Color Me Butterfly

One of the leading questions that always pop up whenever I’m speaking to a group is a question that undoubtedly is in search of a very keen answer… perhaps an answer to bring sense to something that seems senseless.

Why Do Women Stay? lurks at the tip of every person’s tongue.  Why? they are desperate to know.  And even though the question is intended as an inquisition in general, oftentimes, I can’t help but wonder if they are searching for an answer to their own struggles.

When I first started speaking to groups, I struggled with this very question and its elusive answer.  I gave every scientific, pompous answer trying to explain cause or cure.  After all, I often wondered why did I stay?  Why did my mother stay?  Why did my grandmother stay?  Why does my daughter, to this very day, continue to stay?  I too, sought the answer to this question and I’d struggled with it for a long, long time.  Then as I began to speak to women from all walks of life, the answer though slowly, but consistently was revealed as more and more women came to me and confided some of the most sensitive, dismal realities of their personal experiences.  I’d come to understand that the answer spawned from a four letter word.  The answer:  FEAR.  Women stay out of Fear.  Fear about her own and her children’s safety if she leaves.  Fear of raising her children on her own.  Fear of the shame, humiliation and embarrassment she’d encounter when the truth is revealed to her friends and family.  Fear of not being believed when she finally reveals the truth.  Fear of starting over.   Fear of being alone.  Fear that she can not cope on her own.  Fear of breaking up her family – wanting so desperately for the children to have their father.  Fear of being disloyal.  Fear that if she leaves, who else will rescue and change him.  Fear of him making good on his threat to harm himself.  Fear of losing her identity because her identity is attached to him.  Fear of letting go of the only self preservation that she has gained through him.  And finally, Fear of the UNKNOWN.

F.E.A.R.  That four letter word begets so much power:  the power to make a difference in how a woman chooses to live her life.   The power to choose whether she can and will find the courage to let go.  The power to sometimes choose between life and death. 

It came as no surprise when I finally understood the meaning behind this word FEAR; because when I dissected it and really, I mean really understood its power, I also came to understand that it’s not as simple as it seems.  No woman, I believe, wants to stay.   Every woman, given the choice, would undoubtedly choose to live a healthy, happy and joyful life.  But for so many, that choice is too far fetched because it’s shrouded by a word that is capable of moving mountains in her life.  A word that supersedes all that she has come to understand.  A word that has garnered a new respect from me.  Nonetheless a word that I’ve also come to realize has only as much power as I am willing to give to it.  The more I came to understand the meaning and power behind the word FEAR, the more I was able to minimize its power.  I came to understand that this word can only have as much power as I am willing to impart to it.  So though fear sits at the hem of why women stay, I also believe that every women has the power to annihilate fear and make the choice to have a better life.