On Saturday, my aunt gave me a book to read, by Sunday afternoon I was done with it. The book Color Me Butterfly by L.Y. Marlow is a wonderful book. This book is about four generations of physical, emotional, and mental abuse. Each woman dealt with their own version of abuse from the men in their lives and when they had children of their own, those children went through the same exact thing. Some not knowing what happened to their mother, and some experienced first hand what happened and yet the cycle still continued. This book had moments where you cried for the women and children, moments when you hated the person inflicting violence, moments where you hated the women for loving and wanting to give their already strained relationships a second, third and sometimes fourth chance and moments where you understood and were proud as if these women were in your family.


I, personally have never been in an abusive romantic relationship so I can't say what I would and wouldn't allow. I know alot of women have the idea that such things would "never" happen to them or that they would never condone a man hitting them. All that I can say about that is, "Never say Never".

What I can say is that my mother was once in a abusive relationship and it kinda ended like the limosine ride with Ike and Tina. He hit my mother but my mother jumped on him like a cougar and commenced to "beatin' dat azz". Sure she had a swollen eye and a busted lip, but so did he. She left him and never went back. My mother, however was highly abusive towards me in all ways; mentally, physically, verbally, emotionally. Mostly because she served a god that most do.. that god is alcohol and when she was under the influence alcohol told her how to act. I was also sexually abused when I was 6. I blocked it out of my head for so long that I didn't remember and when I got older had dreams and flashes of what happened and who it was. Any kind of abuse is wrong regardless of who it is.

For any woman that is going through a situation of abuse, I say please get help. If a man ever hits you, that is not love. If a man ever calls you out of your name and makes you feel inferior, that is not love. If a man ever makes you feel like you can't do better then him, that is not love. Ladies, love yourself enough to know that he has issues and those issues run so deep that you cannot save him. If he hits you one day and then returns to you with flowers, candy and a sad face telling you that he will never hit you again. He's lying. It will happen again. The abuse cycle varies but they are:

• Build-Up Phase - The tension builds.
  
• Stand-Over Phase - Verbal attacks increase.
  
• Explosion Phase - A violent outburst occurs.
  
• Remorse Phase - You shouldn't have pushed me, it was your fault!
  
• Pursuit Phase - It will never happen again, I promise.
  
• Honeymoon Phase - See, we don't have any problems!

If you have children and they are watching you get abused then your son's could possibly get older and think that is the way to treat a woman, and your girl's could grow up thinking that a man's love starts with his fist. We have got to end the cycle because the ending factor could be death.

In 2006, my cousin was fatally stabbed by her boyfriend and left to bleed to death on the kitchen floor in front of her 3 year old son and 18 month old daughter. She would have been 25 years old this year. R.I.P. Andrea Brown


National Domestic Violence Hotline: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233)