[SPEAKER_02]: This episode of Truth's Table is brought to you by Nav Press, publisher of God, where are you by Dominik Young, a powerful and honest invitation for women, to bring their depression anxiety, grief, and spiritual questions before God, and discover his presence in the midst of pain, learn more, and buy your copy at navpress.com.
[SPEAKER_02]: Sisters, how y'all feel?
[SPEAKER_02]: Brothers, y'all all right?
[SPEAKER_02]: If this is your first time at True Stable, welcome to the table, and you've been sitting at the table with us all these years, we are so grateful that you have been listening to us through these years, and we are inviting you to partner with us and support our work at patreon.com slash True Stable.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now pull up a chair and have a seat at the table with us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Theresaable is pleased to bring to the table, Senator London P. Lamar.
[SPEAKER_00]: Senator London P. Lamar is a Memphis-based legislator in strategists who represents Tennessee's 33rd Senate District, which includes parts of Memphis and Shelby County.
[SPEAKER_00]: She is the youngest woman in the youngest African-American to serve in the Tennessee State Senate.
[SPEAKER_00]: She serves as chair of the Tennessee State Democratic Caucus, where she helps manage caucus messaging, coordinate priorities, and elevates in agenda grounded in community needs.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the Senate, Lamar serves on the Judiciary Committee, the Finance Committee, and the Joint Ways in Means Committee, positions that place her at the center of policy, public safety, and budget decisions impacting families statewide.
[SPEAKER_00]: Before joining the Senate, Lamar served four years in the Tennessee House of Representatives, District 91.
[SPEAKER_00]: In 2022, she was appointed by the Shelby County Commission to fill the District 33rd vacancy and later one election to continue serving her community.
[SPEAKER_00]: Her public service is defined by a consistent focus, strong schools, healthy families, and safe communities.
[SPEAKER_00]: Senator Lamar is widely recognized for her leadership on maternal health equity and policies that reduce preventable maternal morbidity and mortality.
[SPEAKER_00]: In 2024, legislation associated with her maternal health, work advance reforms connected to the state's maternal mortality review and prevention efforts.
[SPEAKER_00]: She has also elevated community-based, evidence-informed solutions, and strengthens outcomes for mothers and babies across Tennessee.
[SPEAKER_00]: Outside the Legislator, Lamar has continued to build capacity in education and community leadership, supporting pipeline programming and day-to-day implementation in the Memphis area.
[SPEAKER_00]: She earned her VA from St. Mary's College and remains committed to developing the next generation of civic leaders through advocacy, community partnership, and public service.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey y'all, welcome to Drew's table.
[SPEAKER_00]: Midwives of Culture for Grace and Truth.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm a community, and I'm Christina.
[SPEAKER_02]: This table is built by black woman and four black women.
[SPEAKER_00]: So welcome to the table.
[SPEAKER_00]: See how you doing, girl?
[SPEAKER_00]: I am doing good today.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you know, this is a little trippy for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're not in our usual location.
[SPEAKER_00]: We sure.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are at a completely different place.
[SPEAKER_00]: We hear we are walking around in the aisles of politics today.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're in politics in politics.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am really, really psyched to be here with Senator London Lamar.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, I mean, this is a very big deal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Come on.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I don't know if I live in Tennessee, but I don't know if all the people know who you are, or who know your accomplishments, and know that you all the first that you represent.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, okay, all the first, but we absolutely wanted to sit down with you to hear more about your story but also we are trying to model for our listeners what it's like to have a real conversation with an elected official who represents your interests, your state or your city's interests to encourage them to support them and to hold them accountable, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So we don't completely fangirl out, but we are so excited to be here with you today.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm so excited to be here with the ball field too.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have such an impactful conversation around just being able to tell my story some of the things I'm passionate about, but also, you know, enlighten the public on the little bit about politics to hopefully encourage not only to support some of the things I'm working on, but to support political engagement and self.
[SPEAKER_01]: really re-emphasize importance of getting out to vote, impactful legislators to put it office to advocate for new and issues you care most about.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hopefully I can bring conversation a more light to that topic because this is such a pivotal time here in this country especially for us, and that we got to be involved and we got to be politically engaged and educated.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, let's have a great conversation.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm excited.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, let's go there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's do it!
