I’ll Soon Leave My Wife And Children

Dear Agatha,

I just want to say you are really doing a great job through your words of wisdom.

Please, I need your advice on what to do about the situation in my home. I have been married for about eight years now. I am in my mid 30s while my wife is in her early 30s.

Unfortunately, my wife still behaves as if she doesn’t know the responsibilities that come with being married. Her idea of being married is to issue frequent queries to me, get into unnecessary arguments with me or nag me at every opportunity. Whenever she does any form of housework, she becomes combative. Even though I am always at a loss as to why she picks up a fight whenever she does the housework, to avoid problems I assist her tend to the children, keep the house clean and all the other housework but sadly nothing pleases her. She nags and complains.

Agatha, many a time, I have felt like running away from my home and marriage which is blessed with two wonderful children who are seven and four years.

Please, what can I do because I am almost at the end of my sanity and would soon erupt if the situation persists in my home? At this stage, I really don’t care what becomes of the marriage any more.

Ernest.

Dear Ernest,

I understand the emotional trauma of having a bad home but that is not enough reason for you to want to pack up your marriage. Show me a marriage that is 100 per cent free of stress and I would show you a liar. There is no marriage without its fair share of problems and compromises. A lot of those marriages we think are perfect have gone through very tough baptism of fire. Divorce is not always the first option or solution to matrimonial problems rather it compounds the problem, which keeps expanding as the children get older and wiser.

What you think is a problem may after all not be as difficult as it appears. Just concentrate on those grey areas and also learn to be a little bit firm. Household chores fall under the portfolio of the woman of the house. It is her duties to keep her home clean, care for the children and you. It isn’t your duty. Yours is to ensure the bills are paid as and when due, be the shoulder for all of them to lean on in good times and in bad times, spend time with the family and give them all the love they need.

Helping her with the housework is because you want to, not because you have to. It is an abnormality for the woman of the house to sit down and watch her man do the house chores. It is wrong.

Sit her down and explain all these to her without getting angry. This is no time to be bossy or to show unnecessary anger. Compromises can only work if the two people in a marriage are willing to invest in it. Where only one person makes all the effort, the union becomes endangered because the party would get tired. Granted, her behaviour leaves much to be desired. You are also not being fair to your marriage and yourself by doing all those things simply because your wife nags. By so doing, you are denying her of the chance to be responsible, allowing her to set the wrong values for your children.

And one of the dangers of such actions is what you are feeling now. You have boxed yourself into a very precarious situation, you feel like packing it up because you can no longer continue with the pattern you have established in your home. If the truth must be told, you encouraged the behaviour of your wife.

To get out of it, call her for a serious re-evaluation of the situation in your home. Be very honest about your feelings as this is no time to pretend you are happy with the situation when in actual fact you feel like putting as much distance between the two of you as possible. Start by explaining to her what you expect of her as a wife and mother and what is expected of you as a husband and father. Continue by sharing your innermost feelings and fears with her. Don’t hold anything back from her.

Doubtless, the part about you wanting to runaway from home would shock her into reality. No sane woman takes pride in a broken home. There are underlying factors influencing her mode of behaviour. The dialogue would help you find out and address them permanently.

Don’t also forget to invite God into your home. Even though you are the physical head, He is the spiritual head of the family so take your marriage to the only one that has the powers to make perfect imperfect situations.

Good luck.

My Husband Frustrates, Cheats On Me

Dear Agatha,

I am married with a child. My marriage is two years old. Frankly speaking, I am not finding this marriage easy or interesting. Recently, my husband introduced a lady to me as his village sister because both of them are from the same neighborhood.  

I didn’t know they were dating until the day God exposed them. I know he has been cheating on me but decided for peace sake to look the other way, but this one is just too much for me to bear. I am finding it very difficult to forget. Please help me.

Vanessa.

Dear Vanessa,

The worst thing that can happen to any marriage is unfaithfulness. It creates incurable injury in the relationship between the couple. It brings about doubts, low esteem on the part of the person being cheated on, destroys trust as well as generates a deep valley of pains and sense of acute betrayal.

However, the alternative choice is often not an easy one especially for the woman. To quit is to give the stranger in the marriage the opportunity of coming in to be the bona-fide occupant of a home in which she was previously a stranger.

The reluctance of the society to support a woman to quit her home comes from the knowledge that extra-martial affairs is common with most men and quitting one marriage as a result of it is one of the most unwise things for any woman to do.

