Sisters, Can We Talk?
Sisters, Can We Talk? By Lisa Marbly-Warir Copyright 2016
Acknowledgements I would like to thank my baby brother Daniel for some of his insight from a man’s POV and my Aunt Margrette (Nona) for her support and suggestions for this book. Editing by Karen Garrette Cover by Annoula (Fiverr)
Disclaimer I kept putting off writing this book because I know that we as Black women are tired of the “everything is our fault” mantra, but then I decided people can glean from this what is helpful to them. It’s just always been in my heart to write such a book-long before the internet, back when I was still a dreamer. And by dreamer I mean I expected to be married by 24, have my first child by 27 and also have a house with a white picket fence. Somewhere my life veered off on another path and I didn’t get married until I was 40. I also don’t have children-funny how life can be at times. I am writing this to provide insight into certain things and hopefully provide some food for thought for young ladies who think they have forever and a day to make the right decisions. I also think that a lot of Black women are not preparing their daughters (let alone their sons) in how to be in a relationship. At the end of the day most of us want to be in a relationship with the right man. There seems to be a lot of negativity-at least online- about marriage and relationships. I want to express that there is nothing wrong with marriage, nor is there anything wrong with wanting to get married and stay married. I’ve also noticed some marriage-shaming. Anybody else notice that? Please note; for women who genuinely do not want marriage for whatever your reasons are, this is not about you or for you. When I post online, I find that I have to put disclaimers, because some subjects are touchy for many women. I am pro-marriage and pro-abstinence-that is, I believe in maintaining virginity until marriage or at least making sure the man you are with is on the same page as you. (I still don’t believe in premarital sex, but I know that is unrealistic in today’s world.) A lot of women are also unwilling to look within themselves for the situations they find themselves in. My words and opinions are meant as preventative measures for young women who may not know certain things in regards to men, love, sex and marriage. I find that a lot of these self-help books tend to target women who have reached their limits with men and usually after they’ve had a kid or two and are exasperated to the point of bitterness.
Table of contents
Chapter One Why are we as a whole disproportionately unmarried when compared to other races?
Chapter Two Signs you may be a placeholder in your boyfriend’s life
Chapter Three Marriage
Chapter Four Mothers and daughters
Chapter Five Fatherless daughters
Chapter Six Sowing oats
Chapter Seven The educated/professional woman
Chapter Eight Church and the single woman
Chapter Nine Kissing a lot of frogs; waiting for the prince
Chapter Ten Unrealistic expectations
Chapter Eleven Men
Chapter Twelve Divorce
Introduction There is some information that many of us are not and didn’t get from our mothers about men, love, marriage and then some. These are subjects that I know many Black women are sick to death hearing about over and over again-that we are the most un-partnered women, raising children single handedly. Why are people so concerned about what we do? I get it. But the fact that it does keep coming up all the time online, on social media, in articles and in conversations amongst ourselves, etc. means that there is something wrong out here in regards to Black women and relationships. We like to sweep certain things under the rug in our communities, hoping it will magically go away. I have found mostly online that many Black women will get mad at the subject of good hair/bad hair, light/dark skin and Black men with non-Black women but they barely blink an eye when it comes to the subject of raising kids alone. And then if someone is speaking out on it, they want that person to shut up about it. Change cannot come about if it’s not faced head on. I know there are already countless books on marriage and how to find the right man. This book isn’t about how to find the right man per se, but how to spot men who may not be in your best interest. I also want to give food for thought on why you might be making certain decisions regarding men-especially the wrong man or men. When I was a single woman, I remember reading Juanita Bynum’s book, No more sheets back in the early 2000’s. I remembered thinking to myself back then that the book wasn’t for me because I was not and had not been sexually active. Then I thought at the time, where are the books for the young women who haven’t gone down that road to the point where they didn’t need no more sheets? Well I don’t think I ever found that book. A lot of Black mothers, (and my mother and I have had this discussion), raise their girls to be single intentionally or unintentionally. Not only single, but strong, hard, independent and totally void of a man loving them. But the problem arises if there was never a real man i.e.