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, sit in a little more, why don't we go ahead and start off with your story.
[SPEAKER_02]: What is your story?
[SPEAKER_02]: What would you like to share with our institution?
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a little bit too long to know on Tennessee people.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you're not Tennessee people.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm Senator London.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're sitting in my office chairwoman of the Tennessee Senate Democratic caucus.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm so I'm 50% of the leadership for the Senate Democrats and I'm also the youngest woman in youngest African American ever to serve in Tennessee Senate history.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was elected on 27, I'm 35 now.
[SPEAKER_01]: New fact is also I'm the first sitting senator to give birth while serving.
[SPEAKER_01]: So the idea of motherhood, not that there are mothers here, but walking into this role and starting the motherhood journey is not necessarily something that's common, but I'm also showing you people that it's possible.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I have to give honor and grace to the women and the mothers who groomed me, which is my mother and my grandmother, and I will say like, how, you know,
[SPEAKER_01]: Did I get here, you know, first of all, I think it's God or Dane.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that God put certain people in a Simon when they were born.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think this was his assignment for my life.
[SPEAKER_01]: And for what he wanted to do for me.
[SPEAKER_01]: And in that way, he empowered my grandmother's to demonstrate what it's like to collaborate when I used to watch her friends, when their social club, where he's had club meetings, playing events, playing troops.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I stand around the table being nosy watching them.
[SPEAKER_01]: He tabs calling to be a pilot team in the ground folks.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
[SPEAKER_01]: with her, her friends, what they did with their club for 50 years.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're only into have my mother's intentionality around service and giving back.
[SPEAKER_01]: They kind of manifest in me to be a very civically engaged person.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I went with my mom and grandma to vote every election like
[SPEAKER_01]: asking, you know, can I press the buttons in the voting booth as well?
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, you know, when I got to high school, I was involved in student council and all of these different clothes because I knew that if I wanted to be engaged in whatever community I was, I had to actually be a part of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that kind of became who I was, it was always that was interesting.
[SPEAKER_01]: But shockingly enough while I was engaged in school, I wanted to be engineered.
[SPEAKER_01]: Why?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because growing up, I thought, yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, Black girls are staying with make a lot of money and I wanted to be someone to break at wealth gap right to the end.
[SPEAKER_01]: So my, I was, you know, Plina College is an engineer major, but my senior at high school president Barack Obama was running for president at the time.
[SPEAKER_01]: And like that whole campaign just had me on fire.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I was even as a young 17 year old, it was so inspiring.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I remember the day I would never forget the day that he won that election.
[SPEAKER_01]: I remember what I had on, what I did that day.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was always interested in politics, but I never thought it was possible.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I saw him and he's chocolate wife that looked like us.
[SPEAKER_01]: Walk on the stage.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have his love with a daughter, I see.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'll show you what.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'm going to do politics because it's possible.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so the colleges are decided to narrow down.
[SPEAKER_01]: I said I want to do political science.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it was totally fine.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I went to college and major and political science.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I never looked back.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, wow.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we are.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it's just amazing how a moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: like that, like that particular moment, how that can just grab a hold of your imagination.
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_00]: Stretch it to a place that you didn't even think it could go to before and so I want to switch gears a little bit because this is a topic that is near and dear to my heart about your interests around maternal health.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, and I don't think we can talk enough about maternal health and the safety of women, particularly the safety of black women in this country.
[SPEAKER_00]: And as someone who had one of my dearest friends die in labor with her baby, this is a topic that I try to talk about as much as possible.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so many people I know have had what sounds like, I don't know, war stories instead of labor stories.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, absolutely.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so why is this topic important to you?
[SPEAKER_00]: And tell folks what you have been doing to bring attention to it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely, so first, give honor to the advocacy for you and the condolences to your friend and her family.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is an unfortunate story is the story of what I'm involved because when I in 2015, my cousin dropped dead at eight months pregnant.
[SPEAKER_01]: I saw her job and she and her baby died.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I had to go to the hospital and claim her body in the baby's body.
[SPEAKER_01]: So that was her third attempt to have in the baby each time she almost died.
[SPEAKER_01]: And she was anti, she didn't believe in abortion.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you know, the doctor told her, you know, this may not be safe, you know.