The reality many women face in their marriages is that of the other woman.  Whether women like it or not, acknowledge it or not, in most marriages, there is always the other woman. A woman practically knows when to push and when to simply keep quiet and allow the natural sequence of life take its course.

Doubtless, this man has been very unfair to you but quitting has never been an option at all. Should you quit now, a time would come again when you feel the urge to be with a man and settle down into another companionship. What happens if that man turns out to be another womaniser, heart breaker? Would you also quit to try with another person? 

Life at every point we find ourselves, is a process of choices as well as sacrifices. More than any other institution in the world, marriage demands the greatest sacrifice as well as determination. It begins with so much hope but holds the worst pains, disappointments and sacrifices. Only a fool sees marriage as a jolly train ride. For any marriage to breathe a sigh of relief and point others at how to go and avoid the slippery path, it must have gone through its own challenges. This is the stage for you to build character into your relationship, giving the skeleton flesh and recognisable features that will make your story telling and counsel to others going through similar challenges worth listening to.

Marriage is about patience, selflessness, tolerance and a firm determination to make it work at all cost. Betrayal or not, he remains your husband, one you have to learn to tolerate. He has become your albatross; one you must employ wisdom and grace of God to live with. You both grew up as two separate entities before becoming an item. Your moral and social attitudes are different and for both of you to achieve your reason for being together, a lot of wisdom and friendship must be invested to insure your relationship with your husband.

Therefore, refusing to let go of the memories will only keep increasing your anger and pains of betrayal. Granted he lied to you about the lady being his village sister, is frustrating yourself the right panacea to the issue at hand?

Don’t allow whatever the motive of both your husband and this lady for lying to you affect your relationship with your husband and reason for deciding to marry him in the first place. You must have recognised something special in him that made you decide on him from the number of men that asked for your hand in a relationship. 

Certainly, his conduct falls short of what is expected from a loved one but the best way to fight an aggressive opponent especially in marriage is for the woman of the house to be calm and calculative. 

You have to be calm to get your husband to listen to your complaints and hurt. One thing is for your husband to see your anger; it is another thing for him to feel your pains and disappointment. Being calculative makes it possible for you to know when he isn’t in the mood to be receptive to your discussions or query about the nature of his relationship with his so-called village sister. 

Truly, this is where you have to take stock, consider the future of your child as well as your reasons for marrying this man. You didn’t marry him because you were forced into it, but because he held something special for you. Don’t allow any other woman take away your dreams from you without struggling to fight for what is yours. This man is yours, licensed, sealed and delivered to you by the laws of God and man. Don’t let pride ever get in the way of ensuring you don’t lose your license to another woman. Only a woman who isn’t sure of what she is doing with her man gives up her home without putting up a fight to protect her space.

No matter how much you are hurting, set it aside and ask yourself what your own faults are as a woman. Why and when did he become a womaniser? When did it graduate from an off thing to habitual? Has it to do with your attitude towards him, the quality of your image, housekeeping, care of him as your husband? How much time and respect do you have for him? What kind of interest do you show in his work, business and person? Beyond being your husband, is he your friend? Are you both able to laugh with or at each other? Do you take any interest in his interests, friends and other things that make him happy? Marriage isn’t just about both of you sleeping together and making babies. There is more to it. It is a meeting of the body, spirit and soul. It is trying to live in the body of the other person. 

To make this marriage work, you must teach him how to love and respect you first as a person and later as his wife. Integrity and respect insure marriage from the devastation that comes from the process of two different people trying to make a life together. 

Over time, you would come to have the understanding to manage this traditional problem in most marriages. By the time you come to understand what you want from life and this marriage, believe me, these other women won’t matter as much as they bother you now. Not even the current threat presented by his so-called village sister would frighten you as much as it does now. 

Silence is what you need most now, because with the kind of emotions going on inside you, you risk rocking the fragile chord of your marriage by confronting him now. What he needs to bring him back home is to present him with a better alternative to what these other women give him.

Look at his other women; put yourself in the position of his mistress. As his mistress, what would you do to wrestle power from the hands of these other women? In addition to using your body, use your money and knowledge of him as the man you have lived with for two years to get him back. Because those women don’t have the stake you have in his life, don’t expend energy fighting them or him. That will only divert you from what you have to do. Also don’t listen to friends who may want to discourage you from adopting humility as a weapon.