-loving father in said girl/young woman’s life in the first place to offer balance. Then these same women will coddle their sons and look the other way when he does wrong, but that is another subject. Many times young women go looking for that love they missed from their father. In my case, I was the opposite. I ran from men; I never allowed them to get close to me. A lot of that was because of my mother and her teachings that men were good-for-nothing rotten creatures whose sole purpose was to hurt women. That is what I grew up believing it took me many years to sort men out on my own. I was blessed to watch women in long-term marriages show me how to be a wife and interact with a husband. I feel many Black women are not getting this. As a matter of fact, I didn’t know how much I missed having a father until I tried to be in a relationship. Your
husband or man in your life is not supposed to be your surrogate father. He is supposed to be your friend, your lover, your confidante, etc. I know some may read this and say how their parents have been together forever and claim to not know what I am talking about. What I would say to those women is, well you are blessed, you got to witness what a lot of us do not. Or, some women will say, “I had a father but he wasn’t there for me emotionally” For me, that is another topic. My rebuttal is usually, that your father is still here for you to make amends with; your father is here to hug and kiss. I’ve never experienced that, so I can’t speak on it. Many of the women I know had a father in the home growing up and I honestly believe that makes a difference; not all the time (which is a constant rebuttal from some women), but I think it is helpful-especially if your parents are together in a healthy relationship, because it can be a blueprint for what to do in your own relationship/marriage. I am married, and because of the home I grew up in, I knew as a child I did not want to follow my mother’s route; divorced with three children on her hip. (She had me out of wedlock, so my brother’s father was my stepdad). I knew at fourteen that wouldn’t be me. I never had children and I believe that it was directly associated with fear of being like my mother, plus, I never wanted to have children without a husband for me and father for them. I think a lot of women in our race have low expectations of men and the role that they play in their children’s lives; a lot don’t even consider their children when it involves the dad. But because I was denied my own father, I vowed I would never do that to a child and at the risk of never having my own children, I’ve kept that vow. I’m by no means telling women not to have children, but what I am saying, please make sure you are with the right man and that he has honored you first with marriage. If he is the wrong man and you had his kids, if he wants to be a part of his child(ren)’s life let him. Thinking you’re punishing him by keeping his children from him is hurting your children more and it might not manifest itself until years later as resentment towards you-the mom, anger, repeating the cycle of fatherlessness, self-destructive behavior etc. I see refusal to face certain things about our community online all the time. A lot of Black women do not-I mean, really do not want to accept any responsibility regarding what go on in our community. We as Black women have often been hurt and trampled upon which is why it is even more important to give your children what you didn’t have and ensure you set the proper base for your children so they don’t grow up and follow your footsteps. (If those footsteps were less than ideal)
Chapter One Why are we as a whole disproportionately unmarried when compared to other races? You might wonder why I as a married woman am even discussing this topic. People have to remember that before any woman is married, she was once single. This book was on my heart many years before I even knew my husband. I also want to add that I was single much longer than many of my peers and family members. Most of them got married in their twenties-the oldest being thirty-two at the time, which was still younger than I was when I got married. I would like to use this opportunity to reference that I am not directing this at all women. There are women who are happy to be single and never marry; if that’s the case, this book is not for you. But there are women who would like to get married. I don’t propose to be an expert on how to get a husband or stay married. Again, this is just observation, and things I wish I had learned when I was a younger woman-or things I’ve seen friends or other women go through. I believe many Black women are disproportionately single because a lot of them are simply not seeing their own mothers interact with a husband or if the mother has a husband, it’s a good chance he’s not even the father of the woman’s children. I have also noticed in the past ten or so years-especially online-the disdain towards marriage and wives. A lot of that stems from the road society and many women have taken in regards to free sex, shacking up, children out of wedlock, one-night stands and friends with benefits; so marriage for a lot of men is not a necessity. Women, instead