[SPEAKER_01]: She was, I don't know, I'm having my baby and she, nobody ends up making it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Which is also why I'm a big group on every abortion.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I've afforded the idea of not wanting kids with the fact that it's the opportunity for you to live.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, but she didn't exercise it right and it's scarred me for life.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that was my first real life story.
[SPEAKER_01]: And this was the way before I got elected to office of the dangers of pregnancy of seeing her having something in challenges.
[SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so it
[SPEAKER_01]: maternal health and women's reproductive justice is something that was near dear to my heart something not always wanted to champion so my freshman year in the legislature I end up getting pregnant myself wasn't married it was like a one night thing they end up turning back like you know we all like it is but it is a home movie it's a home movie it's a home movie it's a home movie it's a home movie it's a home movie it's a home movie it's a home movie
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, and it's good to tell this story.
[SPEAKER_01]: I thank God, and it was interesting because it was very daunting.
[SPEAKER_01]: It wasn't a happy pregnancy and to deal with the fact that my child's father kind of left me hanging and was saying all these bad things, I'm in the public eye, I just wanted to select the
[SPEAKER_01]: position, you know, now everybody's saying, how you go be the youngest woman here.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then you sitting here having baby out of wet lock, this is not a well-paying job.
[SPEAKER_01]: So the expenses of being a single mother like I was stressed now.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so then October 19th, I ended up having placenta abortion and bases of pregnancy related stroke.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I was like,
[SPEAKER_01]: basically having a stroke and in the most excruciating pain that you could ever think of.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I got a wash myself to the hospital.
[SPEAKER_01]: My baby ended up dying and didn't make they couldn't get them out in time.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I had and I almost died.
[SPEAKER_01]: Two my blood pressure was two-teen of a 120.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I was like literally about to stroke out and so they put me down.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had to have a C-section delivered to baby and it was interesting that everything was normal and then two seconds later I wake up and this child next to me that's supposed to be mine at that spent all of this money on a baby shower I had everything going and then you walk out now you've got to pay for a funeral.
[SPEAKER_01]: So having like all of that to go through really
[SPEAKER_01]: change my life for now I can say the better but it just definitely just put my life in just start heavy at the time and to be a fresh like in the public in the all in front of the whole world because you know like you have a baby anybody you know so you know public you got to be places and I like I could hide or you know go miss it for a couple of months you know like everybody knew oh my god
[SPEAKER_01]: So I didn't let it, you know, take me off my track.
[SPEAKER_01]: I decided to turn my pain into purpose and really maximize my advocacy around women's health care.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I used my elected position to now be able to champion something that I would thought that was so important.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because at the end of the day, like maternal health is pro-life policy.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I say wait a minute, you know, if I live in a pro-life state, the majority Republican there to want to talk about pro-life, then I think this, what you saw happen to me?
[SPEAKER_01]: And how I can bring light to the world, you should have no problem aligning with me around these issues around maternal health care.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I decided to dive completely into a legislative agenda around pushing maternal health issues.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'll model a lot of my legislation.
[SPEAKER_01]: around Kamala Harris legislation, and she was champion as a U.S.
[SPEAKER_01]: Senator before the beginning, she made maternal health popular on a national scale.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was thinking a lot of the things that she's pushing, I could replicate here in Tennessee, and just having to
[SPEAKER_01]: It's called the things, and I did, and in addition to championing that, I did a maternal, create the maternal help day on the heel.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm a maternal health caucuses.
[SPEAKER_01]: I brought dulas to the state to be something that's seen as now a reputable profession for women, and the health care space.
[SPEAKER_01]: I felt like if I always had a dula, she would tell me your foot shouldn't be that big.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a sign of how blood pressure it as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: So there's a lot of ways.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, there's a lot of ways.
[SPEAKER_01]: And here we are, there we are.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I do want to say the positive, I have a baby now.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I had a successful pregnancy, I have a two-year-old who has a life.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, my little rainbow baby.
[SPEAKER_01]: So to all the women watching how you start doesn't necessarily mean how you go in.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, so I want to also encourage women who have been through a tough situation is that if that's something that you won't is possible, just, you know, just making sure you have the right themes in place to make this happen.
