It wasn’t until I started working in TV, I realised my skin was a threat to white people in the workspace.

I saw that first hand a month into my first TV job. A girl who was a runner with me found every moment to criticise me and even said I don’t deserve to work in TV.

Me and this girl went on a away trip for the job and she reported me to the production manager behind my back and said I’m difficult to work with.

This came unprovoked!!

I remember being so angry about the situation tears rolled down my face as I was speaking to my mum over the phone.

I cried to my mum “ I’m going to get sacked. That’s my TV job finished before even really starting.”

That incident changed me as a person earlier in my career where I felt I had to mute my blackness in order to not make people threatened of me.

It’s funny because one producer who hadn’t seen me since I was a runner saw me recently. He was blown with how confident I was in a webinar I did a few months back.

I replied, “I’ve always had this confidence within myself, but the white counterparts put it on mute.”

I’ve had white people in TV say I look aggressive, threatening and indirectly say I’m too black to work on certain shows.

I won’t lie, it’s actually affected my mental health over the years.