In war, anything is considered fair. So, get books that deal with love-making and improved relationship. Read them; apply your new knowledge on him. Woo him with gifts, well-cooked food and sexy cloths. Make him jealous with a new haircut and clothes. Listen to his criticism of you and turn it around as your strong point.

Above all, pray away these women rather than fight them physically. God has his heart in his hands and he can effortlessly make these women become irritable to him. All you have to do is learn to trust God and let him reign over your home.

Don’t expect this to be easy; but by the time he comes to realise that despite all he is doing with other women you are still very patient and caring for him, he would eventually come back to you. Whereas, fighting him would only drive him further away from you. Patience builds, while pride destroys.

Be careful to do the right thing for your child and marriage.

Good luck.

I’m Fed Up With Boys

Dear Agatha,

I am facing the greatest challenge of my life. I am 19 years of age and have a boyfriend who beats me so much while he still seeing his ex-girlfriend. What baffles me is his claim that he loves me. Because of the way he is treating me, I decided to pack up the relationship. 

During this time, I met another boy who also claims to be in love with me. Unfortunately, I discovered along the line that all the stories he told me about himself were nothing but lies. I have made up my mind to quit the relationship. Meanwhile, my ex-boyfriend is pleading with me to come back and give him a second chance. I am fed up with boys. I don’t know what to do.

Sandra 

Dear Sandra,

Sincerely, you don’t need this kind of experience at your age. You have too much going for you to allow any man at this stage in your life turn you into a punching bag.

If you begin your life enduring abusive relationship, what would you do when you are older and married? No matter how irritating women get, no man has the right to beat them because of the love they share.

Frankly speaking, this isn’t the kind of man you need in your life. At 19, you need a man to love, appreciate, understand and support you to build confidence in yourself. In a situation where you are already being subjected to violence in your relationship, you unwittingly expose yourself to the danger of an unbalanced emotional relationship. 

But that is also not to say that you may not be guilty of encouraging this violence in this relationship. To be very candid, not many men have what it takes to withstand the violent nature of the tongue of most women. If violence has become the hallmark of your relationship with this man, he alone cannot take the blame. You must, for the sake of posterity, check on your own attitude, character, disposition to him and relationship as well as your conduct with other people, especially men. 

Just as it takes two to tangle, so also it takes two to destroy something very special. Granted that he presents himself as less than a man by beating you, it is in your interest to also be truthful to yourself if you intend to go far with another man. It is always easier for us to shift all the blame to another person, conveniently ignoring our own contributions to the situation we find ourselves in. 

What makes him beat you and when does he do that? What are the situations between the two of you that give birth to this violence? If you are in the habit of hauling insults at him, disrespecting him at will, ignoring his dislikes and pretending you only has the wisdom to conduct this relationship, there is bound to be conflict and a man who has the propensity towards violence would find himself beating you even before he has the time to think out his actions properly.

To help prevent a re-occurrence of this ugly incident in your future relationship, it is pertinent and in your interest too, to take a holistic view of this relationship. It is the only way you can do what is right; see your own faults and delete those things in your life that will not agree with most men. This will also help you to decide whether ••the cause of his violence is from you or not, just as it would also enable you decide whether you should consider taking him back.

And if you do decide you want to go back, it is also important both of you sit to discuss your welfare in this relationship. Like I said, a real man doesn’t go about beating his woman. A man can still assert his authority in a relationship, put his woman under check by merely looking at her without even saying anything. It all depends on the level of maturity of the man and how much respect he has earned from the woman.

Use the opportunity of his coming back to beg you to put some sanity into the relationship. If you love him enough, forgive him, but be wise in ensuring you don’t go back to the same situation. 

If you must, don’t rush into it. Insist on being friends first, something you obviously didn’t insist on before now. If you are both friends first before being lovers, relegating sex to the background and erecting all the right structures that make relationship absolutely rich and interesting, violence will eventually be relegated to the background. 

As a woman you must learn to be patient, supportive and understanding in any relationship.

As for the second man, you didn’t give yourself enough time to know him, recover from the pains of your previous relationship before rushing into it. 

Generally, you must have a clear idea of the kind of man that would make you very happy before contemplating any relationship. You are obviously having all these problems because you lack a vision for your life.

Having a master plan for your life would go a long way in helping you to build your love life along positive lines. To do it right, ask God for help.

Good luck.