"I Don't Know If I Should Tell This Or Not": Why Educator Truth-Telling Matters

This weekend, I started reading Sisters of the Yam by bell hooks. In the opening chapters, she writes about truth-telling as a form of self-recovery, a way for Black women to begin healing by naming what has been carried in silence.  Those pages made me pause and think about something Monika Robinson said during her episode on The Exit Interview.

“I don’t know if I should tell this or not…”

That phrase,  in some way, shape, or form, shows up often in my conversations with Black educators. It usually arrives right before another layer of truth emerges. And almost always, what follows is not gossip or complaint. It is a revelation. It is self-discovery.

Truth-telling is rarely about drama. It is about liberation.

The Cost of Silence in Education

As educators, many of us learned early how to survive systems that were not built with us in mind. We learned to smooth over experiences. To rename harm. To keep moving.

We hide racialized experiences behind phrases like:

• “I was just burned out.”

• “It was time for a change.”

• “I decided to move on.”

But what happens when the truth underneath sounds more like:

• I was the only Black teacher for years.

• I thought working for a Black male principal would be different.

• They said we were friends, but then I was purposely excluded, and that hurt.

• I thought the other Black educators who left were just weak.

During her episode, Monika shared what it meant to spend years as the only Black teacher in her building, navigating isolation while still honing her craft and becoming exceptional at her work. She spoke about being excluded from social spaces and simply telling herself, “I’m not here to make friends anyway.” Sound familiar. 

Because many Black educators know that posture well, the quiet survival strategy of shrinking our needs so we can keep showing up for students.

Truth-Telling as Self-Recovery

bell hooks writes:

“Many Black women in the United States are brokenhearted.  They walk around in daily life carrying so much hurt, feeling wasted, yet pretending in every area of their life that everything is under control. It hurts to pretend.  It hurts to live with lies.”

When I hear stories like Monika’s, I think about how much energy it takes to pretend we are unaffected. To pretend isolation doesn’t hurt.  To pretend exclusion doesn’t accumulate.To pretend that being the only one at the table doesn’t require constant emotional labor. Truth-telling interrupts that pretending.

And here is what I have learned after dozens of Exit Interview conversations:

When educators begin telling the truth, even hesitantly, something shifts.

Their language softens.
Their shoulders drop.
Their story begins to make sense to them.

Truth-telling becomes a mirror.

Naming Harm Is Not Bitterness, It Is Clarity

Monika’s story also reminds us that truth-telling is not always neat or comfortable.

She described how administrative decisions and poor communication shaped pivotal moments in her career, including being handed a contract that would have fundamentally changed her role without a conversation.  These moments matter.  Not because we want to blame individuals, but because naming them helps us understand the systems that push Black educators to the edge.

When districts, schools, and unions bother to ask why Black educators are leaving, I wonder if they think about teachers like Monika, Akil Parker, or Ronda Haynes-Balen. 

Stories like Monika’s and all the folks who share their lived experiences on The Exit Interview show us that people rarely leave because they stop loving education. They leave when the conditions continue to force them to keep up the lie. 

What Truth-Telling Makes Possible

Here’s the paradox:

When we tell the truth about harm, we also reclaim our agency.

Monika eventually found new pathways, moving into nonprofit work and later building her own wellness-centered business supporting educators. Truth didn’t trap her in the past.  It helped her imagine and move toward a different future, one where she is able to support education in a way that brings her joy and clarity.

This is something I see again and again through The Exit Interview:

• Truth becomes data.

• Stories become archives.

• Archives become strategy.

When we tell the truth, we create knowledge that institutions can no longer ignore.

A Question for Black Educators Reading This

Sister bell asks us to consider what happens when we stop lying to ourselves about harm. So I’ll ask you:

What truth have you been carrying quietly in your professional life?  What part of you might finally begin to heal if you named it even if only to yourself?

Why This Matters Beyond One Story

At Liberated Educators Lab, we talk often about storytelling as healing infrastructure. Because truth-telling is not just personal, it is collective. Every time an educator tells the truth about their experience, they make it easier for someone else to do the same.  And maybe that is where liberation begins.

Not in perfection.  Not in silence.  But in the courage to say:

“I don’t know if I should tell this or not…”

…and then saying it anyway.