Relationships and family lives are often glossed up by society and the media as though that is the reality for everyone, yet if we really held the mirror closer against our own society, a disturbing picture of abuse and sometimes violent reality emerges. In the midst of all this are children, who in the absence of any structured and meaningful love and guidance at home, go on to develop mal-adaptive behaviors that will shape their lives and personalities as they develop.
In turn parents may develop poor, authoritative parenting skills, or plain abuse and neglect as the ripple effect of this trauma begins to manifest itself into complex family problems. Some of the effects of this trauma will have lifetime effects and reproduce themselves in future generations.
Over the years I have heard comments such as ‘why doesn’t she just leave’ or stereotypical comments such as ‘that’s how African men treat women.’ Some of these comments are silent; some come from within ourselves, and some from within our own African communities. Although there is a wide body of initiatives and guidelines to further our knowledge on domestic violence, in fact very little is known or has been explored about the context in which African women and men suffer domestic violence.
