Ilyasah Shabazz - Growing Up X

Ilyasah Shabazzs Growing Up X brings to light the significance of being loved and knowing that one is lovable. Love has been the foundation that has united and fortified the Shabazz family so they could go through astounding obstacles.

C AMILLE O. C OSBY

This is a warm and engaging book about how the family of Malcolm X survived and adapted after his assassination in 1965. Ilyasah and his five other daughters were raised by a nurturing and strong mother, Betty Shabazz. The picture painted here is a personal one that helps us to see Malcolm X and his family free from the typical media highlight of his so-called violent rhetoric. Malcolms main mission, as passed on to his daughter, was to empower black people and to empower his children. Growing Up X is an enlightening contribution to our understanding of the legacy of Malcolm X. This eye-opening book is wonderful reading for all Americans.

A LVIN F. P OUSSAINT , M.D.
Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

What makes this book so worthy is its painfully honest account of the Shabazz family life. A heartwarming story, Growing Up X is an intriguing look into the world of a daughter whose father would be proud.

Heart and Soul magazine

that is an inspiration to people of all ages and backgrounds. [It] is a true testament to the power of the human will and, most important, to staying strong in the face of adversity.

T ERRIE M. W ILLIAMS
Author of The Personal Touch

In Growing Up X, Ilyasah Shabazz has crafted a compelling testimony of coming of age in the wake of the 60s triumphs and traumas, and the special challenge of overcoming expectations to become her own person. Though it begins and ends in unspeakable loss, her story is yet one of sweetness and sadness and joy, a fitting tribute to the mothers courage of Betty Shabazz.

R UBY D EE

The daughters Shabazz had the trials and triumphs of growing up with the legacy of two extraordinary parentsMalcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazza father of mythic stature and a mother of courage, determination, and accomplishment. In this sensitive and candid memoir, Ilyasah bears witness to her own life and reflects on the times and events that helped shape it. Hers is a story of faithreligious faith, faith in the bonds of family, and, despite cataclysmic tragedies that tested those beliefs, an unshakable faith in the future.

Professor D ERRICK B ELL
Author of Faces at the Bottom of the Well:
The Permanence of Racism

Ilyasah Shabazz offers a portrait of a husband, a father, a friend that breathes life into El Hajj Malik Shabazz, making him more than a poster on a college dormitory wall or a face on a T-shirt. She also allows the reader to stumble with her as she makes her own discovery of her father, through conversations with family and friends. And she does not hide her quiet tears over his absence. Ilyasah Shabazzs powerful but simply told story is a wonderful contribution to our history.

J ONETTA R OSE B ARRAS
Author of Whatever Happened to Daddys Little Girl?

Ms. Shabazz has written an important and moving tribute to her family. Perhaps her greatest homage to her illustrious fathers legacy is her uncanny ability to relate to her audience honestly. This book paints as clear an impression of Black family values as any ever written, and also reflects the pride of a child who knows she was raised right. Growing Up X might therefore be as important to America as her fathers autobiography.

Congresswoman S HEILA J ACKSON L EE (D-Texas)

Riveting Candid, intimate, and revealing.

The New York Amsterdam News

A One World Book
Published by The Random House Publishing Group

Copyright 2002 by Ilyasah Shabazz

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by One World Books, an imprint of
The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York,
and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.

One World and Ballantine are registered trademarks and
the One World colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.

www.oneworldbooks.net

Library of Congress Control Number: 2001012345

eISBN: 978-0-307-52913-8

v3.1

If I could have convinced more slaves that they were slaves, I would have freed thousands more.

H ARRIET T UBMAN

It is not my intention to rehash my fathers life. He has told his life story in the Autobiography of Malcom X, which you can read for details of his incredible journey. Growing Up X is simply an interpretation of my lifeone of six daughters of Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz.

O ne of the last times I saw Mommy whole and smiling and beautiful was Mothers Day of 1997.

I took her out to dinner at the Audubon Caf, along with my friend Kathy and her mother, whom I called Auntie Wilma. At the last minute, Mommy invited her friend Mary Redd to join us. We loved Auntie Redd as much as Mommy, but we had not expected her and so we were caught unprepared; we had no gift for her. As Mommy and Auntie Wilma began opening their presents, Mommy leaned over and whispered to me, Go find some flowers for Mary Redd. I dont want her to feel left out. Kathy and I flew out the door.

When we came back with the flowers, Mommy, true to form, tried to sneak me money. She insisted, but Im not her daughter for nothing; I told her to put her money back in her purse.

Afterward, Mommy took us to the site of the old Audubon Ballroom, which Columbia University was developing into a biotechnology research center. Mommy expressed her concerns about the promises that were not kept in making the center a real and living memorial to her husband, Malcolm X. She showed us the life-size bronze sculpture of Daddy downstairs and told us how she had wanted the artist to change the suit he was wearing because My husband didnt wear Armani. He wore single-breasted suits. He was conservative. (The artist, Ms. Gabriel Koren, changed the suit.) Then she took us upstairs to the ballroom and showed us the beautiful mural depicting Daddys life. She told us how she had instructed the artist, Mr. Daniel Galvez, to paint a bassinet in one area because her fourth baby, Gamilah, would feel left out if he did not. She also made sure the artist positioned the crescent and star on Daddys ring correctly. If youre gonna do something, do it right, she said, just the way shed said it a million times before. And for Gods sake, follow through.

It was a wonderful evening for me, spent in the physical presence of one of the most important people in my life and the spiritual presence of the other. When it was time to part, I kissed Mommy on the cheek and gave her a big hug.

Good night, Mommy. I love you. Happy Mothers Day.

Two weeks later, on the first day of June, I attended a play in Mount Vernon, New York, with my friend Crystal and her six-year-old daughter Nia. The play was Endangered Species by Judy Shepherd King and it was about how young people and their families can battle the scourge of the violence, drugs, and AIDS that is afflicting our communities.

It was a special event for me; in my capacity as director of public relations for the city of Mount Vernon, I had spent weeks courting press coverage for the event, and the turnout was great. Doug Watson of Black Entertainment Television was on hand, as were many other journalists. Overall, the event was a rousing success and I was pleased. At one point in the evening Doug pulled me aside and whispered he had just run into my mother and my nephew Malcolm at a nearby restaurant, The Bayou. They looked like they were having a good time, Doug said. I was sure they were; Mommy liked to enjoy herself when she could. Part of me wanted to sneak out and join them, but of course I couldnt leave.