I am tired of seeing so many well-known women call their estranged, cheating, abusive ex-husbands/boyfriends ‘family’, simply because they share children.

’He will always be family!’

Bullshit.

What did these men do to deserve such label? After all, they repeatedly abused and degraded women that have went through the labour, pain, and other risks of mothering their children.

He is not your ‘family’, he is just a man with no value or use to you once he stops providing the benefits, respect, money, and support. That is all.

Upon relieving the emotional, physical, and mental abuse from men, I decided that no man that I will be engaged to and marry, will be put in the ‘family’ category. He is either a dating potential, husband, or a stranger.

Men come and go.

One day, you are happy with the relationship/marriage and his treatment of you, the next — he degrades you or you find out that he is cheating.

The connotation that comes with labeling him your family keeps the responsibility of care, contact, and other forms of unpaid labour on you.

Keeps you tied to someone who is now a stranger. So, make sure you treat and speak of him the same.