Sustained loving care is needed to help heal the pain of emotional abandonment. Throughout our history in this nation, black people have tried to deny this pain—to act as though it does not affect our capacity to trust. Without trust there can be no genuine intimacy and love. Yet for those among us who have been abandoned, it is difficult, if not impossible, to trust. To move toward love, we must confront the pain of abandonment and loss. This means speaking what may have once been unspeakable.
