Her Sides

Spotlight on Yejide Kilanko Q: Tell us a little about yourself I was born in Ibadan, Nigeria, as the first of five children. I attended Federal Girls’ Government College, Onitsha and studied Political Science at the University of Ibadan. In the year 2000, I joined my husband in the United States and stayed home to raise our children. After we moved to Canada in 2004, I went back to university and got my social work degrees. My day job is as a long-term therapist in children’s mental health. Q: Let’s go to how it all started. When did you discover the writer in you? I was about 12 years old when I started writing. I’m an emotional person and I quickly found out it was the best way for me to express myself.  Q: What inspired you to write? I started reading quite early and I fell in love with words. Q: How did you start writing, was it just poems, short stories or books? What did you first write? Poetry.

Take a walk with me This life changing experience started when I was a freshman in college. Everything was seemingly going on as planned, or so I thought until something way bigger than I had imagined occurred and turned my life around. I went home for the weekend to spend sometime with my family. Just as I was about leaving the house the Water Corporation tanker came up to the house to supply water. The way it worked was we would bring out empty barrels and they would fill it up with water and we carry them back into the house. I figured it was one more thing to do before leaving the house so I decided to help my folks in filling the empty water barrels. I was almost done, when I slipped and landed on my right knee , just by the barrel of water inside the house. I immediately felt excruciating pains shoot up my body and I screamed out for help. My dad ran towards me, coming to my rescue. He had a friend visiting at that time and they helped me up; but I couldn't sta...