I want to leave, she confesses. But the reality is, I can't manage it. My earnings just aren’t enough to cover everything. As I watch her eyes welling up and her lips quiver, I find myself at a loss for words. The weight of time feels immense, like an elephant pressing down on my chest.

I recall the nights we were so close that I could reach out and touch her bed with my foot, whispering to wake her. We shared secrets in the dark until our mother would shout for us to stop talking and go to sleep. Those were days before marriage, jobs, and kids, when time felt abundant.

I remember her boyfriend who mistreated her, whispering in the dark, urging her to keep it secret from their father. It’s all right, he said. She ultimately left him, and I couldn't help but wonder what was wrong with me for not seeing it coming. I liked him, thought I should have been aware, even if I was just a naive thirteen-year-old.

Her eyes sparkled when she showed me her engagement ring, and I admired the delicate buttons on the back of her wedding dress. She looked stunning, radiant—just like I imagined. I too wished for that moment, adorned in dark curls and white lace, holding flowers and dreaming beneath the stars.

But that was the past; this is the present. Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, and he had a great fall. I was the first sister to experience divorce, and I wouldn’t wish it upon anyone, especially her. I just want her to find happiness. I apologize.

As I stand in the driveway, waving goodbye as she drives away, I know she'll be tossing and turning late into the night, crying into her pillow. I sit on the back step, cradling a warm decaf, gazing at the moon as if it holds answers.

It’s not only women who suffer. We can’t truly love our husbands, brothers, sons, and uncles without acknowledging that they too endure pain, sometimes inflicted by women.

Yet, one injustice doesn’t erase another. I feel as though I’ve spent a large part of my life listening to women express their sorrow over situations that should never occur, if we’re being honest—if the world were equitable and love were gentle.

At six years old, Betty lived next door and would come over for coffee with my mother. What I disliked was that she brought Kenny along, and I had to play with him. He wasn’t nice; he was cruel. Sometimes, my mother would let us have cookies and watch TV inside, but on other occasions, she’d send us outside to play.

I could always tell when it was an outside day because when they entered through the back door, Betty often bore bruises or a black eye, sometimes a swollen lip. It saddened and frightened me. I’d sigh and say, “Let’s go play outside, Kenny.”

If it wasn’t Betty, it was Lilly, or Annie, or Margie. It felt like every sorrowful woman found her way to cry at my mother’s table, where she’d offer coffee and hugs.

When I began school, I asked my best friend Cindy if her father hit her mother, and she was taken aback. She replied no, and I felt relief. I didn’t need to inquire about Cheryl or Maryann—I already knew the answer was yes.

At thirteen, Laurie from down the block asked if I could babysit while she worked evenings, and I agreed. However, she cautioned me not to come to her house. She picked me up and quietly spoke to my mom before driving me to a motel.

Once she left for work, her little girl Vanessa confided that her mommy had run away from her father because he was abusive. At just five years old, she looked heartbroken and frightened. I comforted her in my lap as we watched TV together.

My emotions felt like a dark forest where I was lost among the trees, which were not trees but rather women, crying out in despair. I wished to escape their haunting sounds, but they lingered.

I didn’t realize back then, but every nine seconds, a woman in America experiences domestic violence. It’s the leading cause of injury among women, surpassing car accidents, muggings, and rapes combined. Domestic violence hotlines receive over twenty thousand calls daily.

Many children are aware of this reality—ten million every year—simply by witnessing it.

At eighteen, I sat with my friend Sheila in her small, run-down apartment, urging her to report the abuse. I promised to support her, but she cried, insisting it wouldn’t help. They’d only question her about being there and her choice of dress. So, she refused.

Every two minutes.

That’s how often a woman is raped in America. The World Health Organization reports that one in three women will be sexually assaulted during her lifetime. Nearly half of women in Canada face similar threats.

At twenty, during a casual gathering, a guy named Kevin asserted that rape wasn’t as prevalent as I claimed. He said if it were true, he would know someone affected, but he didn’t. I scoffed and told him he actually did know at least two women who had been raped. He stared at me, taken aback.

Carol supported my assertion, but I continued, asking Kevin to consider why those women didn’t confide in him. What was it about him that made the women he cared for reluctant to share their experiences? It fell silent after that.

Every two minutes. I couldn’t ignore the reality, though it was hard to face. The Brock Turner case, which gained widespread media attention, highlighted a grim truth: rapists often go unpunished. Though Turner was caught due to witnesses, the judge described him as a promising young man whose future shouldn’t be ruined, sentencing him to just three months in prison.

That incident reminded me of Sheila, crying and covered in mascara, questioning the point of speaking out. Her sentiments echoed the harsh realities many women endure.

I was thirty-three when my friend Sherri was shot by her husband in front of her mother’s home. Her mother’s screams and the sirens still haunt me. Two little boys lost both parents that day, a tragedy that brings tears to my eyes.

Years later, as the nation searched for Gabby Petito, memories of Sherri resurfaced, reminding me of her vibrant spirit, her laughter, and the joy she brought to those around her—at just thirty-three.

Every day in America, three women lose their lives to a partner or former partner, individuals who once loved them. For a painful experiment, search "man kills wife" on Google and brace yourself for the distressing results.

There’s the story of a man who shot his wife on Christmas, leaving three daughters crying by the tree. Or the man who murdered his wife over pancakes, stabbing her to death in their kitchen.

Another case involved a man who shot his wife in a mall parking lot while their eight-year-old daughter watched. The child now suffers from PTSD—a condition often associated with war, yet here it is, affecting a little girl.

From 2001 to 2012, we lost 6,488 American soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq, while 11,766 women died at the hands of men who once claimed to love them during the same period.

I will pause here.

Don’t misunderstand; this isn’t solely about violence against women.

It represe