Mayday: The Day My Mother Died (And My Ambition Lost Its Brakes)

Identity

Mayday: The Day My Mother Died (And My Ambition Lost Its Brakes)

By MoAfrika Skotch Ntilane — 26 May 2025

24 May. A date the world forgot. I did not. It split my life into before and after.

People say time heals. People say grief softens. For me, time did not heal. Time just taught me how to function with an open wound. How to move with pain as if it is an accessory rather than a burden.

The Explosion: When Grief Ignites Purpose

No one warns you that losing a parent rewires your whole operating system. Not gently, not slowly, not like a software update. It is more like someone ripped out the motherboard and replaced it with a version that does not allow for hesitation or excuses. It only knows one speed, and that is forward.

I opened online stores like a man running from something invisible. Momentum became my medicine, and work became my therapy. Every launch was like a small rebellion against the quiet that had taken my mother from me.

WWMD: The Brand I Refuse to Bury

Out of all my ventures, there is one that I refuse to abandon: my clothing label, WWMD, What Would Mama Do. This brand carries her voice, her courage, her stubbornness, her love. It is every lesson she taught me condensed into cloth and print.

The Year I Became Someone Else

I am not the person I was. I am better in ways that count. I have more clarity. More fire. More focus. I see through people’s façades. I see who deserves my energy and who does not. I have less tolerance for excuses, for nonsense, for those who drain without giving back. I move faster, harder, sharper, and with a single-mindedness that is frightening even to me at times.