Overcoming Childhood Trauma
The Brian Lehrer Show
WNYC
4.6 • 1.5K Ratings
🗓️ 25 September 2023
⏱️ 14 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Jenisha Watts, senior editor at The Atlantic, talks about how she overcame and left behind a traumatic childhood to become a successful journalist who is able to navigate a world very different than what she had known.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | It's the Bryan Lair show on WNYC. Welcome back everybody. I'm Arun Van Gogh Paul from |
| 0:16.7 | the WNYC and got the newsroom. And now we're going to wrap up today's show with a story |
| 0:23.2 | of perseverance. Our guest joining us in a moment is Janisha Watts. She's a senior editor for |
| 0:30.5 | The Atlantic, but her background is quite different from others in her field. In her latest |
| 0:36.2 | piece titled, I never called her mama. Janisha Watts shares a story of her childhood for the first |
| 0:42.2 | time as well as her journey to her current life. And now she brings that story to us. Janisha, |
| 0:48.2 | welcome to do you in YC. Thank you. Thank you for having me. And listeners, we want to invite you |
| 0:56.3 | in as well. Perhaps if you grew up in poverty, you experienced trauma as a kid. Maybe you're working |
| 1:01.9 | in a ritzy professional spaces amongst those who grew up in some amount of privilege. Tell us how you |
| 1:07.7 | adjust. Do you hide the truth of your childhood? Do you mingle comfortably with your colleagues? |
| 1:12.5 | Call us or text us at 212-433-WNYC. That's 433-9692. Janisha, I know it's a long and complicated |
| 1:23.0 | story, but tell us a little bit about how you grew up. So I was born and raised in Lexington, |
| 1:33.8 | Kentucky. My early childhood, I lived in the Charlotte court projects. And there was a |
| 1:41.4 | especially an area where a lot of low income, black families lived with maybe like single mothers. |
| 1:51.3 | And from there, I moved to the suburbs of my grandmother when I was probably in the sixth grade. |
| 1:59.4 | And I guess a lot of the story your essay has to do with your mother whom you call a |
| 2:09.9 | Trina. Tell us a little about Trina. So Trina and my mom, yes, she was addicted to |
| 2:19.8 | crack cocaine since I was in elementary school. So the piece talks a lot about me navigating |
| 2:29.2 | my life with having a mom that I addict and having and being the oldest of five siblings. So I had |
| 2:37.2 | so I was the oldest and taking care of my brothers and sisters as my mom struggled with her |
| 2:46.0 | addictions throughout our childhood. And at the same time, you're growing up as a |
| 2:52.9 | environment. It's very difficult for you and your siblings. As often you're the one who's |
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