Birthday Reflections: The Journey So Far

Dolo Brewer
Oct 1, 2025
7 min read

Updated: Oct 7, 2025

Celebrating Another Year of Growth, Healing, and Becoming

Tomorrow, I celebrate another year of life. As I sit here reflecting on my journey, I'm overwhelmed by how far I've come and how much I've grown into the woman I was always meant to be.

From Guinea to America: The First Crossing (2003)

Twenty-two years ago, I left Guinea and arrived in America on October 5, 2003. I was young, full of dreams, and terrified. I didn't know then that leaving home would be the first of many brave decisions I'd have to make. America wasn't just a new country; it was a new version of myself I had to discover.

My father brought us to America, seeking opportunity, education, and a better future. What I found was all of that and more, but also challenges I never anticipated. The loneliness of being far from everything familiar. The struggle to maintain my identity while adapting to a new culture. The weight of expectations from family back home, from myself, from the American dream itself.

But I persevered. I earned my degree in Public Health. I built a life. I met my husband. And most precious of all, I became a mother to three beautiful daughters.

The Years of Losing Myself

There were years too many years when I lost myself completely. While raising my daughters, I gave away pieces of myself until I couldn't recognize who I was anymore. I was mom, wife, daughter, friend, but somewhere in all those roles, Dolo, Rose, and Monemou disappeared.

I recall the sleepless nights, staring at screens, as I tried to distract myself from my own thoughts. The overwhelming feeling that I was failing at everything. The loneliness even when surrounded by people. The breaking point was when my words in my journal didn't even make sense because my mind was so scattered. Those were dark times. Times when I needed medication just to function. Times when my inner child sat alone under a mango tree, waiting for someone to save her. Times when I wondered if I'd ever feel whole again. But even in those dark times, something was preparing me for what was to come.

The Awakening: Finding Her Under the Mango Tree

The turning point came when I finally connected with Precious, my inner child, the little girl who had been wounded and waiting for so long. Finding her under that mango tree, seeing how she'd learned to comfort herself because no one else came, broke my heart and began to heal it at the same time. She taught me that I couldn't wait for others to validate me, to love me, to save me. I had to do that work myself. And slowly, painfully, beautifully, I did. I started to reclaim my power. I remembered that I wasn't just a mother, I was also Dolo Rose Monemou, a woman with visions, dreams, passions, and something meaningful to contribute to the world.

The Birth of The Seny Collection

From that healing came The Seny Collection. "Seny" means gold in Kpelle, my native dialect. It represents everything precious, valuable, and worth treasuring. The Seny Collection isn't just a business; it's the physical manifestation of my healing journey. It's proof that I could take my pain, my heritage, my education, and my passion and create something beautiful that empowers other women. It's African artisanship celebrated through ethical fashion. It's women supporting women across continents. Every piece we create carries my story and the stories of the artisans who make them. Every design honors both where I came from and who I've become.

The Greatest Gift: My Three Daughters

As I reflect on my life, my three daughters are my greatest accomplishment and my deepest joy. They've witnessed my struggles and my victories. They've seen me at my lowest and watched me rise. And through it all, they've loved me unconditionally. Now, they're excited about our upcoming move to Senegal. They're learning that life is an adventure, that home can be multiple places, that their mother is more than just someone who takes care of them—she's a woman with dreams who isn't afraid to chase them. I'm giving them something I once lacked: the belief that they never have to choose between loving others and loving themselves. Being a mother, a wife, a professional, and a creator, they can be all of these things. That their heritage is something to celebrate, not hide.

Returning Home: Redefining Success on My Own Terms

And now, at this point in my life, I’m preparing to take my American-born daughters back to Africa. Not as someone who couldn’t make it in America but as someone who did. As someone who built a life, pursued education, started a business, raised a family, and now chooses to expand what success means. The ancestors who once whispered my name across the ocean twenty-two years ago are calling me back again. Back to the earth that birthed me. Back to the water that first cleansed me. But this time, I return not as the young woman who left in search of more, but as a mother, an entrepreneur, a healer. A woman who has done the inner work and is finally ready to plant new roots while honoring the old.

Senegal will be the place where my daughters learn to walk among baobab trees: to climb their majestic branches, to enjoy their healing and nourishing fruit, and to feel the wisdom in their shade. It will be the place where they learn to speak not just their father’s language, but mine too Kpelle. To understand that they belong to something ancient and beautiful. It’s where The Seny Collection will deepen its roots in African soil. Where handcrafted stories will continue to travel from artisan hands to homes around the world. Where our legacy will be sewn not just into fabric, but into the land itself. As the mango season slowly approaches, I find myself dreaming of the day when our daughters will run barefoot beneath the trees, chasing the sunlight, giggling in the breeze. I look forward to the scent of ripening fruit hanging heavy in the air, to their fingers sticky with juice, to the sound of their laughter echoing through branches that once sheltered my own childhood joy.

Life Wisdom

As I celebrate another birthday, here's what life has taught me:

About Pain: It's not something to run from or medicate away indefinitely. Sometimes you have to sit with it, feel it fully, and let it teach you what it came to teach you.

About Healing: It's not a linear process. Some days you feel whole; other days you feel broken again. But the difference is that you know now you can survive the broken days.

About Identity: You don't have to choose between your different selves. You can be Guinean and American. Traditional and modern. A mother and an entrepreneur. All of it at once.

About Love: The most important love you can receive is the love you give yourself. Until you learn to hold your own hand, you'll always be waiting for someone else to do it.

About Purpose: It often comes from pain. The things that break you open can become the doorways to your greatest contributions.

About Courage: It's not the absence of fear. It's making the decision even when you're terrified. It's getting on that plane to America at nineteen. It's starting a business when you're not sure you can succeed. It's moving your family across an ocean because something inside you says it's time.

About Home: It's not just one place. It's wherever you choose to plant your heart. And sometimes coming home means going somewhere you've never been.

Gratitude

As I stand at this milestone, I am deeply grateful:

To God, my creator, who blesses and guides me daily
For my husband, who supports my wildest dreams
For our three daughters, who teach me daily what unconditional love looks like
For my ancestors who guide me still
For The Seny Collection and what it represents
For every person who has supported my journey
For the inner child who waited patiently under the mango tree until I was ready to find her
For no longer needing medication to feel okay
For the courage to return to Africa
For every struggle that taught me my own strength
For this life, with all its beauty and pain and possibility

Looking Forward

Tomorrow I turn another year older. But I don't feel old I feel alive. I feel like I'm finally becoming who I was always meant to be.

The next chapter is being written in Senegal, among baobab trees and mango groves, with my daughters watching me live courageously and my business growing deeper roots. The next chapter is about showing other women, especially those in the African diaspora, that we can return with pride, that we can build businesses that honor our heritage, and that we can give our children both roots and wings. I don't know what the next year will bring. But I know I'm ready for it. My inner child is holding my hand. My daughters are watching me with trust. My ancestors are guiding me. And I am finally, beautifully, completely worthy of the life I'm creating.

This is what it looks like to become. This is what it feels like to heal. This is what happens when you stop waiting to be saved and save yourself instead.

Happy birthday to me. To all the versions of myself I've been and all the versions I'm still becoming.

Thank you to everyone who has been part of my journey. Your love, support, and presence have helped shape me into the person I am today. Here's to another year of growth, courage, and gold (Seny). Like Seny, you deserve to fearlessly shine