[SPEAKER_02]: sisters we carry so much.
[SPEAKER_02]: We carry expectations at work at home in our friendships in our faith we carry responsibilities we carry other people's needs and often we carry our own pain quietly telling others to be strong to push through to keep the faith but what happens when you're exhausted when depression lingers when anxiety won't let you rest when shame,
[SPEAKER_02]: In God where are you, Dominic Young creates a safe and honest space to bring those questions into the light.
[SPEAKER_02]: In it, you won't find a book filled with cliches or easy answers.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a chance to be real about what you're feeling and to discover that God is not intimidated by your sorrow, your anger, or your uncertainty.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you need to take a healing journey, rooted in faith, authenticity, and truth, or if you've ever whispered, God, where are you in my pain?
[SPEAKER_02]: You are not alone.
[SPEAKER_02]: And this book is for you.
[SPEAKER_02]: God, where are you?
[SPEAKER_02]: By Dominic Young is available now wherever books are sold, go to nappressed.com to buy your copy.
[SPEAKER_02]: As you were talking, I was wondering, like, oh my goodness, what does it mean?
[SPEAKER_02]: First of all, how to go through that privately, but then have to do it publicly, newly elected.
[SPEAKER_02]: It a new role, trying to transition, that's so much at one time, I'm curious about your own spiritual disciplines, about what keeps you from cynicism, what helped to encourage you on your path toward motherhood again, what helps to root you and ground you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, wow.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it was in 2019 COVID here in 2020.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I was able to heal a little bit at isolation because the world stopped.
[SPEAKER_01]: Everybody was putting their house.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I was there by myself doing just doing anything I could to feel better.
[SPEAKER_01]: One of the things I did do to make me feel better was
[SPEAKER_01]: Nobody thinks about this, but because I was, I was 32 weeks when I had my disruption.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I was basically almost full term.
[SPEAKER_01]: So after the C section, I looked like I had a baby.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, right.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I had the scars, the mama stomach and everything.
[SPEAKER_01]: I started working out and running again.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I, when COVID, you can do number be outside, I will go running in the neighborhood, go to the park and I got my body back.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because you would be shocked to have mentally triggering an issue looking in the mirror and look like you had a baby, but there's no baby there.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I, yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: One of the ways was, okay, let me give my body back to normal.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I saw and adopted a healthier lifestyle.
[SPEAKER_01]: I started eating better because I had gestational diabetes, preclancy, all of those things.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let me start running.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if I want to do this again, I need to be healthier.
[SPEAKER_01]: So let me, I know I want children, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: So let me start.
[SPEAKER_01]: This is a wake-up call to be healthier.
[SPEAKER_01]: I started playing video games again.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm a more NFL player.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's all those people.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's the audience.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've played GTA to do over it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I just kind of like, just do different things.
[SPEAKER_01]: But it was hard.
[SPEAKER_01]: My temper got worse.
[SPEAKER_01]: So my patience.
[SPEAKER_01]: started to go away because I felt like I also didn't protect myself.
[SPEAKER_01]: From people who also had some to say, and I let those that you stress me out.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I was like, you know, anybody ever go come for me again, or if I don't like this or I feel like you're coming from me, I'm like, like, I'm a, do what I now need to put that back a little bit.
[SPEAKER_01]: But, you know, it was me trying to, as a way of trying to protect your work protect this, I'm myself.
[SPEAKER_01]: I isolated myself from people a lot of times like if I had to have to be there, I wouldn't.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to whirl up and back up.
[SPEAKER_01]: I started going out again to help because I'm a social person.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'll be in, you know, also I started to isolate too much.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I think I should think too like, you
[SPEAKER_01]: you know, putting myself out there more starting to date again.
[SPEAKER_01]: Heal from that.
[SPEAKER_01]: I wish I would have did there to take therapy more seriously.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think the healing process would have been a little bit faster, but I'm very self-aware.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's like I saw it, you know, so it's a matter of like doing the things.
[SPEAKER_01]: But it's still a working progress.
[SPEAKER_01]: I still have flaws from the situation.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm still, you know, dealing with
[SPEAKER_01]: I learned how to problem solve with people, like I'm wondering how people were like, you know, I'm the nicest person of front, but sometimes when you like you do something across me or piss me off, I just leave you alone.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's never a fixing.
