Adelle Onyango who is heavy on social activism and women’s rights and empowerment opened up about her childhood that most people didn’t know about.
The radio presenter and a host on her own podcast, ‘Legally Clueless’ revealed rather shocking details about living a difficult life in her childhood with an abusive father.
The always vibrant, smiling, philanthropist opened up after one of her ardent listeners named Miriam opened up on her experience living in an abusive home since childhood.
“I told Miriam this, but I will just repeat it. I am so thankful that she shared her story. It is so powerful and such an important story because I know it is not easy to be that vulnerable.” the 31-year-old media personality said.
“I am also thankful on a deeper level because that was my lived reality for a few years until my mom left my dad. I think she left him when I was in, I think, class 5, class six…. But my dad was super abusive, like physically abusive.”
Adelle Onyango remembers how insecure she was as a child when she used to hear her father’s car approaching her house not knowing how her father would react every single day that he came back home.
She was really happy about her mother finally left him for the sake of her safety, sanity, and her children that she would forever be happy about that decision.
She used to have serious anxiety despite her being a child when her father was around, she couldn’t be free with her father.
“The anxiety that would come when I’d hear his car horn, like when he’d come home in the evening, it was intense.
I was just thinking…. and Imagine at that age, I was thinking would he be violent today or will it be a peaceful night, silently trying to make a deal with God praying, ‘Please just let him be peaceful today, and I’ll make sure I do ABC, and I am so thankful that my mother left him.
It was such a huge act of love for herself first and then a huge act of love for my sisters and I. When I look back, I’m just like I am so thankful she left him,” she said.
Finally revealing why she’s always happy and always smiling, Adelle Onyango says she recently came to know the source of it all.
Apparently, she’s afraid of confrontation and anger, she learned this during one of her therapy sessions.
Adelle isn’t impressed by the way society, in a way or two usually normalizes violent homes and the effects it has not only on the spouse but also on the children in that household.
She has since been avoiding confrontations and any emotion that would trigger anger from anyone she’s close to that’s why she’s always smiling.
There’s hardly a day you will find Adelle Onyango not wearing a genuine smile on her face.
“I don’t know about other people or other countries, but here we have really normalized violent homes so much, and we ignore the effects it has.
Not only on the spouse getting abused but on the kids. For instance, I remember once in therapy, it came up, and I realized people always tell me I’m never angry and you are always smiling.
Related stories about Adelle Onyango:
- Adelle Onyango doesn’t regret quitting her radio job
- Adelle Onyango partners up with Trace FM for her ‘Legally Clueless’ podcast
- Social activist Adelle Onyango gets prestigious nomination for humanitarian of the year in Zuri Awards
The truth is I am very scared of anger. This actually just came up in therapy. I am scared of anger; I am scared of confrontation.” she went on.
Adelle would rather cut someone off rather than be involved in a confrontation with him/her since that would save her a lot of emotional entanglement with herself that might take her back to her childhood that involves her abusive father that she doesn’t want to be a part of.
“And so if someone wrongs me, I will either just cut them off; by the way, blocking people and just cutting them off is the easiest thing I can do once I see we are heading in a direction where we will end up in a confrontation or worse off anger.
I remember my therapist telling me I can communicate whenever someone angers me or when I get myself in a confrontation that I can communicate that without it getting abusive.
For me, anger has always been synonymous with abuse, violence, confrontation, yelling, screaming, just a mess. I just stay away from such emotions and obviously many other things,” she continued.
This is the very first time Adelle Onyango has opened up like this about her past, especially about her abusive father that not a lot of people knew about it.
Above anything else, Adelle Onyango towered through her trials and tribulations to become the powerful woman she is today, and for that we commend her, appreciate her and support her.
