When you’re a child, you learn that family includes your parents and your siblings then as you grow older you realize that your family also includes cousins, aunts, and uncles. You’re taught that family is who you spend a lot of time with. You spend the holidays with family and even have yearly family reunions. This is your blood family and these people are important. They come first. They have your back. They teach and guide you. They love you.
Or that’s the way it’s “supposed” to be but sometimes, your blood family is not your family at all and you’re left convinced that you don’t have a family. You are alone to face this world without a “home”.
A family can be defined in many ways and almost every person has their own view and definition of families. Some may define it simply as the blood relatives they have grown up with, living in the same home for most of their life. Whereas others, including myself, have a much more in depth or personable definition. No matter the culture or living situation, my definition of a family is the people I know will be there for me whenever I need them to be. This includes not only my actual blood related siblings, parents, grandparents and cousins but also my best friends and even some of my parents’ close friends that I have known the majority of my life.
But to me, family should not be defined by blood; a family can be defined as a person or people who make an effort to make sure that you are doing okay. They prove to you that they will always be an important part of your life, and that you will never be alone when you need someone the most. Family is an important factor in life, these people can help determine what type of person you will be. They help shape you into becoming an amazing person. They do not necessarily have to be blood to be a part of your family. They could just be a major aspect of your life. These people could be complete and total strangers to you at first, but if they demonstrate that they will help improve your life, they should be considered family. These people display many characteristics that will help benefit you in many ways.
In our world today, we hear different stories of fathers raping and getting their daughters pregnant while the mother look the other way. We see brothers having carnal knowledge of their sisters, fathers sodomizing their sons. Uncles or Aunties sexually abusing their nephews and nieces. These are relatives who are supposed to protect and guide you and show love to you. I was speaking to a friend who told me she had neither visited her home or spoken to any member of her family for the past seven years. She was about 16 years when her father started having carnal knowledge of her body and it continued for about three years before she finally decided never to return ‘home’ again. He did it countless times and he told her he was doing the right thing and that he did not want boys outside to teach her. When her mother eventually got him in the act, he threatened to leave and divorce if she made a fuss about it.
How about the case of a boy who was raped by his uncle? He was living with his Uncle and his family at that because his parents travelled to MECCA and within the three weeks period he was with them, the Uncle would sneak into his room with an extra key and sodomize him. He threatened to kill his mother and dad if dared say anything to anyone. You can imagine the kind of trauma the buy went through at that age. Till today his parents did not know what happened to him, they do not know why their once gentle and religious son prefers men to ladies.
##To be Continued
##EMBA 28
##Annabel Nzegbule
It is the Hope that Kills You