With Auntie Agatha, gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com,Tel: 08054500626
Dear Agatha,
I have been dating this man for over three years but we have never had sex because I am still a virgin.
The idea of no sex came from me and he graciously agreed to my terms. We are both undergraduates in different schools and hardly have enough time to be with each other due to distance of our schools.
We only get to see once in four or five months but we are constantly communicating with each other. Distance hasn’t affected our relationship. He loves me so much; even his family members adore me. He is brilliant, hardworking, caring and God fearing. He wants to marry me in future but I am finding it very difficult to give him a clear answer because he is of average height. I have always dreamt of marrying a tall man. I am a bit taller than he is.
Please I need your advice. Kindly counsel me on what to do.
Ann.
Dear Ann,
Marriage doesn’t function on the physical looks of the couple, but on what they both have inside of them. You may have dreamt of marrying a man who is tall and handsome but if God didn’t create your ideal man in that mould, what are you going to do?
Height isn’t one of those things you discover about people as the days go by; it is an obvious thing, something one notices in a person instantly. Why did you agree to his offer of friendship when you knew he wasn’t your kind of man? Why did it take you three precious years of your life to come to this realisation that a relationship you have laboured tirelessly to build isn’t worth keeping on the premise of the man’s height?
There is something you aren’t saying. Whatever that thing or whoever he or she may be, just be sure you are sincere to yourself because you would be the one to suffer the regrets at the end of the day.
How exactly has his lack of your ideal height affected the quality of your relationship with him? Granted that you need to massage your dreams, but when one gets to the junction of naked reality, some dreams simply have to die if one hopes to stay happy in life.
In life the barometer to gauge our happiness and fulfillment in life remains the quality of our relationships. Only a few can function at full capacity while in very bad and disturbing relationships. For the majority, something would always be missing in their lives once their relationship is showing signs of problems.
Before you lose one man you will never be able to replace in your life, no matter how much you try; take real time out to reflect on your three years with him. How would you rank these years? That he didn’t harass you into submitting to his sexual desires, allowed you the freedom to keep your vows, shows a man matured and extremely understanding.
A lot of young men his age would always want to experiment with sex irrespective of whatever agreement they entered into with the girls in their lives.
If for three years, he didn’t, then it underscores a man with a strong character and a deep sense of responsibility. These are rare attributes; ones very sensible women are looking for in their men.
You will understand more of life if you have the benefit of listening to a lot of women and men who have suffered emotional disability due to wrong values marketed during their youths.
Life is a journey of strong and stormy winds. Everybody needs a friend to restore confidence in one’s ability when those challenges come. As a woman you would need the support of a very friendly and supportive husband to help you realise your ambitions in life.
You would need more than the height and looks of your partner to be contented in a marriage.
Perhaps you need to take time out to reflect on those things you think are important and what is really important at the end of the day to you and your future.
If you are astute enough you will discover your answers right in your heart, know what you should do. But, more often than not the problem is accepting what would work for us. From time immemorial, the struggle to submit to the will of God for us is tougher than doing what we think is right. Life is about whom we are and not what we are or look like.
To get a good perspective to what is right and wrong for you, please go to God in prayers. It is always important you submit to His will always. Allow His spirit to direct you rightly.
Good luck.
Monday, March 28, 2011
I quit my marriage for my boyfriend
Marriage Clinic with Auntie Agatha Edo; email; gataedo@yahoo.com; agatha.edo@gmail.com; 08054500626
Dear Agatha,
I got married six years ago to a man I never really liked from the beginning. I agreed to marry him because I was under intense pressure from my family members to marry. Being the only child of my parents, they wanted grandchildren.
I tried to explain to them that the man I truly loved wasn’t ready. Besides he was abroad trying to make things better for us. Initially, my parents agreed but on my 29th birthday, they gave me an ultimatum of three months to bring my own choice of a husband or they would force me to marry their best friend’s son who has never hidden his interest in me.
I didn’t know what to do. I tried in vain to get in touch with my man but he was unreachable. The friend whose contact I often use to get him too wasn’t going through.
For six months, I didn’t hear anything from him. I had no clue what was happening. Meanwhile, the pressures kept mounting so I was forced into agreeing to marry one of the men who wanted my hand in marriage.
I honestly tried to love him but I just couldn’t bring myself to. My love for my boyfriend was just too strong to let go. A year after my marriage, I got to know through a friend of mine the reason he stopped communicating with me. The hardship in that country made him marry a citizen of that country.
