The Deadline Shifted
As far back as I can remember, my life has been busy. I remember swimming and dance classes at the YWCA. Whether indoors or outdoors, I found a way to play sports all year. In middle school, I joined band, chorus, soccer, and started an informal Black books reading club. Summers were filled with volunteering, camps, travel ball, and visiting family in the South, returning to Pittsburgh just in time for the school year, southern drawl in tow.
The more I took on, the more that adults praised my leadership, time management, and responsibility. The more recognition I received, the more I wanted to do. Plus, if I stayed busy, I stayed out of trouble.
This past summer demanded that I tap into that zone again, letting muscle memory take over. My Black trans queer family kicked off the season convening Black families for an unschooling conference, a vegan festival, and a ten-day ancestral skills gathering. Two days later, we drove 3,000 miles cross-country to cohost a family gathering. There were weekly swamp hikes, visits to herons, and reunions across state lines. A wedding five years in the making brought together people from fifteen states on ancestral land.
My chronic pain, numbness, tingling, headaches, fatigue, and stiffness didn’t disappear, but they didn’t stop me either. I found myself amazed, grateful that my body was holding up. The summer allowed me to forget about my body.
But with the cooler temperatures of November came the full force of my symptoms: chronic headaches, pain, fatigue, and disproportionate numbness in my limbs and hips. The numbness in my hands and feet led to burns, cuts, slammed fingers, stubbed toes—injuries I often didn’t feel until later.
Listening to my body has been a challenge. Like many of us, I was taught early: to wake up before dawn, to ignore pain and stay in the game, to grind no matter how tired. I took pride in being reliable and dependable. I learned that rest was lazy, slowing down was weakness. Working in nonprofit spaces, I absorbed the message that to be in service I needed to erase myself. Self-erasure keeps systems moving smoothly — but productivity isn’t neutral, and urgency isn’t accidental.
The abandonment of Self, ignoring pain and sickness is woven into the fabric of American culture. We are indoctrinated with messaging from early on that to be the best, we must be the fastest, strongest, and most productive. Deeply encoded in our cultural DNA and passed down from one generation to the next lives the trauma of forced labor from sun up till way past sun down with little to no reprieve. A time when urgency and productivity was life or death. Now, armed with hollow bootstrap theories, we grind ourselves and wear detachment as a badge of honor. In a capitalistic society built on enslavement and genocide, urgency and productivity are currency.
Overwhelmed, years ago I called my spiritual mentor, Diva Nut Tmu-Ankh Butterfly Dreaming, and rattled off everything I needed to do. She listened, then asked one question: “Michael, who is creating these tasks and deadlines?”
“Mostly me,” I said.
“And who can change them?”
“Me.”
She reminded me that deadlines are not fixed. Someone makes them up; often, it’s us. Even working for myself, I’d recreated the same systems of urgency I was taught. I’d love to say I have it all figured out. I don’t.
A few weeks ago, I was invited to write this essay — the same day I got sick. Without much thought, I said yes and promised it by Friday, assuming I’d be better by Wednesday. Eight days later, I was still sick and the essay wasn’t done. Instead of pushing through or disappearing in shame, I emailed the editor with the truth: I needed more time. I didn’t offer my medical history or apologize for having a body. I simply communicated. The deadline shifted. Nothing fell apart. That exchange reminded me how often urgency is assumed rather than required, and how much harm we do when we treat timelines as immovable. Communication, like rest, can be an act of resistance, one that allows us to remain present instead of disappearing.
When we stop requiring self-erasure as proof of commitment, a world of emotionally responsive, attuned beings becomes possible — a world that is flexible, adaptable, and strong. I invite us to ask ourselves: who benefits when I override my body? What would our movements look like if they assumed fragility? What if sustainability were built in, not “earned” through collapse?
Michael David Battle (he/him) is a writer, cultural worker, and the Global Executive Director of Garden of Peace, Inc., an arts and community organization centering Black trans and queer families. His work explores memory, rest, belonging, ancestral connection, and liberation through storytelling and community practice. Michael lives in Portland, Oregon, and works across the Pacific Northwest, Appalachia, and the Southeast.
About Rooted In Rights
Rooted in Rights exists to amplify the perspectives of the disability community. Blog posts and storyteller videos that we publish and content we re-share on social media do not necessarily reflect the opinions or values of Rooted in Rights nor indicate an endorsement of a program or service by Rooted in Rights. We respect and aim to reflect the diversity of opinions and experiences of the disability community. Rooted in Rights seeks to highlight discussions, not direct them. Learn more about Rooted In Rights.
