#119 – Episode 119 – Sober Black Girls with Khadi Olagoke

VeronicaValli

In this episode, Veronica interviews the founder of the Sober Black Girls Club Khadi Olagoke. Khadi talks frankly about her struggle with alcohol and why she was often the only Black girl in the room.

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I have a really fabulous interview for you guys today with a young woman who I came across on Instagram who has an important and powerful message, Khadi Olagoke. Khadi is an attorney and the creator of Sober Black Girls Club, a collective that provides resources and support to Black girls considering beautiful sober lives.

Khadi started Sober Black Girls Club when she, as a Black woman struggling with alcohol, came up against the lack of digital and physical spaces where she felt supported, represented, and safe to share openly.

Khadi was introduced to alcohol in her college years and she worked hard and partied hard right through to law school where she maintained straight As and continued to perform well at work.

The cracks started to form when she decided to stay, in isolation, in her now-empty college town for the summer to study for the bar. Under pressure to do well in the bar exam, hurting from a relationship of five years which had just ended, Khadi was using caffeine to stay up and drinking two bottles of wine to go to sleep each night.

Khadi was depressed and with all the self-medicating, she didn’t recognize the signs.

She told herself things would be different once she passed the bar so she kept pushing. The bar came and went and Khadi moved back to the city, got a great job at a law firm, an apartment, a car and all the things she had been working for.

But nothing changed. Her self-esteem continued to plummet and eventually, she lost all the things she had worked for.
When Khadi decided to seek help and found that she was the only Black person in meetings, she was discouraged. She knew she wasn’t the only Black person going through these issues but she didn’t know where to go.

That’s why she created Sober Black Girls Club in the hopes of giving other girls like her a safe space to get sober. Since then, she’s learned a lot and helped a lot of people.

Anyone can suffer from addiction but the trauma behind our addictions is different and how we recover can be different. – Khadi Olagoke

What does Khadi want the recovery community to know about what she needed in her recovery that wasn’t provided?

Representation. With the massive inequalities in the world, communities where people can see people they identify with are critical.

So much trauma is inflicted on a daily basis onto Black people and marginalized folx from the people, systems, and structures that were not created with them in mind.

It’s important to be able to share experiences with people who understand and who have been through it and that is why organizations like Sober Black Club are needed.

If you feel strongly about this, there are lots of ways you can support Khadi and the Sober Black Girls Club. The world needs this and America needs this. So if you can make even a small contribution, we would be eternally grateful.

 

About Khadi Olagoke

Khadi A. Olagoke is an attorney and the creator of Sober Black Girls Club- a collective that focuses on health, wellness, and sobriety among Black womxn and non-binary folks. Khadi created SBGC in October of 2018 after noticing her own struggles with alcohol and the lack of digital support for women of color working towards sobriety. Since then, Khadi continues to provide consistent content through SBGC to support and connect women to pursue wellness, sobriety, social justice, and much more.

Connect with Khadi Olagoke of Sober Black Girls Club

 

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