Color Me Butterfly

What, I can’t help but wonder, has our world come to when we turn on CNN, or Fox News, or our local news channel and learn about the remains of a 26-year old pregnant young mother who’s been found slain in a national park.

I can’t even begin to describe the sorrow in my heart when I heard the news of Jessie Marie Davis and her unborn daughter Chloe; and then of Bobby Cutts, Jr., the father of Jessie’s two-year old son Blake and suspected father of Chloe, and that he had been arrested and arraigned on two counts of murder. 

And it didn’t stop there . . .  Just a few short days later, police found Nancy Benoit and her 7-year old son Daniel along with the hanged body of pro wrestler Chris Benoit, Nancy’s husband and Daniel’s father, in their suburban Atlanta, Georgia home.  The police suspect murder-suicide.

And still, it didn’t stop there because earlier this month, Christopher Vaughn, was charged with eight counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of his 34-year old wife Kimberly and their three children Abigayle (12), Cassandra (11) and Blake (8).  Kimberly and her three children’s bodies were found on June 14 in the family’s SUV parked on a service road, about 40 miles outside of Chicago.  Kimberly was shot once and the children were shot twice.

I just can’t fathom – wrap my mind around – the idea, that a person can become so twisted in their thoughts that they find the strength and justification to murder and kill their own family.  What, I ask again, has our world come to?

As our nation ponder and take in the terror of these three families, I can only hope that in a few short weeks, when the dust began to settle, and the next big NEWS thing that tend to catapult something like this to the back of our minds, that these women and their children will not be forgotten. . . that justice will not just prevail in the courtrooms, but in our communities and societies . . .  that we will take a stand, once and for all, and raise our voices in unison and say NO MORE!  No more can we allow for women and children to fall victim to this type of terror and we do nothing about it except become mesmerized by its news, and stone-faced with no action.

This is, in no uncertain terms, terror before our eyes; a kind of terror that must be brought to legal, cultural and social justice.

It should come as no surprise to us that women are physical, emotional creatures.  Our self worth is oftentimes defined by our emotional intelligence.  Well, in some cases, it’s emotional unintelligence – an intelligence that sometimes makes us put others first before we put our own well being first.

I say this not to judge or come across as being better than any other woman; but because I am part of the we.  I have lived and learned a life by experience.  A life where my self worth was wrapped around someone else.  A life where I often ignored my own needs in lieu of the needs of another.  A life where I have found myself stuck in the perils of an abusive relationship.  I certainly can attest to the ‘L’ word – I”ve loved, I’ve lost, and I’ve learned . . . the hard way.

In the better part of my life, I found what I thought was ‘love’.  I’ve been in relationships where I’ve experienced every kind of ‘love pain’ that one could imagine.  I’ve been slapped, punched, kicked, thrown, and made to feel less than an ant.  I’ve been at a place where self worth wasn’t even a word in my dictionary.  Self what?  I often wondered.  There was no ‘self’ anything.  Just a broken young woman who hid her bruises and her shame.

Oftentimes, the ‘L’ word comes at a price.  It is a ransom that has the power to break a woman’s body and soul in half.  A ransom that we sometimes are willing to pay for the sake of love.  Or at least what we’ve convinced ourselves love is.  It took me many, many, many years to find my self worth and once I took the time to pick up and mend the broken pieces within me, it was at this point that I was able to find ‘true love.’  You see . . . the ‘L’ word is more than about that wonderful fuzzy feeling we get in the deepest places of our heart.  It’s more than about feeling a tickle of lust.  It’s more than just about having ‘a man’.  It’s about learning to love and value YOU first and when you learn to love and value you first, then you will undoubtedly find the true ‘L’ word.  A word that is deserving of YOU!

I was just sixteen-years old the first time my eye was blackened, my lip split.  The culprit?  My seventeen-year old boyfriend who had rammed his fist into my face because he thought I was cheating on him with another boy.  Not true.  But by the time he folded me in his arms and begged for forgiveness, the swelling was already rising.

That was many, many, many years ago and that is something that, still to this day, haunts me.  My bruised face and broken pride, is, today, the bruised face and broken pride of many young teens and women.  They are teens and young women who have not even earned enough miles on their young lives to know who or what they are capable of becoming; but whom have traveled a dark and dingy road – a road that is no less traveled – one that holds a horrible truth.  What truth? You wonder.  The truth that young women ages 16 to 24 years old experience the highest rate of domestic violence and abuse.

