Florence Uwaeme
Dear Nigerian men, do not be blinded by the fact that you are male and that you are supposed to always be in charge and then refuse to walk away from your abusive partner. Do not for a second think of what people will say if you take a walk or even run away from your abusive partner. For it is you who wears the shoe and knows exactly where it pinches. It is you who dodges all the class cups thrown at you at every given provocation. It is you who goes through emotional breakdown due to lack of peace of mind. It is you who gets jittery whenever you remember that you’ll still be going home to face the same demon.
Dear Men, Please, choose you over everyone else. Choose you over what your family, neighbour’s, and friends will say. You have to always choose you because when you finally get maimed by your abusive partner, it is still you that would be stone dead. Those family, friends and neighbours will cry for a week or two, then they will forget about you. The world will move on within you. Some of those friends and family members that advised you to be a man by staying put in that abusive union will blame you when you die.
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Do not say that you built the house so she should be the one leaving. That would be a great risk to take because she will never leave. Instead of putting your life on the line because of a property that can be replaced, forgo that house, forgo that property and save yourself first. Do you not know that you are someone’s child? Do you not care about them enough to save yourself? Do you not know the agony your sudden departure would cause them? Do not allow the expectations of the society or your religious inclinations send you to an early grave. You are the one that will cease from living here on earth.
You don’t have to prove your masculinity to anybody by remaining in an abusive relationship. A dead dog is better than a dead lion. You are human first of all and your life does matter. Leave I beg of you. Run and never look back. You deserve happiness. You deserve the peace of mind. And only you can give that to yourself. Take a walk.
