From survival to Thrivance: co-mothering as early career Motherscholars of Color

Inspired by the Indigenous framework of Thrivance and grounded in a Critical Sisterhood Praxis, this duoethnography maps our journey (re)membering and (re)claiming communal practices of fictive kinship and chosen family. We offer what we've affectionately coined as our Comadre Story—the story of how we became chosen family through our journey of co-mothering while navigating critical junctures in our academic careers during a global health pandemic. We offer our narrative as an extension of existing research on the burdens and violence endured by Women of Color navigating and negotiating white academic spaces. Additionally, we interrogate the ways that institutional demands fragment, dismember, and disembody Motherscholars of Color and offer ways we can curate sacred spaces for wholeness.