Recently I spoke to a group of teen girls and boys, an event that was hosted by Girls, Inc. in Philadelphia.  At this event, I divided the room into two groups:  one group was asked to discuss and make an argument for why they felt girls were as responsible for a relationship as boys; the other group was asked to discuss the opposite:  why boys were as responsible for a relationship as girls.  No sooner than the young women and men moved to their sides of the room, they were already contemplating their arguments.  The result?  Some very moving, honest and real accounts about why they felt a boy or girl holds the key to how good or bad a relationship turns out.  One young man (check him out in my ‘Author’s Event Photos’) went on to say that he felt that girls are just as responsible for a relationship because they are very aggressive when it comes to dating and making choices about who they want to be with.  They can be very fast, he went on to explain.  They sometimes prefer the bad boy image, another teen added.  Fast.  Bad Boy Image.  These are very powerful statements, so powerful that it forces us to give credence to what this means.  It simply means that girls often end up in a bad and/or abusive relationship because they put themselves there.  Would you agree?  I do.

Why do I agree.  I agree because I, having experienced my first account of domestic abuse at the tender age of sixteen; and later raised a young daughter who also found herself in the perils of a similar relationship, in hindsight, now realize that my daughter and I shared equal responsibility for the choices we made.  No longer am I embarrassed to say that I, too, embraced that bad boy image and that I was fast.  Fast in the sense that I was eager to date this person knowing full well (having witnessed it early on) that this was not going to turn out to be a good thing.

It breaks my heart to know that young women who haven’t even driven a car yet, or thought about college yet, or contemplated their life’s worth yet – have embarked on a road no less traveled – a road where they are gripped by the arms of an abusive relationship.

With stats that suggests that 52% of teen girls are currently involved in ongoing abusive relationships, this population of young women is fast on the trail of a road no less traveled.  And it is my hope that we will pave a new road for these young girls and women – young girls and women, whom I hope someday will be at the forefront of our society.

I sat with knots in my stomach, gripped by the arms of reality as I watched the video that Oprah shared with the world.  The one where Susan Still sat on a bed, her arms raised across her face and head, protecting herself from the fierce blows that came at her; the ones where her thirteen-year old son stood propped behind a camera, while Ulner Lee Still, Susan’s now ex-husband stood atop her – scouring blows and berating her:  telling her how “stupid” and what a “dumb heifer” she was.  My heart swelled with grief.

As I watched, I was reminded of the horrible times and stories that my mother and grandmother shared with me; and about similar circumstances when I was just seventeen-years old, my arms raised protecting my face and head, my eyes cowering to the ground, afraid to look at him for fear that another blow was imminent.  I was reminded of a time my mother shared with me about when she was a young wife and mother, forced to walk down the street by her husband’s side – facing a stoned wall as he threatened to kill her if she were to even look at another – let alone another man.  “He didn’t have to worry about me looking at no one,” my mother shared.  “My face was so battered that I was too ashamed to look anyone in the eye.”  I was reminded of a time when my grandmother lay vulnerable and powerless as my grandfather herald strikes that were capable of breaking a small woman in half – tampering her body, her mind, her soul. 

Susan Still’s raised arms – are the raised arms of many women.  Women who may raise their arms in self-defense or raise them in shame.   The same shame that Susan endured for many, many years.  The same shame that my grandmother, my mother, myself and my daughter, absorbed for 60+ years.  A shame that too many women carry every day because they simply can't muster the courage, the power nor the strength to raise their arms and say no more! 

My heart goes out to Susan and her family.  I am proud of her for finally finding the courage to take a stance, raise her arms, and say no more.  No more would she allow herself and her children to fall victim any longer.  And just as Susan was brave enough to raise her arms, we as a society need to raise our arms in unison.  Raise them for every woman or child who fall victim daily to the vicious cycle of domestic violence and abuse.  Raise them to our constituents in the government, private, and public sectors and encourage them to raise their voices in putting an end to domestic violence and abuse.  Raise them to our families, communities and friends and ask them to join in the fight against a plague that is soon becoming one of the worst epidemics in our world.

The next time you or someone you know encounters domestic violence and abuse, I implore you – beg you, to find the hope, the courage, the strength to raise your arms -- and say NO MORE!