Grief is a natural response to loss1 . so impatient with our Black sisters’ natural response to loss when they are able to escape violent relationships? Response is a physical reaction to stimulus or a situation2. Loss is the fact or process of losing something or someone3. When a woman’s intimate partner dies, she has a loss of that relationship. When a woman’s intimate partner and her separate - regardless of the reason - she also has a loss. Why then do we seek to silence a Black woman’s natural response to the loss of a relationship from an abusive partner by shaming her for it? On August 30th every year, it is National Grief Awareness Day. This month, I want to give you permission to grieve and permission to allow others to grieve. Notice again the definition of loss, Beloved. How many times during a given day on a lesser level do we experience loss? We lose time in the morning because one of our kids won’t get up on time and we run late to something else. Loss - of time. A small one, granted, but one nonetheless. We lose one out of our favorite pair of socks after the laundry. Another small loss, but happening on the same day, two losses that day. We lose our job, a friend. Larger losses. Ones from which most of us rebound at some point, however, all losses described cause some sort of physical reaction - a response. Most people won’t criticize you for an irritable response to losing a sock from a unique pair. Most people won’t criticize you for a disappointed or even depressed response to losing a job or a friend. Why? Because it’s relatable. We feel like your response makes sense because our response would be similar. No one criticizes someone for a despondent response to the death of a loved one - especially an intimate partner. Why? Because it’s supposed to be the most important relationship in life and it is something that one usually does not cause and therefore usually causes sympathetic responses from others. Why? Because if we had to deal with that level of loss we would want people to show us compassion, sympathy, support. Let’s get back to the initial question then. If loss is something that simulates compassion from most humans for one another, in our community why are we Let’s look at the heart of what most of us believe, whether we’ve ever admitted this or not. We are afraid; yes, afraid. We are afraid that if she is focused on the loss, she will want to make the loss end and will go back to the dangerous relationship. Many of us saw firsthand the danger she was in, some of us have been there with her through it and have thought we might lose her at different times, some of us have even been a safe space for her to run to throughout this violence. We want to know if we are being “stupid” for being supportive because what if she’s just gonna go right back to him anyway? So we verbally shame4 her, stop speaking to/engaging with her, tell others not to engage with her, etc., thinking that if we stop the natural response to loss we will prevent her from going back to the violence. However, we’ve learned that loss causes a natural response to it and that response is grief. Grief can be accompanied by self blame5, loneliness6, desperation7, anger8, and just plain sadness9. Can we ever truly shame someone out of an emotion? No, Beloved. We can shame someone into hiding emotions, however. When we hide our emotions that accompany grief, that can be the most dangerous thing for the DV (domestic violence) survivor. Why? If she cannot share her emotions with safe people, she will begin to re-engage with the abuser who is probably already hoovering10 her. And just like the vortex created by a vacuum, if she cannot honestly talk through her emotions with us - her community, her family, her friends - for a moment she will find false acceptance and compassion with the abuser. And since abuse is about the abuser keeping power and control, and since her drifting further from his reach initially indicates a possible threat to that for him, she is now in danger of an escalation of his violence11. Escalations in an already abusive relationship can look like the following12, 13: • Increase of attempts to isolate • Increase of forms of isolation • Increased threats of violence to victim, or others loved by victim, or abuser themselves • Increase of anger intensity during violent episodes • Abuser expressing fantasies of murder 11
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