of voicing their true desire for marriage, make choices that lead them away from marriage. They tend to vilify it and make it seem as odious and stifling as possible to feel better about not having it. I also believe that lot of Black mothers use their own hurts and disappointments about men and pass it on to their daughters, and this is not fair or right. If anything, as a mother you should be showing or telling your daughter what mistakes not to make in regards to men. (Yes-I understand, not all daughters listen nor want to listen to their mothers, which makes it all the more important for a mother and father to live by example.) I think some women see wanting marriage as a weakness. A lot of us have this false sense of strength. I’m strong and can do it all by myself; my mother did it, my grandmother did it, and my sister etc., but are they really that strong, or did they do what they had to do to survive? Are our mothers and grandmothers being honest about the burden of doing it all by themselves? By the same token, are our mothers and grandmothers who went the distance with their husbands being honest about the work and effort it takes to keep a marriage intact? By the way, my grandmother was with my grandfather for almost seventy years before her death in 2010, and while she may have had her own struggles and differences with my grandfather, she told me a few years back that she was glad she stayed with him. One of her quotes was, “Don’t get off the payroll.” That sounds funny now, but back then women didn’t have all the options work-wise that we have now. But this is all another subject for another time; I don’t want to get into the rebuttals of why marriage is not a cure-all.
I see that so much from some Black women-they shoot down the idea of marriage at every chance, but talk out the other side of their mouths about men not being traditional-minded and skirting their responsibilities. You can’t put the carts before the horse and expect a smooth ride; and by that I mean that a woman can’t have a child or children by a man who never made her his legal wife and never intends to make that woman his wife and expect it to go along smoothly. Many women think because they are having sex with a man and living with him that she is the one, when in reality, she is simply his placeholder until the woman he really wants to be with comes along. That is why I am writing this-so women can see or know the telltale signs that the man she may be sleeping with or shacking up with most likely is not the man who plans to spend his forever with her. This is why so many women get tripped up with a kid and the man leaves and she wonders why. He wasn’t planning on staying to begin with-hard truth. Some of my grandmother’s children-(my aunts and uncles) honored her for staying with my grandfather (who sadly passed away at age 97 as I was working on this book) because it gave them the example of maintaining their own marriages. If you haven’t noticed, marriage is important to me because it was important to my family. I hear this argument quite a bit from women: That most of the women they know did it all by themselves. I don’t know any sane woman who would purposely want to raise kids by herself. I also don’t get the argument that some have used that even if you have a husband you are still raising kids by yourself. I just don’t get that mindset, but I have definitely heard it. Some women may not believe they deserve a man who actually loves them and wants to take care of them and the offspring they created with them. A lot of women have duped themselves into believing that marriage is only beneficial to men. There are benefits for both men and women and especially children. Somewhere Black women are getting the message that marriage is not for them or that they have to have a lot of money to be married, or look a certain way etc. But somehow, having and raising children alone is deemed as easy, I don’t believe some young women are getting the message about some boys/men. Their main objective is having sex, and NOT wanting the woman enough to at least put a ring on it. Dating used to be about courtship-getting to know a person for the purpose of getting married and then starting a family. We have some women asking this question: Why don’t men court anymore? And I ask why exactly should they? Men are getting all the conveniences of having a wife without actually making it official. They can come over and “kick it” at your crib. I really don’t talk like this, but I’ve heard women say things like this. Men have it very easy today in terms of sex and no responsibilities as well as the consequences of it. Girls/women are usually the ones left holding that precious baby and left to raise the baby or babies by themselves. So I want to offer some signs that you may just be a temporary girlfriend. I’d also like to add that many women try their hardest to make relationships work with the wrong man. And here is a scary thought: Many times a woman continues on with a man knowing he is NOT the one. Many times it’s because she may be scared to be alone, embarrassed of rejection, or she may have low self-esteem. The reasons are infinite.
