Clark-Cole
A reminder that even when it pours, grace still flows, and we are still here.
If you’re reading this while tired, please know; I am too. This isn’t written from the other side of healing; it’s written mid-process, with rain still in my hair, with faith still trembling in my hands, with love still learning how to trust itself again. We are all still becoming. And maybe that’s the holiest thing of all.