In 1993, when Lorena Bobbitt cut off her then husband’s penis and threw it into a field, I was only six-years-old. But with an action like that, Bobbitt’s name would be floating around in the lexicon for years to come. Not only were there a ton of news stories about her, there were pop culture references, jokes and a whole lot more. So it wasn’t long before I had to ask my parents who she was.
They told me that she had cut off her husband’s penis.
What they didn’t tell me was that she claimed her husband raped her that very same night. But it wasn’t just the rape. She claimed that her husband John Bobbitt forced her to have an abortion, consistently threw his infidelity in her face and emotionally, physically and sexually abused her. With the exception of the the rape allegation, there were witnesses to support that she had indeed been abused and that it had escalated since the beginning of their marriage in 1989.
After Lorena Bobbitt was found not guilty by way of temporary insanity, from all the abuse she’d endured, she and her husband parted ways. She went by her maiden name and tried to keep a low profile, while John Bobbitt starred in a porno, John Wayne Bobbitt: Uncut , to make money. (Once authorities located John’s penis they were able to successfully reattach it.)
Recently, Lorena appeared on the Steve Harvey show to talk about how her life has changed since that summer night in 1993.
She talked about how she’d remarried a man named Dave Bellinger, who never mentions the incident that made her a household name. The couple now have a 10-year-old daughter and even opened a foundation for victims of domestic violence, which I will expound upon later.
But what I found most interesting is the fact that she said her ex-husband made several attempts to contact her.
She told Harvey, “He tried, but I always deleted his number.”
She didn’t say much right then, but a quick wikipedia search revealed that the couple appeared together on “The Insider” in 2009, in their first meeting since their divorce. After saying he didn’t realize she was so sensitive, he apologized to Lorena for the way he treated her during their marriage and Lorena told the world that he still sent her Valentine’s Day cards and flowers. John said that it was a friend of his that was contacting her, not him.
Crazy.
If any good came of this situation, it’s the organization Lorena founded, called “Lorena’s Red Wagon.”
She told Harvey,
“It basically helps women and children through family-oriented activities…I can provide for them. When a victim leaves the house they don’t have time to pack. They just have the first opportunity to leave. If any child in the shelter has a birthday we bring cakes…I want to bring hope to women and children of domestic abuse, and that’s what we do.”
As you might assume, Harvey was full of jokes when Bobbitt first came on stage. But by the end of the interview, he commended her for turning her tragedy into a vehicle to help other battered women and their children.
You can watch her interview with Harvey in the video below.