She made him change his phone number. She also destroyed his former sim card, threatening to report him to the authorities as a drug peddler if he does as much as call home. She gave me a number and when I called, it turned out to be him. He gave me specific time to call him. When I was able to talk to him, he told me he never stopped loving me and that he did what he did to make life comfortable for us.
I told him about my marriage and son. He told me not to worry that he would marry me when he comes back.
Perhaps this caused my carelessness and attitude to my husband. I became very rude to the point he had to report me to my parents. Still nothing changed. At a point I didn’t care if he got to know about my boyfriend. Whenever he called, I would take his calls irrespective of whether or not my husband was listening to my conversation.
When he could no longer tolerate the situation, he took some of his things and relocated to one of his flats.
I was glad but it was short lived when I discovered I was almost four months pregnant. He came back to be with me. I had twins and it was while I was nursing the twins my ex- boyfriend came back.
I left my 10 months old twins, their elder brother and husband to follow my boyfriend. I went with him to Ghana. He gave me the impression that he had come to take me back with him only for me to discover after staying with him for eight weeks that he didn’t have the intention of doing that. He left me in the hotel one night with the impression that he was going to see a business partner.
I didn’t know he was travelling back to his base that night until the next morning when the hotel staff brought a note he left for me at the reception. He begged me to forgive him that he had no intention of marrying me because he was happy with his wife and children. He told me to go back to my husband and family. In addition to my ticket back home, he gave me two thousand dollars to start a business of my choice.
I don’t know what to do anymore.
I discovered too late that I loved my husband and want my family back but I don’t know how to go about it or face my husband for that matter. My parents have washed their hands off even though they are the ones caring for my children.
Cyn.
Dear Cyn,
You did act very irresponsibly and you unjustly hurt a man whose only crime was to love and care for you. That your husband came back after he left home, when you became pregnant with the twins underscores his love for you.
Only a man who is caring would endure the humiliation of listening to his wife converse in intimacy with another man without going physical with her.
A lot of men would have beaten the living daylight out of you for such show of disrespect and impudence.
The irony of life is what you are experiencing now. A lot of us don’t know the value of what we have until we are at the point of losing it or have lost it entirely.
The issue here is more than your husband. He alone cannot take you back because you have disrespected everyone involved with your marriage; your children, parents, in-laws and him.
It isn’t just that you abandoned your children but left your home and family to follow a man. What manner of love would make you abandon ten months old babies or your home for that matter?
Frankly, you didn’t act like a mother at all, let alone a wife. If for eight weeks you didn’t feel the urge to be with your babies and would have actually left them if the man hadn’t abandoned you, what guarantees are there for your parents and husband that you won’t leave them again if this man does as much as snap his fingers at you? What assurances are you going to give your husband that you won’t hurt or humiliate him again?
Love isn’t reckless; it is a feeling that goes with so much responsibilities as well as sacrifices. Love is also about wisdom; to know what is right and what isn’t. How would you feel if your husband had been the one who abandoned you with 10 months old twins and a son to be with another woman? How would you feel if he came back only after the other woman left him to be with her own family?
The questions you need to ask yourself before looking for ways to beg your husband and family is this; do you want your family back because you are now convinced that you really love him or because you have been left high and dry by the man you thought loved you as much as you loved him?
This question is critical to your recovery of your home and happiness. Your honest answer to it would determine the length you are ready to go, the humiliation you are ready to suffer in the course of getting your husband to take you back.
It is only after you have done this that you can ask God for forgiveness. The reason being if you aren’t convinced that you have come to stay through thick and thin with your man, chances are you would still hurt them beyond reason.
Forgiveness from God would help make things easier for you to redeem. At this critical stage, He is the only one who can help melt the heart of your husband, make him forgive you completely.
However, be realistic enough that it won’t be automatic and may not come very soon. Find your way back to your parents. No matter how badly you have behaved, you are still their child and only one at that. Their stance is normal. You not only disgraced them but presented them as bad parents who didn’t instill the right discipline in their child. I am sure if they hadn’t been this hard on you; you won’t realise the depth of pains you caused everyone with your behavior.
You must understand that they are under extreme pressure to ensure you don’t derail forever. Go to them and let them see how sorry you really are. Bear in mind that they have to see that you are truly sorry for them to ever trust you again. It might also take a while for them to take you back. The thing is for you not to give up; to win their hearts back and have access to your children.