Buy today https://www.amazon.com/Sisters-Can-Talk-Lisa-Marbly-Warirebook/dp/B01JYTLVGO/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1471887344&sr=83&keywords=sisters%2C+can+we+talk#nav-subnav
Acknowledgements I would like to thank my baby brother Daniel for some of his insight from a man’s POV and my Aunt Margrette (Nona) for her support and suggestions for this book. Editing by Karen Garrette Cover by Annoula (Fiverr)
Disclaimer I kept putting off writing this book because I know that we as Black women are tired of the “everything is our fault” mantra, but then I decided people can glean from this what is helpful to them. It’s just always been in my heart to write such a book-long before the internet, back when I was still a dreamer. And by dreamer I mean I expected to be married by 24, have my first child by 27 and also have a house with a white picket fence. Somewhere my life veered off on another path and I didn’t get married until I was 40. I also don’t have children-funny how life can be at times. I am writing this to provide insight into certain things and hopefully provide some food for thought for young ladies who think they have forever and a day to make the right decisions. I also think that a lot of Black women are not preparing their daughters (let alone their sons) in how to be in a relationship. At the end of the day most of us want to be in a relationship with the right man. There seems to be a lot of negativity-at least online- about marriage and relationships. I want to express that there is nothing wrong with marriage, nor is there anything wrong with wanting to get married and stay married. I’ve also noticed some marriage-shaming. Anybody else notice that? Please note; for women who genuinely do not want marriage for whatever your reasons are, this is not about you or for you. When I post online, I find that I have to put disclaimers, because some subjects are touchy for many women. I am pro-marriage and pro-abstinence-that is, I believe in maintaining virginity until marriage or at least making sure the man you are with is on the same page as you. (I still don’t believe in premarital sex, but I know that is unrealistic in today’s world.) A lot of women are also unwilling to look within themselves for the situations they find themselves in. My words and opinions are meant as preventative measures for young women who may not know certain things in regards to men, love, sex and marriage. I find that a lot of these self-help books tend to target women who have reached their limits with men and usually after they’ve had a kid or two and are exasperated to the point of bitterness.
Table of contents
Chapter One Why are we as a whole disproportionately unmarried when compared to other races?
Chapter Two Signs you may be a placeholder in your boyfriend’s life
Chapter Three Marriage
Chapter Four Mothers and daughters
Chapter Five Fatherless daughters
Chapter Six Sowing oats
Chapter Seven The educated/professional woman
Chapter Eight Church and the single woman
Chapter Nine Kissing a lot of frogs; waiting for the prince
Chapter Ten Unrealistic expectations
Chapter Eleven Men
Chapter Twelve Divorce
Introduction There is some information that many of us are not and didn’t get from our mothers about men, love, marriage and then some. These are subjects that I know many Black women are sick to death hearing about over and over again-that we are the most un-partnered women, raising children single handedly. Why are people so concerned about what we do? I get it. But the fact that it does keep coming up all the time online, on social media, in articles and in conversations amongst ourselves, etc. means that there is something wrong out here in regards to Black women and relationships. We like to sweep certain things under the rug in our communities, hoping it will magically go away. I have found mostly online that many Black women will get mad at the subject of good hair/bad hair, light/dark skin and Black men with non-Black women but they barely blink an eye when it comes to the subject of raising kids alone. And then if someone is speaking out on it, they want that person to shut up about it. Change cannot come about if it’s not faced head on. I know there are already countless books on marriage and how to find the right man. This book isn’t about how to find the right man per se, but how to spot men who may not be in your best interest. I also want to give food for thought on why you might be making certain decisions regarding men-especially the wrong man or men. When I was a single woman, I remember reading Juanita Bynum’s book, No more sheets back in the early 2000’s. I remembered thinking to myself back then that the book wasn’t for me because I was not and had not been sexually active. Then I thought at the time, where are the books for the young women who haven’t gone down that road to the point where they didn’t need no more sheets? Well I don’t think I ever found that book. A lot of Black mothers, (and my mother and I have had this discussion), raise their girls to be single intentionally or unintentionally. Not only single, but strong, hard, independent and totally void of a man loving them. But the problem arises if there was never a real man i.e.-loving father in said girl/young woman’s life in the first place to offer balance. Then these same women will coddle their sons and look the other way when he does wrong, but that is another subject. Many times young women go looking for that love they missed from their father. In my case, I was the opposite. I ran from men; I never allowed them to get close to me. A lot of that was because of my mother and her teachings that men were good-for-nothing rotten creatures whose sole purpose was to hurt women. That is what I grew up believing it took me many years to sort men out on my own. I was blessed to watch women in long-term marriages show me how to be a wife and interact with a husband. I feel many Black women are not getting this. As a matter of fact, I didn’t know how much I missed having a father until I tried to be in a relationship. Your
