I’m Married But In Love With Another Man
Dear Agatha,
Thank you so much for the wonderful work you are doing. I am a young woman who needs your candid advice as I am really heartbroken.
Although I am married, I met another man and fell in love with him. I must confess I have never fallen in love before I met this guy not even with my husband. When he had financial problems, I came to his rescue and even paid for the education of his five children, fed him and his wife, in fact I spent all I had on this guy. When he became diabetic, I paid his hospital expenses including buying all his drugs.
I also took out a loan from my bank to pay for his ticket when he wanted to travel to the United Kingdom. In the process of assisting him, I lost my job. I didn’t mind because I thought he loved me. He was always there, giving me moral support whenever I was having problems. He stopped writing or calling immediately he got to the United Kingdom and called me recently to say he is now in love with a friend of mine and that I should not call him again.
Now that I have lost my job and I’m left with nothing, he dumps me. I feel terribly bad because I thought he was going to stand by me as he used to. Though he promised to refund some of the money especially the loan I took for him, he never did. He is now rich in the United Kingdom to the extent that he is building a house in Nigeria.
I am very bitter and wish him to return to his old self.
My husband is a man who flaunts his affairs with women in my face, he is never there for me and we cannot discuss as husband and wife. I have tried all I could to change him but all to no avail. We have been married for 20 years now. He is always in and out of relationships with women; it is really frustrating but with God I am coping as I have resigned to fate.
Frustrated Wife.
Dear Frustrated Wife,
That your husband is having affairs is no excuse for you to do what you did. Having been married for 20 years, you ought to know better than to do what you did. What examples are you showing your children, especially the girls among them? Are you encouraging them to go into extramarital affairs when they are having problems in their own marriages?
If the marriage is so bad, why are you still there? Why not quit and be free to pursue whatever relationship you desire? Why stay in your husband’s house to have an affair? What were you expecting from this relationship? Were you expecting fulfilment from a man who has five children, wife and his challenges as a man? If this man defrauded you emotionally and financially, it is because you put yourself in a position to be so treated. He didn’t ask you to be so gullible and unthinking. He took what you offered him and played you for the person you presented yourself to be.
Did you think he would leave his family for you? He wasn’t having problem with his marriage, just his finances. You were the one having problems with your man, not him so he had no reason to walk away from his own marriage. Besides, you are also married and living with a man so what you both had was a secret love affair, something dirty and shameful, never to be advertised because of the mess and scandal it would bring not only to the two of you but the embarrassment to people around you. If he told you he loved you, it was only because that was what you gave him the impression you wanted to hear. Seeing how willing you were to do anything for him, telling you he loved you was the only way he could compensate you and make you do more for him.
If it were something to be proud of, you would have since made so much noise about it especially as the person who took him over from you happens to be your friend. It was an illegitimate thing, a bad gamble you should not even mention to anyone.
Sincerely, this man has no blame whatsoever. If you were careless enough to put your job on the line for him, can you blame him? You didn’t value your job else you would have thought twice of investing your money and essence on a man who has a wife and five children and who from your narration didn’t promise you anything.
In your interest as well as those of your children and marriage, do yourself a big favour and forget about this man. You have paid the price for your lack of discretion. Allow the matter rest.
As for your marriage and habit of your husband, there is the need for you to look inwards. If for 20 years, your husband’s passion for other woman hasn’t changed, then something must be wrong somewhere.
Apart from the possibility of a spiritual angle to it, what are your own contributions to the situation in your home? While I am not ruling out the reality of him being one of those men who take delight in chasing after everything in skirt, not caring if their wives get hurt in the process, there is also the need for you to look at your own contributions to the problem in your home. No matter how bad your husband is, there must be something, no matter how insignificant, that is encouraging him to be behaving the way he is doing.
How are you treating the issue of his infidelity? Do you nag or fight him over it? Chances are if you fight him, he would continue to do so because you have exposed him to your vulnerability. He knows fighting and nagging are the worst you can do, hence you have demystified your invisibility as a woman fighting for her happiness. No war has ever been won when you expose your opponent to the limit of your strength. The secret key to wining a battle, no matter how minute is to keep quiet while you fight back. No man feels comfortable when he is aware that his wife knows all about his secret affairs and yet remains unperturbed and appears not to notice. A lot of men get scared when the woman at home adopts such a position. Overtime conscience and people around would make them think twice.
If you have been nagging him, stop and pretend you have come to terms with the person he is. The best weapon of any woman desirous of happiness in her home is prayer, followed by patience and acceptance of the situation.
There is no battle God cannot win. As you must have found out, having an affair is not a solution, instead it has led you to a greater problem because now you no longer have a job and must now depend on the generosity of your husband to survive. You are now forced to eat the humble pie to get him to foot your bills. Now he is the victor while you are the victim of a situation for which you ideally should have been the one having the last laugh. Sincerely, no man likes to be told what he can do and cannot do.
Going out with another man, you betrayed the covenant you entered into with God to remain faithful to your husband. The consequences are more on you, because men from the time of creation are polygamist by nature. What a woman would do and be condemned, a man will get a standing ovation for from the society.
Whereas, if you had depended on God from the very moment you noticed his behaviour, allowing the spirit of God take control and direct your every move, today, you would have had a testimony to tell. Many women, who have husbands like you and know the powers of prayers, have learnt to use it effectively while appearing to give their husbands the freedom to misbehave.
There are so many battles in marriage, which are purely spiritual; such battles require the intervention of God only. If you attempt to fight such battles on your own powers or strength, you suffer needlessly and massively.
To ensure God comes into your marriage and home, go to Him first to ask for forgiveness of the many mistakes you have made so far before requesting His presence in your home and life.
Handing over the battle of your husband’s weakness to Him, is the only way you can get him interested in you alone. Because God isn’t a magician, you will need patience to endure the in-between period to victory.
Good luck.
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