BLACK WOMEN--HOW WE CONTRIBUTE TO THE CYCLE OF ABUSE

I know you probably read the title to this and rolled your eyes.  I know you're probably like--here we go again.  Another person ready to dog out the black woman!  Well, thanks for clicking anyway.  And if you continue reading you will see that although some of my words may sting a little bit but it is the sting of truth.

So, a little while ago I wrote about Intimate Partner Abuse.  As black people this is so prevalent in our relationships we don't even recognize it.  And no I'm not just talking about physical abuse, although this is a big deal.  I'm talking about verbal abuse, mental and emotional abuse and financial abuse.  Now, there may be a small population of women thinking to themselves, "I've never been abused" and you may be right but look around.  What about your friends, family members, co-workers, church members, and neighbors--I promise you won't have to look hard to find someone that has dealt with abuse on some level.

As I explained in my last post, "Why Don't You Just Leave Him?--Domestic Violence in the Black Community" When I was younger I used to watch those Lifetime movies all the time where the husband beat his wife, and I always asked myself "why don't she just leave him?".  As I got older and I begin to see some of my friends and peers be involved in abusive relationships I begin to ask the same question.  I really didn't understand.  It wasn't until I found myself involved with someone who I thought was PERFECT that I slowly started to understand the complicated dynamics of abusive relationships.

With Black women it is slightly different.  We see a lot more violence and abuse than other groups of women.  In fact, "statistics show that Black women are two and half more likely to be murdered by men than their white counterparts.  Black women also experience significantly higher rates of psychological abuse--including humiliation, insults, name-calling, and coercive control--than do women overall." It is because of this that in some cases we are more accepting of violence.

Being in an abusive relationship changes you.  I never realized how much it could change you until it was to late.  First of all let me say this: If you've been in an abusive relationship I suggest that you take the time to see a therapist.  A lot of times we as Black people go through major life changing traumatic events and never take the time to talk to anyone about it.  We end one abusive relationship only to enter another relationship without taking the time to check up on our mental health.

If you seek out help first before entering another relationship you can express things such as, how being in an abusive relationship changes your life.  It does--and we have to acknowledge that.  We cannot change what we don't take the time to acknowledge.

When I think about an abused person I'm reminded of how an abused dog behaves.  A dog that has been starved of affection, food, and beaten and yelled at, and berated-- is a changed dog.  Even if it gets a new owner it still doesn't change the fact that it was once abused.  A rescued dog is either timid or aggressive.

This is how we as women behave sometimes in new relationships if we were once abused and now

find ourselves with new partners, friends or boyfriends.  We're jumpy so every time the new flame makes a move that reminds us of the abusive partner we will either cower or become defensive.

Sometimes we can turn into the abusers.  Abuse comes in many forms--physical, emotional, financial and sexual.  Although women can most definitely fall into every last one of these categories I would like to especially talk about emotional abuse.

"Emotional abuse is an attempt to control, in just the same way that physical abuse is an attempt to control another person.  The only difference is that the emotional abuser does not use physical, hitting, kicking, pinching, grabbing, pushing, or other physical forms of harm.  Rather the perpetrator of emotional abuse uses emotion as his/her weapon of choice."

Most of the time, as women, we are not aware of how we can be emotionally abusive.  Sometimes our feelings of insecurity translates as cheating and then we may falsely accuse men of cheating, blame them for our own personal unhappiness, constantly check voice and text messages.  "The accusations, the blame, and the constant checking up are forms of emotional abuse."

It took me awhile to see and understand the ways in which we as women can play a role in the cycle of abuse.  I had to look very closely at my past actions after I left my abusive partner.  Things that I noticed was a lot of yelling (which is not technically abuse because everyone yells in the heat of an argument), "but screaming at someone hysterically in an emotional verbal assault is considered to be emotional abuse."

The danger in continuing in this destructive cycle is that it is never-ending.  Emotional abusers continue to berate, verbally bash, and criticize everyone they become romantically involved with.  But it doesn't just stop there--emotional abusers affect the lives of everyone around them--their children, friends, family members, co-workers...etc.

I hear Black women being described as loud, aggressive, over-bearing, not really good listeners and the list goes on and on, but when you think about all of the things we have to endure.  We are constantly criticized for everything.  We are criticized for things other races are praised for--it's unfair but it's facts!  I can honestly say that this may be where a lot of frustration comes from with Black women.

The problem with this is sometimes when you have a lot of anger or frustration stored up it comes up and out at the wrong time and the wrong place.  It's like the wounded and abused dog example--the dog may end up getting a better and loving owner who may get attacked just for helping.  This happens a lot of times when we leave one abusive relationship and then get into another one.  That new person has every intention of treating us better but because we've been hurt, mistreated and yes abused we may come off as abusive ourselves. 

The moral of the story is this: we each have to evaluate ourselves and ask ourselves why "we" ended up in abusive relationships, and why did we stay?