LETTER TO MY FUTURE DAUGHTER PT. 2

BEING IN AN ABUSIVE RELATIONSHIP

Dear Future Daughter,

How is her health now, hope she is responding to treatment? Who could have done such a thing to a fellow human being. All in the name of being in a relationship. Indeed, this is man inhumanity to man. Those photos of her were gory as they were obscene. I lost my appetite for days after seeing them. The notion of abusive relationship contradicts love itself. How can love cause so much FEAR?

There are some problems that people bear for life, some sort of burden. Marrying an abusive man is one of them. You'll endure the marriage. Marriage is not suppose to be endured, it ought to be enjoyed. He flares up at every slight provocation, he has anger management issues. He suffers from aggressive behavior. Anger management is the ability to understand signs that you are getting angry. He needs to calm down and deal with the situation in a positive way. An abusive partner is not one who only engage in physical battery of the other, it also includes using abusive words on your partner. It includes damaging personal properties. He flares up sporadically. He shouts at you, threatens you, being excessively possessive of you. He puts you down by constantly comparing you unfavourably with others. He physically and sexually violates you. He isolates you from family and friends, mostly with unruly behavior. This can subject you to perpetual physical and emotional harm. You begin argy-bargying with yourself, You start to think that the abusive behaviour of your partner is your fault. You feel there is something you are not doing right, maybe, just maybe. It is a common feeling, but it is important to know that you're never to blame for another person's behaviour.

Today, he whips you with belt, tomorrow when you finally tie the nuptial knot with him, he may use a knife. A good relationship begins with a good choice of partner. So does a good marriage. If you don't feel someone is the right person for you, better not date that person. Marriage is a critical decision. Your marriage partner must not be a reckless choice. If you can't accept the man or woman in front of you, don't go into marriage. Deal with facts. You should always deal with facts in your relationship, not wishful thinking. Do not go into marriage with someone you will live with in fear. Do not go into marriage hoping he'll change, you are not a gambler, and even if you were, do not gamble in marriage. Especially when the peace you enjoy during courtship is deciduous. An abusive relationship is like a vehicle with flat tyres, it gets you no where. Except frequent visits to the hospital for regular stitches of course. Eventually, it will crash. You either give up on the marriage or you give up the ghost. Better to have a broken engagement than to have a broken marriage.

Click here to read LETTER TO MY FUTURE DAUGHTER PT. 1 (PARENTAL PREFERENCE)

Partner choice determines outcomes, flavours and progressions. Just think of the bonding of various chemicals. Some are toxic, some obnoxious, some volatile, some wonderful. If he’s not right for you or you’re not right for each other, the relationship has taken on issues before commencement. A bad partnership combination filled with hope is an anger fuelling bitter memory in the making. And that’s how the strange philosophy of “the reality of marriage” comes to being.

That philosophy propounds that the dream of happiness and romantic bliss in marriage is a fantasy of the unrealistic. That the “reality of marriage” is in actuality full of misery, difficulties, fights and unhappiness. Those who propound this theory are often those seeking accommodation with the consequences of wrong-headed choices. The “reality of marriage” philosophy comes from bad experience, frustrated dreams, difficult hope, sadness. We’ve come to accept this philosophy by default. It’s why some say it doesn’t matter who you marry, just marry! Such philosophy is obtuse. It does matter who you get married to. If your boyfriend is a serial cheat for example, you can’t complain of unfaithfulness in marriage if you go ahead with it (volentis non fit injuria). The signs were there, but you chose to ignore the facts. He already showed you he wasn’t going to be faithful. What usually happens is that some people take on the mantle of messiah, seeking to “save” their partners. And they seek to prove their goodness by insisting on pursuing marriage to someone who’ll bring them sorrow. These are insistent do-gooders who want the praise of the world for marrying the wrong man. There’s some psychological reward they get for insisting on going into marriage with someone with questionable tendencies. Having been rewarded for bad behavior, the man of course continues with those morals and they begin to suffer. Having forgiven so much, they then get annoyed at discovery of one more instance of cheating after marriage. They become frustrated, terribly frustrated. Their character changes. They’re angry. The reason they’re angry is because they feel they should be rewarded with fidelity for enduring so much. They feel the man should reward them for overlooking the past and ignoring the facts of infidelity during courtship. That kind of marriage is essentially over. The condition precedent needed to make it successful is out of the woman’s control. The marriage can only work if the man reforms, and the woman can’t control that factor. It’s up to the man.

When the success of a marriage is dependent on reformation of a partner’s character that’s a difficult one. Why marry a thief hoping for reformation of character? What if he refuses to reform? What becomes of the marriage?

Click here to read LETTER TO MY FUTURE DAUGHTER PT. 1 (PARENTAL PREFERENCE)

Being in an abusive relationship is not thesame as partners having quarrels once in a while in their relationship. But both know the quarrel has nothing to do with their commitment to each other. That commitment is non negotiable because they truly and genuinely love each other. That non negotiable commitment is a “fundamental irreducible.” Nothing can touch it. Their union is off limits, even to themselves. They know they’ll always get back together after a quarrel, because they want each other, need and can’t do without each other. Their relationship is not to be negotiated. That is a resolution. Unfortunately, it is not the same thing in this case. Your friend's partner has probably beaten that commitment out of her. She no longer have friends, people who can really understand what she is going through. Excceot of course, her psychiatrist, her pharmacist and her therapist. She needs someone she can really admit the reality of what she's going through to. But what is her family members doing about this? For a man who has not perfected the marriage rites yet to be treating her this way. Forgive me, this is not abuse but battery.

Your desperation for love, affection and partnership should not be an invitation to your selpucher. Even if he hides such tendencies from you during courtship, in marriage, it will always elicit. Your own safety must come first. Do not buy into this "for better for worse" mantra. Yes, how about the "to love and protect till death do us part" vows? You must stay safe, not for your sake only, but for your children as well. No religion should justify subjecting an individual to such obnoxious treatment. Of what good will it do your children if he beats you to death? Death by hanging for him will not recoup your life that has been lost. And those children you are considering now will become orphans eventually. No one will rescue you, you need to rescue yourself.

If you don't want to be a newspaper headline, run before he kills you.

Love,
Your Daddy,
Aluzu Ebikebuna Augustine.
07068639696 (SMS only)