Page 23 - Women's Yellow Pages (2019)

We Wear The Mask
Halima Tammy Thompson
www.wewearthemaskfilm.com/

The psychological effects of poverty are far-reaching.
And women are statistically more likely to feel the impact

This film was such an important project because in my own experiences in poverty I found it so painful
to know that people were constantly judging me because of the financial predicament that I found myself
in. Although I was born into Generational Poverty, I was constantly made to feel that I had created my
circumstances and I deserved all the stress, pain and hurt that come with living in poverty. I learned to
suffer silently and in isolation and as a result, I stayed poor longer than I needed to.

As I began working in the nonprofit sector and coming across women who were experiencing very
similar trauma and pain in their journey from poverty to self-sufficiency, I realized that I had not quite
overcome my own poverty trauma and shame. Every day I was coming across women who were either
very in tune with how their experiences with poverty were impacting them or had suppressed their pain
so deeply that they hadn’t made the connection. It became my personal mission to create safe spaces,
programming and opportunities for other women to do the self-assessment and self-actualization that is
necessary to heal.

In early 2017 I had been having a tough week at work and a lot of my poverty trauma had been trig-
gered. I was feeling that no matter how much I spoke about the struggles that families in our commu-
nities were experiencing, WE weren’t being heard. I had an idea to create a documentary, which was
crazy because I had no experience in film making at ALL!

Although I had no idea what I was doing, I felt compelled to tell this story and to give space for other
women to tell their stories. This was a project that was supposed to happen because all the pieces fell
into place exactly the way they were supposed to. We were able to get funding from the project through
the generosity of the Heinz Endowments and the perfect filmmaker was available to work on this project
with me. Most importantly, the women who were courageous enough to share their stories were perfect.

Ifeel so blessed to have had the opportunity to work with this amazing group of people and I’m excited
for what happens next.

"Poverty is not just about HAVING LESS MONEY"
~~~Tammy T. Thompson

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