husband or man in your life is not supposed to be your surrogate father. He is supposed to be your friend, your lover, your confidante, etc. I know some may read this and say how their parents have been together forever and claim to not know what I am talking about. What I would say to those women is, well you are blessed, you got to witness what a lot of us do not. Or, some women will say, “I had a father but he wasn’t there for me emotionally” For me, that is another topic. My rebuttal is usually, that your father is still here for you to make amends with; your father is here to hug and kiss. I’ve never experienced that, so I can’t speak on it. Many of the women I know had a father in the home growing up and I honestly believe that makes a difference; not all the time (which is a constant rebuttal from some women), but I think it is helpful-especially if your parents are together in a healthy relationship, because it can be a blueprint for what to do in your own relationship/marriage. I am married, and because of the home I grew up in, I knew as a child I did not want to follow my mother’s route; divorced with three children on her hip. (She had me out of wedlock, so my brother’s father was my stepdad). I knew at fourteen that wouldn’t be me. I never had children and I believe that it was directly associated with fear of being like my mother, plus, I never wanted to have children without a husband for me and father for them. I think a lot of women in our race have low expectations of men and the role that they play in their children’s lives; a lot don’t even consider their children when it involves the dad. But because I was denied my own father, I vowed I would never do that to a child and at the risk of never having my own children, I’ve kept that vow. I’m by no means telling women not to have children, but what I am saying, please make sure you are with the right man and that he has honored you first with marriage. If he is the wrong man and you had his kids, if he wants to be a part of his child(ren)’s life let him. Thinking you’re punishing him by keeping his children from him is hurting your children more and it might not manifest itself until years later as resentment towards you-the mom, anger, repeating the cycle of fatherlessness, self-destructive behavior etc. I see refusal to face certain things about our community online all the time. A lot of Black women do not-I mean, really do not want to accept any responsibility regarding what go on in our community. We as Black women have often been hurt and trampled upon which is why it is even more important to give your children what you didn’t have and ensure you set the proper base for your children so they don’t grow up and follow your footsteps. (If those footsteps were less than ideal)
Chapter One Why are we as a whole disproportionately unmarried when compared to other races? You might wonder why I as a married woman am even discussing this topic. People have to remember that before any woman is married, she was once single. This book was on my heart many years before I even knew my husband. I also want to add that I was single much longer than many of my peers and family members. Most of them got married in their twenties-the oldest being thirty-two at the time, which was still younger than I was when I got married. I would like to use this opportunity to reference that I am not directing this at all women. There are women who are happy to be single and never marry; if that’s the case, this book is not for you. But there are women who would like to get married. I don’t propose to be an expert on how to get a husband or stay married. Again, this is just observation, and things I wish I had learned when I was a younger woman-or things I’ve seen friends or other women go through. I believe many Black women are disproportionately single because a lot of them are simply not seeing their own mothers interact with a husband or if the mother has a husband, it’s a good chance he’s not even the father of the woman’s children. I have also noticed in the past ten or so years-especially online-the disdain towards marriage and wives. A lot of that stems from the road society and many women have taken in regards to free sex, shacking up, children out of wedlock, one-night stands and friends with benefits; so marriage for a lot of men is not a necessity. Women, instead of voicing their true desire for marriage, make choices that lead them away from marriage. They tend to vilify it and make it seem as odious and stifling as possible to feel better about not having it. I also believe that lot of Black mothers use their own hurts and disappointments about men and pass it on to their daughters, and this is not fair or right. If anything, as a mother you should be showing or telling your daughter what mistakes not to make in regards to men. (Yes-I understand, not all daughters listen nor want to listen to their mothers, which makes it all the more important for a mother and father to live by example.) I think some women see wanting marriage as a weakness. A lot of us have this false sense of strength. I’m strong and can do it all by myself; my mother did it, my grandmother did it, and my sister etc., but are they really that strong, or did they do what they had to do to survive? Are our mothers and grandmothers being honest about the burden of doing it all by themselves? By the same token, are our mothers and grandmothers who went the distance with their husbands being honest about the work and effort it takes to keep a marriage intact? By the way, my grandmother was with my grandfather for almost seventy years before her death in 2010, and while she may have had her own struggles and differences with my grandfather, she told me a few years back that she was glad she stayed with him. One of her quotes was, “Don’t get off the payroll.” That sounds funny now, but back then women didn’t have all the options work-wise that we have now. But this is all another subject for another time; I don’t want to get into the rebuttals of why marriage is not a cure-all.
