Throughout my mother’s decades-long struggle with her Canadian Chinese identity, I was close by. The impoverishment and alienation she experienced, worlds away from model minority mythology, meant she’d always rather not talk about it. But what wasn’t said was felt, across stances on self-worth, strength, and womanhood that flooded the way we both live our lives. This story felt like a path to voicing it. I sought to capture the consuming burdens placed on women in the minority, including what we inflict on ourselves. How, when this is the world you’ve known, do you learn to grow and mother?