This morning, I found myself angry.
Not mildly irritated. Not shaking my head at another ridiculous social media post. Angry. The kind of angry that makes your fingers start typing before your heart has finished processing what it feels.
A woman in my city was recently killed by her husband on an open street after years of domestic abuse.
Yesterday, a friend told me about an altercation with her husband and casually explained that it had gotten “only a little physical.”
Only.
That word has been sitting heavily on my heart.
Then this morning, I came across a social media post asking women whether they would allow their husbands to beat them once a week in exchange for $8,000 a month.
And women were laughing. Some were enthusiastically accepting the offer. Others were making jokes as though somebody had just offered them a generous employment package with excellent benefits.
I started typing a response. I wanted to rebuke every last one of them. But then I remembered something.
I am not speaking about a hypothetical situation. I am speaking as a woman who nearly lost her life in her first marriage.
I know what it means when love becomes fear. When the person who promised to protect you becomes the person you need protection from.
And I know that sometimes the distance between “only a little physical” and a funeral is much shorter than anyone wants to believe.
I often watch Nigerian novellas, and one of the recurring themes that troubles me is how frequently a wife is encouraged to endure.
Endure the humiliation. Endure the infidelity. Endure the mistreatment. Endure the violence.
Be patient. Pray harder. Respect your husband. Don’t embarrass the family. Don’t destroy your marriage.
And somewhere along the way, endurance becomes confused with virtue, while suffering becomes an expected part of womanhood.
Now, I understand that these are dramatized stories, not a representation of every Nigerian home or marriage. But the message they portray is painfully familiar across cultures.
How many women, regardless of nationality, have been told to stay because marriage is sacred, while nobody reminds the husband that his wife’s life is sacred, too?
How many have been encouraged to pray for the man who hurts them without anyone offering to help them get somewhere safe?
And how many women have been buried while people stood over their caskets talking about how strong, faithful, and devoted they were?
There is a difference between perseverance and being conditioned to tolerate abuse.
God did not create women to be punching bags in the name of submission.
And what makes this moment particularly heartbreaking is what is happening right here in the United States.
We have just witnessed historic victories for women in the 2026 elections. Record numbers of women are preparing to serve as governors and in the United States House of Representatives. Women have won Senate seats and other powerful offices, breaking barriers that once seemed impossible.
Women are being entrusted to lead states, help write laws, oversee budgets, and make decisions affecting millions of lives.
And yet, on the very same soil where we celebrate women ascending to positions of extraordinary power, we are laughing about whether a woman should accept $8,000 a month to be beaten by her husband.
We are celebrating women gaining seats at the tables of power while joking about women being powerless at their own kitchen tables.
Do you see the contradiction?
We can celebrate a woman becoming governor but still have trouble convincing another woman that she deserves to live without fear in her own home.
We can applaud women breaking glass ceilings while making light of women having their spirits, their bodies, and sometimes their lives broken behind closed doors.
Political progress matters. Representation matters. But what good is celebrating a woman’s right to lead if we cannot agree that she has the right to live without violence?
Eight thousand dollars a month?What is the going rate for your dignity? Your safety? Your peace? Your life?
And what happens when the man who is supposed to beat you only once a week decides that the arrangement has changed?
What happens when the first slap becomes a punch? When the apology becomes an excuse? When the excuse becomes a pattern?
What happens when the money keeps coming, but the woman doesn’t make it home?
Domestic violence is not a punchline.
It is not a financial opportunity.
It is not something we should teach another generation of women to negotiate.
And before anyone misunderstands me, I am not writing this to shame women who have survived abuse, who are still enduring it, or who laughed without considering the weight of the question.
I know that leaving an abusive relationship is not always simple. Fear, finances, children, threats, isolation, and countless other circumstances can make escaping dangerous and complicated.
I am not asking why she stayed.
I am asking why he believed he had the right to hurt her in the first place.
I am asking why we keep measuring the seriousness of abuse by the severity of the injury instead of the presence of the violence.
I am asking why we are still teaching women how much they should endure instead of teaching everyone that love does not require violence.
Somewhere, a woman is convincing herself that what happened last night wasn’t that bad.
Somewhere, a daughter is learning that love and violence can coexist as long as the bills are paid.
Somewhere, a woman is praying for her marriage when what she desperately needs is protection.
And somewhere, a woman is running out of time.
Please understand this:
You do not have to nearly die before what is happening to you deserves to be called abuse.
You do not have to be hospitalized. You do not have to have photographs. You do not have to explain away bruises or wait until the next incident to decide whether the last one counted.
And you certainly do not have to die before the rest of us take it seriously.
I survived.
Not every woman gets to say that.
So forgive me if I cannot find the humor in a weekly beating with a monthly paycheck.
I know too much about what that laughter is making light of.
And if my words reach even one woman who has been telling herself that it was “only a little physical,” I pray she hears me clearly.
Your life is worth more than the marriage you’re trying to save, the reputation you’re trying to protect, or the money someone is offering you to endure the unthinkable.
You are not required to become a martyr to prove you were a good wife.
And to every daughter of God who has been made to feel small, ashamed, or unworthy, remember the words of Psalm 3:3 (NLT):
“You are my glory, the one who holds my head high.”
There is something beautiful about a God who does not demand that His daughters bow their heads beneath the weight of another person’s cruelty, but reminds them that they are worthy of standing tall.
Daughter, lift your head. You were never created to live beneath somebody else’s fist.
You deserve to live.
And that should never be up for negotiation.
Love, Chelle
defygravitywithoutwings.com
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If you or someone you love is experiencing domestic violence, help is available.
You do not have to wait until the violence gets worse to ask for help. You deserve safety, support, and someone who will listen without judgment.
National Domestic Violence Hotline
– Call: 1-800-799-SAFE (7233)
– Text: START to 88788
– Online: http://www.thehotline.org
Free, confidential support is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If you are in immediate danger, call 911.
Please remember: Seeking help is not a betrayal of your marriage. Your safety matters.
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