I see that so much from some Black women-they shoot down the idea of marriage at every chance, but talk out the other side of their mouths about men not being traditional-minded and skirting their responsibilities. You can’t put the carts before the horse and expect a smooth ride; and by that I mean that a woman can’t have a child or children by a man who never made her his legal wife and never intends to make that woman his wife and expect it to go along smoothly. Many women think because they are having sex with a man and living with him that she is the one, when in reality, she is simply his placeholder until the woman he really wants to be with comes along. That is why I am writing this-so women can see or know the telltale signs that the man she may be sleeping with or shacking up with most likely is not the man who plans to spend his forever with her. This is why so many women get tripped up with a kid and the man leaves and she wonders why. He wasn’t planning on staying to begin with-hard truth. Some of my grandmother’s children-(my aunts and uncles) honored her for staying with my grandfather (who sadly passed away at age 97 as I was working on this book) because it gave them the example of maintaining their own marriages. If you haven’t noticed, marriage is important to me because it was important to my family. I hear this argument quite a bit from women: That most of the women they know did it all by themselves. I don’t know any sane woman who would purposely want to raise kids by herself. I also don’t get the argument that some have used that even if you have a husband you are still raising kids by yourself. I just don’t get that mindset, but I have definitely heard it. Some women may not believe they deserve a man who actually loves them and wants to take care of them and the offspring they created with them. A lot of women have duped themselves into believing that marriage is only beneficial to men. There are benefits for both men and women and especially children. Somewhere Black women are getting the message that marriage is not for them or that they have to have a lot of money to be married, or look a certain way etc. But somehow, having and raising children alone is deemed as easy, I don’t believe some young women are getting the message about some boys/men. Their main objective is having sex, and NOT wanting the woman enough to at least put a ring on it. Dating used to be about courtship-getting to know a person for the purpose of getting married and then starting a family. We have some women asking this question: Why don’t men court anymore? And I ask why exactly should they? Men are getting all the conveniences of having a wife without actually making it official. They can come over and “kick it” at your crib. I really don’t talk like this, but I’ve heard women say things like this. Men have it very easy today in terms of sex and no responsibilities as well as the consequences of it. Girls/women are usually the ones left holding that precious baby and left to raise the baby or babies by themselves. So I want to offer some signs that you may just be a temporary girlfriend. I’d also like to add that many women try their hardest to make relationships work with the wrong man. And here is a scary thought: Many times a woman continues on with a man knowing he is NOT the one. Many times it’s because she may be scared to be alone, embarrassed of rejection, or she may have low self-esteem. The reasons are infinite.
Buy today https://www.amazon.com/Sisters-Can-Talk-Lisa-Marbly-Warirebook/dp/B01JYTLVGO/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1471887344&sr=83&keywords=sisters%2C+can+we+talk#nav-subnav
