Doubting Her Sincerity To Marry Me

Dear Agatha, 

Please, help me once again concerning my teenage sweetheart. Between September last year and December, I was responsible for the provisions of her daily needs. 

Being in Abuja for university education, she request of me to help provide her accommodation since I stay on campus. Although, I promised last year to help her out on this, I later changed my mind, because of what happened between my ex-fiancée and me.

I eventually spoke to a friend of mine who lives in Abuja to help accommodate her for me. He agreed and told me she would live with his sisters. 

When I told her of the arrangement I made, she declined insisting she wanted a place of her own. I then gave her the go ahead to look for a house. Last month she called to say she has gotten an accommodation, and that she wanted to share the place with a friend of hers so they can share the bills equally. 

She sent me a text message days later to inform me that someone else was about renting the house they saw, and so asked if I was still going to help her as promised. I was very angry when I got the text because it was devoid of any romantic sentiments. For all she cares, I could be just another person in her life. I didn’t bother to reply the text message and didn’t call either.  She however called me on Feb 13, to wish me a Happy Valentine. She also requested we chat online. When she came online, I took the opportunity to present her with the package I have in mind for her, a marriage proposal I told her I would be coming back home in Easter to implement. I told her I needed her response since I plan on buying the wedding things before coming back to the country. 

To my shock, she told me marriage is not something we can discuss online that, besides she doesn’t know me, despite the fact that she and I have known each other for 12 years. 

She told me that she asked me for money to get an accommodation, but I refused because I don’t care about her. I was angry and told her that I am now convinced she wants me for the money she can milk from me and not because she cares for me in any way. 

To my dismay, she told me she was ready to refund whatever amount of money I have spent on her. I really don’t know what this woman wants from me. I love her so much, what should I do to have her, Agatha? 

At 32, I need a mother of my children not just a wife. Besides, my mother is desirous I get married.
Worried Anewday.

Dear Worried Anewday,

Why make promises you have no intentions of honouring? Sincerely, it marks you out as someone who isn’t serious and grossly uncaring. The ability to honour one’s promises underscores the worth of that person. That you kept making promises to this woman you knew you had no intentions of keeping is wrong even if you have reasons to doubt her love for you.  The real test of our worthiness as human beings is our ability to keep to our words at all times because the God who created us decreed us into existence as well as the world we live in by the power of words. 

If she is angry due to your inability to keep to the promises you made to her, she has the right to be. At this point, it is not her motive for dating you that is the issue, but that you have failed to make good your promises to her.  For this reason, you are wrong in the sense that you made her hope on something you knew from the beginning you had no intentions of keeping. 

Had you told her from the beginning when she requested you rent a place for her that you are not in the position to do so or won’t do it because of your experiences with your ex, then she would have been wrong to go ahead to look for a place and insist you pay for it. Not only did you make a u-turn, but also attempted to force her into a situation that could have ignited another problem. Asking her to go and live with your friend, someone she doesn’t know instead of the house you promised her wasn’t fair. And when she complained, rather than telling the reason you are foot-dragging on the house issue, you again promised to send her money, which you also didn’t keep. If the truth must be told, there is no way she can be happy with you or ever take serious another promise from you. You may have taken care of her in the past, all these you did because you wanted to and not because of a promise you made to her. 

How is she sure your marriage proposal isn’t another empty promise, one you would again have reasons not to fulfill? 

This is the impression you have to work at clearing from her mind. She must know at every point in the relationship that you are dependable. 

Because of the problems generated by the clumsy way you handled the issue of her accommodation, you should have waited until you came back to discuss the issue of marriage. She is right, things like that don’t get discussed in haste especially as you both live so far apart. 

Knowing each other for 12 years is quite different from knowing if you both have the right kind of quality for marriage. She has to know who you really are, and you know who she really is. Image may be everything for motivational speakers and advertisers, but when it comes relationships and marriages, it takes more than image to make it work. It takes peeling the surface of the package, peeping into the real substance of one’s partner to know if the person is worth spending one’s life with. 

From your story, you and this lady are, at best, familiar strangers. From everything that is happening between the two of you, it is very obvious that you both are holding the wrong end of the stick. You both need time to clear up the misconceptions generated by the house fiasco to be able to move forward. 

Don’t give up on her yet. Yes, her attitude may appear frightening and disappointing to you, but so also is your own attitude.

Resist the temptation of allowing what your former girlfriend did to you influence your current relationship. It would be the greatest mistake and injustice to yourself and this lady, because such negative feeling will never allow you to settle sufficiently into another relationship and give it the necessary boost to work.

Having made up your mind to quit your previous relationships, bury all the memories of what happened between you and your ex. Allow your new girlfriend make her mistakes just as you are susceptible to making yours. These mistakes are what give your relationship character and proper definition. If you are unable to define who both of you are based on these mistakes, it will be difficult to grow your relationship.

Coming back home will give you both the opportunity to study each other, observe some salient points which nobody ever mentions, but are crucial to the overall success of your living together. 

Be honest enough to tell her your misgivings about her as well as your reason for not keeping your promises to rent a house for her. Let her know about your hidden fears, generated in you by your ex. Properly handled by you, she will come to understand you better just as you are also expected to give her the freedom to operate as herself. 

That your mother is expecting you to get married or that at your age, you ought to be married isn’t enough reason for you to take a blind leap into the institution without clearing some basic hurdles that are capable of making your marriage regrettable. 

God never does anything without a reason. Go to God in prayers, because this concerns Him more than you. Without the right woman by your side to compliment your efforts, create the right environment at home for you to function as a man, give the right kind of understanding to make you succeed at your business or career, exercise the right kind of patience to give you confidence as a man even when all the indices are pointing to the opposite, it will be difficult for you to achieve your dreams in life. To this end, you must ask God to point you at the right kind of woman whose passion will be to make you happy even when you are very naughty. She has to be a friend to be able to forgive you anything.

Good luck.