International Women’s Day rolls around every year, and with it comes the usual flood of social media tributes, hashtags, and corporate nods to female empowerment. “Women are strong,” they say. “Women are resilient.” “Women are the backbone of society.” And for Nigerian women, especially those in the diaspora, this isn’t just a phrase it’s a lifelong expectation. The world does not just admire our strength; it demands it. We are the ones who must push through exhaustion, carry everyone else’s burdens, and still show up smiling. But what if we don’t want to? What if, this International Women’s Day, we stopped being celebrated for our struggles and started demanding space for something more: ease, balance, and the freedom to just exist?
For Nigerian women abroad, strength is not optional; it is a currency. In the workplace, it means constantly overperforming to be seen as competent, knowing that being excellent is the bare minimum for recognition. In society, it means navigating a world where race and gender intersect in ways that force us to fight battles that others don’t even see. It means defending our accents, proving our intelligence, and working twice as hard for half the reward. But the expectation of strength doesn’t end there. No matter how far we go, home follows us. We are still expected to hold families together, send money back, stay culturally grounded, and embody the perfect Nigerian woman. We are to be independent, but not too independent; successful, but not intimidating; generous, but never burnt out. We are supposed to hold it all together, always.
And so we stretch ourselves thin, keeping up with impossible expectations while the world applauds our resilience. We become pillars even when we are exhausted. We solve everyone else’s problems, even when no one asks how we are doing. We are celebrated for our ability to endure rather than our ability to thrive. Every International Women’s Day, our names may be mentioned in lists of “powerful women,” but power has been mis defined. Real power is not in endless sacrifice; it is in having the freedom to choose. The freedom to say no. The freedom to set boundaries. The freedom to exist without proving ourselves through struggle.
This International Women’s Day `let’s challenge the narrative. Yes, Nigerian women are strong. But we are also tired. We deserve to be seen beyond our resilience. We deserve systems that support us, workplaces that don’t just tolerate us but uplift us, relationships that do not rest on our ability to carry them alone. We deserve rest, softness, and the right to say, “I don’t have to do it all.” The true power of Nigerian women in the diaspora is not just in how much we can endure, but in how boldly we choose ourselves. The world does not need another reminder that we are strong. It needs to make room for us to be free.
What does strength mean to you? Have you ever felt the weight of being “too strong”? Share your thoughts in the comments section below or join the conversation on our social media platforms. Let’s talk about what true empowerment looks like.
