I am strongly disturbed by the story about Michelle Obama’s documented and scientifically proven connection to the horrors of slavery. According to several news sources, First Lady, Michelle Obama’s great-great-great grandmother, Melvinia Shields, was a slave who was impregnated by an unknown white man. Michelle Obama’s story is a classic American slave story of mixed heritage that connect white and black Americans.

Melvinia Shield's story hurts because it reminds me of the story that my mother told me when I was a little girl about how her grandmother, was raped by the white landowner whom they rented their home from.

My mother said that each month when the white landowner would come to collect rent from her grandparents; a part of the deal was that my great-grand mother was required to have sex with the white landowner. She said that she remembers several times when the white land owner would come to collect rent and everyone else was required to go outside of the house while the white landowner had sex with her grandmother.

My mother said that her grandfather, my great-grand father, would sit under the apple tree in the front yard, cry and drink whiskey from a bottle, while he clutched his bible. My mother said that it would take a week for her grandparents to have the courage to look each other in the eyes again because of the shame and humiliation that they put up with to put food on the table.

I have a white boyfriend that I have been dating for over 13 years. Before we started dating, we were just friends who complained about our pending divorce and legal issues. Then one day he asked me out on a date and I told him no. I told him that I could never ever ever see myself dating a white man because he could never understand or respect my culture as an African American Woman.

He did not flinch. He moved his hand off of mine and respectfully said okay. He asked if we could continue to be friends. I said okay. After several months of hanging out as friends, I had completed my second master’s degree and he wanted to take me out to celebrate my accomplishment. He treated me to a really fancy restaurant and we had a good time.

I thanked him for the fabulous meal as he got out of my car. He closed the car door and began to walk away. He came back to the car and motioned for me to let down my window. He leaned over the window of my car and began to sob as he said, “I messed up! I messed up! I don’t know if I can do this. I am so in love with you. I have loved you since the very first time I laid eyes on you and you are never going to love me back because I am a white. I can’t sleep; I can’t concentrate on my job; I can’t help my son with his homework -- because I can only think of you.”

My white boyfriend melted the frozen ice of slavery, Jim Crow, and the Civil Rights Movement from my trodden heart. I began to cry. I got out of the car and I hugged and kissed him and we have been together ever since. Neither one of us have ever dated outside of our race. He is not a cool white boy who is trying to act black and I am not a wanna-be-white-girl or black woman who is so “power-to-the-people-black” that she thinks that her hair doesn’t need a perm. We are both stereotypically represent our race.

Both of our fathers were extreme racists. When I tried to tell my dad that I was dating a white man, my daddy said, “I would much rather see you bring home a dog than a white man. Why would you want to be with somebody who has had their foot on the necks of every race of God’s children? There is not one race you can name that the white man didn’t try to exploit, rape, and kill.”

My father was born in 1911, three years before Harriett Tubman died, and he went on to tell me how black people were not allowed in Tiger Stadium and how he would wake up in the morning and see his friends hanging from a lynching post this still stands in the deep rural south.

Now this is going to sound really weird, I always thought that being with a white man would take me away from my African roots, but this relationship has proved to be the exact opposite. My white boyfriend, would frequently put his hand next to mine and in awe, talk about the richness of my dark skin color; unlike the black skid mark jokes that I grew up being called from my own people. He tells me all the time that I am the most beautiful woman in the world to him and he values my opinions about everything.

Maybe Michelle Obama’s great- great-great grandmother, Melvinia Shields was probably raped by a white man like so many other Blacks in America, but the beauty of her story is to remind America that even from the most brutal pain—good can come from it. Michelle Obama is the first African American first lady, and I loved her the first time I saw her on television. We not only share the same skin tone but the same historical plot with a different story line.