[SPEAKER_01]: You just gone out the way and I'll have to deal with you no more.
[SPEAKER_01]: as a coping mechanism but I want to get better at like, you know, solve a real relationship problem.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's a given take.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's nothing perfect.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just tell women who've been through tough situations where there's grief or whatever.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you are just working on being better, the thing you were the day before, you're doing good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: So one.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're prospering.
[SPEAKER_00]: One step at a time.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I have no doubt that your constituents and the people who support you adore you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love them too.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, because of how transparent and how honest you are about yourself, and it's really uncommon actually to hear a political leader named their struggle, and their current struggles.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm a working progress, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: But there's such a freedom in being honest about this.
[SPEAKER_01]: It is, because I'm not trying to be somebody I'm not.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I don't get, like, when I walk in the room, I'm not,
[SPEAKER_01]: like seeing action like I'm just myself and like I feel like America now wants more authentic elected officials like you're too good the sick of like the whole fakeness of it all like unfortunately I was one of criticism about our soror was yeah, you know like we don't know you And like no, I want to buy it ever say anything about that to me and I go back to how did I
[SPEAKER_01]: get involved in politics.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was inspired by seeing President Barack Obama.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I also know by being the first on everything like you have to give people permission and I won't young people to know that you can be yourself, you can be authentic and you can be about the work and get there and so I recognize that a part of my role is also given back to the people coming behind me and opening doors for
[SPEAKER_01]: And I recognize I'm opening the doors for more authentic legislators, more realness.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm opening doors for mothers who thought they can't have young children and do this.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am opening doors for people who are experiencing grief and want to take their pain and actually maximize it to some sort of purpose.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I want to...
[SPEAKER_01]: I want to be the glass breaker for all of those people who never saw themselves in this position before like I want them to see themselves in me and then get that confidence to run because I don't want to be in this seat forever.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am a fine believer in passing the torch and even when I look at my staff and the young black girls, I'm bringing it up under me like, yeah, I'm doing everything I can to see to pass it on to you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, whoever's ready to come out to me, and I think that's one of the failures of our community of the generation before, but it's on me to change the tide and make opportunities for the generation from behind me.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's allowing you to be authentic self, allow you to fumble and stand back up, you know, like you can fall and get back up and you can still be successful, because no path, this perfect, no path is a straight line, there's some turns, there's a cliff,
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like, it's all of those things.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a whole line there.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's all whole.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hello.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's just your move.
[SPEAKER_01]: Keep it flexing, everybody.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, because we're called a station, we don't have to be like, if your life challenges your human, just like everybody else, like when you cry, it bleed and get sick.
[SPEAKER_01]: And like everybody else, I gotta go to the bathroom, go to sleep.
[SPEAKER_01]: You dress, shower, just like everybody else.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I want the average person to see themselves and me because I'm wondering let us say who's ever came for the average person.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, who is on your mind?
[SPEAKER_00]: Give us some examples of who is on your mind when you do this work.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, we, our folks who are listening in, we, it, one is a great opportunity to hear how you think and how you see the world and your role.
[SPEAKER_00]: But to remind people, again, that we need to be praying for our electives of faith.
[SPEAKER_00]: We can be encouraging that we need to be supporting, then we need to be reminding them of why we put them there and whether we vote for them or not, why they are there, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So who is on your mind when you come into your office and who are you thinking about serving?
[SPEAKER_01]: So I think about my mom, not because she's my mom, like I love my mom, but I saw the sacrifices she made.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like my mom, to me represents the average American, the black woman who is working a working class job.
[SPEAKER_01]: She's giving up every day.
[SPEAKER_01]: taking her a key as she is working real hard to make sure we're in the best program.
[SPEAKER_01]: She's skipping lunch to make sure she has enough money to do all the things to put give me a better opportunity as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I think about her, her struggles, I think about she is the average person.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so when I look at her,
[SPEAKER_01]: And all the things she taught me about serving, even we don't have everything that you need.
