If the aggrieved woman let out a cry of grievance, once women hear it, they know that things are not good. All women will then gather, dress in war g… - Nwando Achebe

The Igbo people have a saying that a child who is carried on the back does not realize that walking is a painful activity

None ever did and in fact, I haven’t seen it in my life time, but my father talked about this, telling a story about a man who committed suicide after this thing happened to him.

Sitting on a man is the most extreme sanction that Igbo women have when they want to punish a man. For example: if a man continues to ill-treat a woman, the women groups Otu Umu Ada, Otu Ndi ama Ala, the title societies, the market women, the woman can go to one of these groups to report him and there, they will decide which punishment to mete out on him. They can decide to boycott their matrimonial duties or sit on the man. In one village, the women asked the men to clear the path to a stream and the men refused. The women got together and declared a boycott. They boycotted cooking, so, men could not eat for few days. They went to their mothers’ houses and their mothers told them they were not cooking, the same with their wives. Again, sitting on a man is the most extreme sanction; it only happened if other sanctions have failed.