One thing I have never managed to figure out is why we allow ourselves to stay in horrible relationships-all out of the name of love. Yes, I don’t believe in love but if I did, I know it would be anything but that.
I blame our parents. Yes; how original of me to blame our adult life choices on the time our parents didn’t give us a hug that one Tuesday morning.
Psychology claims that the relationships we have with our parents determines the relationships we’ll have with other people. This isn’t too far-fetched as I’ve yet to meet a promiscuous person who has a positive relationship with both their parents and who is void of any childhood trauma. Now this doesn’t mean that every person who can’t keep their clothes on has issues; some people just can’t keep their clothes on.
Nonetheless, I digress. So how do our parents affect our love lives? Well, they don’t. Not exactly. Their marriage, union, agreement is what affects our love lives. African culture has a man as the head of the house. This doesn’t make as much sense now as it did then. Then the women didn’t leave the house. Then women couldn’t wear pants let alone hold a job. Then their sole purpose was to procreate. This mantra was instilled, consciously or unconsciously, into our parents’ minds so- it’s not their fault.
I hope I haven’t lost you. I’m about to make my point.
So, with the man being the head of the house and essentially holding all the cards not just in the relationship but in both their lives- they can do whatever the hell they want. And so they do. They beat. They drink. And they sleep with anything that has legs. Granted, women of our parents generation weren’t necessarily awarded the opportunities that we are now. Their prom nights were basically their bridal showers as they were married soon after.
As children, we watch these relationships unfold. We go from hating our fathers for not treating our mothers as the queens they are, to resenting our mothers for being submissive and tolerating their BS. Despite it all, you knew that your parents loved each-other. No matter how many times your father stayed out late or your mother screamed at the top of her lungs, you knew that there was love shared between them. And that’s where the problem comes in.
Whether they can admit it, mothers are somewhat responsible for the idea that the amount of sh!t a woman takes from a man equates to how much she loves him.
When a man is in an unhealthy relationship… Heck, when his partner is accused of not being able to cook or clean properly, the man is encouraged to leave the relationship, so why aren’t women afforded the same courtesy?
Today women have options. Back then, women probably stayed with their philandering husbands because they didn’t possess the skills that would allow them to take care of their children. Not that that’s a legitimate reason to stay in a tumultuous marriage but again; I digress. Women today are educated and successful as hell, so they don’t need a caregiver, they need a partner in crime. They don’t have to stay with a guy just because he can take care of her and the kids simply because she can do that all by herself. However, for some reason she doesn’t know that. Or maybe she simply refuses to see it.
A relationship like that doesn’t just affect the girl. Granted, she’ll grow up to either do everything she can to keep her man happy, regardless of how he treats her. She could grow up to despise men and grossly resent both her parents. Then again, she could also grow up and know what she deserves and not bother with relationships simply out of loneliness and wait for the one that’ll treat her right. Men can also be affected. They can either grow up to view women as commodities and do everything to instill their dominance, or they could grow up to treat women how they wish their mothers had been treated. They can also grow up to be belittled in their relationships because they want their partner to feel empowered – something their mothers never felt.
The ride or die mantra had been drilled into your mothers and aunts, and it unconsciously passed down into our generation. If you stay with a man that treats you like anything less than gold – your daughter, niece, cousin and sister will see this and soon adopt it into their lifestyle. Before you know it, they’ll be another statistic, and you’ll find yourself asking why didn’t she just leave him instead of trying to figure out why you haven’t left.
So; are you really staying together for the kids?
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