“You should have stopped him way before he got to this point.”
—Gilda, in the movie For Colored Girls
I have never been in a physically abusive relationship. I’ve never cowered in fear because of a dinner served cold, a misspoken word, or because my dress was not to his liking. I can’t imagine a fear so crippling that I can’t leave, can’t cry for help, or just pick up a bottle and fight back, but I know there is fear just like that in other women’s worlds, and unfortunately their children are often the bigger victims of that fear.
A woman chooses her mate, good or bad, but a child in an abusive household never had a choice. A child beaten unmercifully because he won’t stop crying, because he soiled the bed, or because he won’t eat broccoli has no choice. He can only look to others to protect him and in a home where there is an abusive male the first person the child looks to for protection is the abused mother.
In the movie For Colored Girls, Phylicia Rashad’s character Gilda spoke the most heart-wrenching words I have ever heard in the movies concerning abuse: “You should have stopped him way before it got to this point.” The “point” being before he killed her children. Maybe it is easier said than done but it has to be done. You, the mother are the first and sometimes only line of defense for that child who cannot protect himself.
I can’t and won’t judge any woman in an abusive relationship because I know there are many variables that have gotten her there. It does, however, make me a little prickly when her abuse is turned on the child. Many women stand by in fear while their husbands or boyfriends terrorize their entire household—cursing, hitting, traumatizing the weakest people in the home: the babies. In 2010, is it still so hard to walk away from a “man” so weak that he would do the most horrific things to your child? About a year ago there was a case here in Rhode Island (even though they are numerous all over the country) where a woman’s boyfriend beat her three-year-old son to death while she was at work and he was babysitting. She claimed not to know her boyfriend was physically abusing the boy, yet there were other incidents of documented abuse. The state charged her with neglecting to protect her own child. There was some outrage for those who sympathized with her because of her abuse but there was much more outrage on behalf of the murdered child. I have no doubt she was abused by her boyfriend but why did she choose to leave her child with this monster while she was at work all day?
Gilda: You have to take responsibility for your role in this
Crystal: Are you saying this is my fault?
That scene broke my heart but it was the most honest and humbling words ever spoken to an abused woman who stood by and suffered the greatest loss I could ever imagine because she did nothing. The deaths of those children were not all on his shoulders but hers as well.
I don’t have an answer for abuse other than to run and run fast away from it, if not for yourself but for the child that rested in your belly peacefully for nine months. For the child who, no matter how rich or poor you are, looks at you like you are a superhero. Be that superhero.
