“Why are so many “STRONG”Black Women Single?”

Well bomb.com mommas, how have you been?! 🙂It has been a long time since I’ve posted. This post is inspired by a private Facebook page for single Black Christians. Since my brain began to spin with so many ideals and thoughts about the subject, here I post…

A single Christian Black male posted a meme to engage conversation amongst followers. The meme stated,

“Why are so many strong Black women single?”

See my response below…

You know…as a Black woman who is divorced after almost 16 years, I can only give perspective in hindsight and while on my self rediscovery journey. The “strong” Black woman in my humble opinion was systematically engineered within our community during slavery that stemmed from a place of necessity, fear, and hopelessness.

This phenomenon dates back to slavery, when our men were snatched from us while being sold to the highest bidder, as we screamed in response to the dehumanized experience of our man being taken against his will, forcing us to push our emotions aside for mere survival and to care for self and our children with “strength”. As such, we were forced to “suck it up butter cup”, “put our big girl panties on” and learn how to navigate and survive without covering!

Since then, our Black men have struggled to identify his role and understand the need to cover us in a healthy way. We are no longer physically bound (some may challenge this notion), instead our men have struggled to show up in a healthy way to cover us and return home unscathed from the battle. Many are without the tools in his toolkit to properly love and care for himself, the Black woman, and children in a healthy godly way.

Fast foreword generations , “Big mama” struggled to care for herself and was forced to raise children alone (unmarried or with an absent or abusive man/husband). Recent generations saw this narrative and realized its error but lacked the tools to do things differently from a perspective of rebuilding the family. So, more often than not, Black women are either single or in toxic relationships.

When we finally awake from the blows of life, we find ourselves scared, but unable to fully invest in our healing due to the demands of life that include child rearing, financial scarcity, and mental health, alike. So, we remain in survival-mode! We see our non-black counterparts and we inwardly want to live a soft life, some have even studied this notion of “femininity”, but don’t have the luxury of reinvention because after spending years and in some cases half of a lifetime in situationships, relationships, marriages, or careers (to occupy and pour into a longing to accomplish and succeed), we are simply exhausted! This exhaustion shows up as being “angry”. We are not angry! We are sad, scared, disappointed, frustrated, tired, fatigued, and simply uncovered in a world that has not given us permission to be soft, free, openly scared and rescued; calling us “strong” and in many cases championing what appears to be supernatural strength! So, we stay in this posture for us and the world because it’s “safe” here and we haven’t seen modeled anything different!

The secret is, though we have figured out the cheat code to EXIST and appear “strong” in the world, we long to live and thrive and be seen as vulnerable; as the Black little girl that we once were or desired to be! We truly desired to be covered by a trusting, honest man with the tools to see past the “resting b* face (I don’t curse, simply for illustration. My apologies), “anger”, and “attitude”. In reality, we are like every other woman; we want to be seen, valued, cared for, accepted, and loved fully without apology! We want to be validated and not told or treated like we are too much or not enough!

We are not angry!

We don’t want to self-sabotage!

We don’t want to marry our careers!

We don’t want to raise kids alone!

We don’t want to be single!

We WANT to be covered by a healthy man that is willing to truly see with his spiritual eyes! One who recognizes his own issues and is willing to do the hard work necessary to become the best version of himself!

In turn, as the “weaker vessel”, we want you to see a little girl trying to ride the bike of life who has fallen down, got a boo boo from life’s fight, is crying, and NEEDS a man willing to pick her up, kiss her boo boo, and help her back up onto her bike. As a matter of fact, she want to be gently placed on the back your YOUR bike and cared for with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.

I promise you, if you nurture her with the Fruit of the Spirit, the outcome, once she heals, is unmatched by anyone else because she will pour into her man in a way that no one else ever can! Your house will be made a home because you set the foundation for her to be recharged and to operate from a place of rest and not survival, anxiety, and fear! In turn she can build YOU up and create an atmosphere of peace so that when you return home from the battle, she has the energy to pour from an overflowing cup, not an empty one!

So, this is my perspective and I believe our Black community can only heal and rebuild our romantic relationships through covenant marriage by including both God and therapy to unpack systemic trauma, generational trauma, relational trauma, and mental neglect/anguish, with intention!

Signed,

A recovering “strong” Black women who is learning how to embrace a “softer” life and realizes this uphill journey is worth it to ease the struggle of my Black daughter!