[SPEAKER_01]: I also remind myself that even though I'm still, don't have everything I feel like I mean, I'm still going to be fighting for the average person, people like her.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think about the young people all the time, because I believe it's hard to sometimes change a mind of a grown person, but I could probably change the hearts of mind of a young person.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I may not be able to change a current circumstances but I can hopefully change the future like invested in them and giving them the confidence to say that you can do it like again, or think about Obamacous just seeing them on the stage is literally the reason why I'm here.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like just seeing them walk out on that stage him dare to run is what made me believe that I could be in this position.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, I always think about young people and I just think about,
[SPEAKER_01]: I, all the women who've been through what I went through a maternal health, it is my priority topic.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a hundred and twenty nine of us here.
[SPEAKER_01]: So everybody has their thing, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: But I know what my thing is what I bring, do the most impactful it and that's maternal health.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, you know, I think what more can I do to push the needle with Tennessee having a high maternal mortality rate in this nation?
[SPEAKER_01]: Here, and we're supposed to be pro-life.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want no other woman to die, or here that you vow to die like I did.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want nobody to have to incur the burial expenses that I had to incur.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want nobody have to experience that loss.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like it's hard.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I just want to,
[SPEAKER_01]: Changed old circumstances and then I just want Tennessee be the better state.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like life is hard.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm struggling.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I'm Filling and trying to pay my bills every day child care kicking my butt just like everybody else You know the economy is terrible.
[SPEAKER_01]: I still can't afford to buy a house.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm still ring like everybody else like I get It some also advocating for the average person and the fact that
[SPEAKER_01]: This is just unaffordable to live, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: It is.
[SPEAKER_01]: And like, no matter where you are.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not, I'm not bougie, I'm not rich.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I want to remind people who we really need to be advocating more.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: And unfortunately, the average person is not always thought of in this building where I serve, but I'm a constant reminder of who's really important.
[SPEAKER_02]: Mmm, thank you.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, Senator Lamar, I'm curious to know what needs to be done or what do the sisters at the table need to do in order to hold you and other elected officials accountable to say even maternal health and getting, you know, getting, bringing that down, and making it a better
[SPEAKER_02]: opportunity and landscape for black women to have children safely.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, what needs to happen?
[SPEAKER_02]: What can they do?
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, because it seems like such a huge problem.
[SPEAKER_02]: And a huge massive issue that it just feels like, how do we, what can I do?
[SPEAKER_01]: People can get intimidated.
[SPEAKER_01]: Two part question.
[SPEAKER_01]: One, you can do a lot of things support me and give Richard's vote.
[SPEAKER_01]: Go vote for me at the polls.
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't hate my campaign.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: I can do that whole spill.
[SPEAKER_01]: You'll see that my social media later this year.
[SPEAKER_01]: What I want for us is black women.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's talk about our community.
[SPEAKER_01]: First, I want us to break the stigma around, speak of it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, you know, when I decided to share my story, I really didn't have a, I could, could not have shared it, but there was a lot of older black women who were like, you really about to tell people what happened.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, you like, just, you know, sleep this, like, just let this go ahead, does settle the focus on something else.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's been so taboo to talk about a miscarriage.
[SPEAKER_01]: I lost it.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, you just go away, you had a baby and that's why one folks have miscarriages.
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_00]: So alone.
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: More common than people were.
[SPEAKER_01]: Not only alone, one of the feeling that I felt that people are often a myth is when we say one thing I was scared of was, I will hope that me and think I was bearing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I can't have kids because there's this stigma around and for can you infertility, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: So I was worried about, you know, people that like, well, a man wanted to date me thinking I can't have no more babies, wishing like obviously it's not true, but I was so I want us to have us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: All of these to all this stereotypes, we first got a break them within ourselves before we demand a world break them about us.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Secondly, we need to get honest about comprehensive sex education in a grander scheme.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like we don't talk about sex, periods, healthcare, amongst our community.
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't need to be given out of girls and young men, hot Cheetos, and all of those things early on and on is going to impact their periods.
[SPEAKER_01]: then it's going to kill you.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's going to kill you.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's going to kill you
[SPEAKER_01]: the the circumstances around motherhood and then we also need to break stimulus around motherhood.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know we've been having babies for our 10th year.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know so you know we got to do better at loving on our black mothers.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like you know she hit three kids it's like okay we get it but
[SPEAKER_01]: And what we go do to help out now, like what how are we going to wrap our arms around the mothers and our communities?
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's accountability for not only us as women to have power conversations, but also help these brothers accountable too.
[SPEAKER_01]: So we got to make family great again.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, let's talk about what's made grammar.
[SPEAKER_01]: We got to make family popular.
[SPEAKER_01]: We got to really love on the idea of marriage.
[SPEAKER_01]: Not that nothing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Nothing, anything's wrong with being single.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like I'm gonna do my thing single too.
[SPEAKER_01]: But we wanna make sure we, you know, encourage our men and men, the women that they get pregnant, we wanna encourage like the idea that
[SPEAKER_01]: Couples are sexy again like our grandparents like that is what's gonna give us through the tough time It's each other and then for all our single folks what can we do to build a better community amongst yourselves So that you can love each other you don't feel isolated from your own community So it's the idea of family in the different ways that it looks like how we can bring the black family back
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think that will help as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then we also got encouraged to face community, to do a better job at actually delivering services and support versus getting up in a pool pit and just talking about people.
[SPEAKER_01]: Pool pit needs to be to the people.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I want us to...
[SPEAKER_01]: encouraged the church to refocus his priorities, be less judgmental, and be more service oriented.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if we can do those things amongst ourselves as personal accountability, in addition to making sure we're mobilized and to the polls, then I think that we then can take some of our power back to change our circumstances and hold the system accountable.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, again, we are so grateful for the clarity of your voice, the broadness of your voice.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that is rooted in a real story, a real story that's not over.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is just starting for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we're really, really grateful to be able to be in your office and to hear here about who you are, not only as a legislator, but as a woman.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we're just grateful to sit with you today.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, so grateful to be here with you all.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's been...
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I definitely pick and choose, you know, my story is so vulnerable of how, you know, and who I share my story with, because I want to make sure it's delivered in a way that's proper and brings dignity.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm thankful to connect with you ladies and be able to be invited to your platform to share my story and enlighten your listeners around the work that I'm
[SPEAKER_01]: overly honored to be in this role.
[SPEAKER_01]: I really believe guy put me here.
[SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't think there's this a lot of things is happening.
[SPEAKER_01]: I ain't been sitting down a plane or whatever.
[SPEAKER_01]: They just walking by faith.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I know faith without works is dead.
[SPEAKER_01]: So.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, it's just being a good person, first and foremost, I wake up every day of trying to do the right thing the first time be a good person and treat people right Just stand true to my values and stand strong on you know the things that I care about and I let God do the rest.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's just go fall
[SPEAKER_01]: And my lap and after like God talks to me in my dreams and you know a lot of times he gives me the vision when I lay down And I close my eyes and then I wake up and morning with a sense of clarity Wow, I'm around what he wants me to do and so that's my message to all young people.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's just
[SPEAKER_01]: stay consistent, stay focused, stay friends, stay a good person, stay present, and all your heart's desires and what your purpose in the world is going to happen in or what one person have today don't mean you won't have it till tomorrow.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, continue to like clap for your friends because one day they'll be clapping for you, too.
[SPEAKER_01]: So you never know, you know, what's going to happen.
[SPEAKER_02]: I love that rejoice with those who rejoice.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you so much Senator Moore for taking the seat of true state, but we're honored to have you into and get the honor of receiving your story and holding it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for your work.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm blessed to have you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much.
[SPEAKER_00]: Before we go, just a quick word of blessing for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, ma'am.
[SPEAKER_00]: Great to sky.
[SPEAKER_00]: We just thank you so much for for London who you've made.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we ask God that you look and tell you to use her voice for gluing, she has gone through her own journey and she knows a pain that is so hard to even describe and with that pain she took it and she made it purposeful.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so God we ask that you would bless everything that she is seeking to do to save the lives
[SPEAKER_00]: to save the health and well-being of women in the state of Tennessee and even beyond this place.
[SPEAKER_00]: Would you continue to protect her?
[SPEAKER_00]: And we give you thanks in praise for her two-year-old, and we pray that you are looking to you to uphold her and restore her, and that one day in one day soon you will turn all of her morning into dancing.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is in your name, we pray, amen.
[SPEAKER_02]: Amen, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.