Once you are able to win their trust again, they would be the ones to do the major job of reconciling you with your husband. The fact that he trusts them to care for his children shows the high regard he holds them.
If you patient, really sorry, responsible, respectful and steadfast in your resolve to win back your husband, overtime he would come back.
Just be prayerful that he hasn’t closed his mind against you forever. If he has, it would take the extra grace of God to make him change his mind.
Good luck.
Dear Agatha,
I got married six years ago to a man I never really liked from the beginning. I agreed to marry him because I was under intense pressure from my family members to marry. Being the only child of my parents, they wanted grandchildren.
I tried to explain to them that the man I truly loved wasn’t ready. Besides he was abroad trying to make things better for us. Initially, my parents agreed but on my 29th birthday, they gave me an ultimatum of three months to bring my own choice of a husband or they would force me to marry their best friend’s son who has never hidden his interest in me.
I didn’t know what to do. I tried in vain to get in touch with my man but he was unreachable. The friend whose contact I often use to get him too wasn’t going through.
For six months, I didn’t hear anything from him. I had no clue what was happening. Meanwhile, the pressures kept mounting so I was forced into agreeing to marry one of the men who wanted my hand in marriage.
I honestly tried to love him but I just couldn’t bring myself to. My love for my boyfriend was just too strong to let go. A year after my marriage, I got to know through a friend of mine the reason he stopped communicating with me. The hardship in that country made him marry a citizen of that country.
She made him change his phone number. She also destroyed his former sim card, threatening to report him to the authorities as a drug peddler if he does as much as call home. She gave me a number and when I called, it turned out to be him. He gave me specific time to call him. When I was able to talk to him, he told me he never stopped loving me and that he did what he did to make life comfortable for us.
I told him about my marriage and son. He told me not to worry that he would marry me when he comes back.
Perhaps this caused my carelessness and attitude to my husband. I became very rude to the point he had to report me to my parents. Still nothing changed. At a point I didn’t care if he got to know about my boyfriend. Whenever he called, I would take his calls irrespective of whether or not my husband was listening to my conversation.
When he could no longer tolerate the situation, he took some of his things and relocated to one of his flats.
I was glad but it was short lived when I discovered I was almost four months pregnant. He came back to be with me. I had twins and it was while I was nursing the twins my ex- boyfriend came back.
I left my 10 months old twins, their elder brother and husband to follow my boyfriend. I went with him to Ghana. He gave me the impression that he had come to take me back with him only for me to discover after staying with him for eight weeks that he didn’t have the intention of doing that. He left me in the hotel one night with the impression that he was going to see a business partner.
I didn’t know he was travelling back to his base that night until the next morning when the hotel staff brought a note he left for me at the reception. He begged me to forgive him that he had no intention of marrying me because he was happy with his wife and children. He told me to go back to my husband and family. In addition to my ticket back home, he gave me two thousand dollars to start a business of my choice.
I don’t know what to do anymore.
I discovered too late that I loved my husband and want my family back but I don’t know how to go about it or face my husband for that matter. My parents have washed their hands off even though they are the ones caring for my children.
Cyn.
Dear Cyn,
You did act very irresponsibly and you unjustly hurt a man whose only crime was to love and care for you. That your husband came back after he left home, when you became pregnant with the twins underscores his love for you.
Only a man who is caring would endure the humiliation of listening to his wife converse in intimacy with another man without going physical with her.
A lot of men would have beaten the living daylight out of you for such show of disrespect and impudence.
The irony of life is what you are experiencing now. A lot of us don’t know the value of what we have until we are at the point of losing it or have lost it entirely.
The issue here is more than your husband. He alone cannot take you back because you have disrespected everyone involved with your marriage; your children, parents, in-laws and him.
It isn’t just that you abandoned your children but left your home and family to follow a man. What manner of love would make you abandon ten months old babies or your home for that matter?
Frankly, you didn’t act like a mother at all, let alone a wife. If for eight weeks you didn’t feel the urge to be with your babies and would have actually left them if the man hadn’t abandoned you, what guarantees are there for your parents and husband that you won’t leave them again if this man does as much as snap his fingers at you? What assurances are you going to give your husband that you won’t hurt or humiliate him again?
Love isn’t reckless; it is a feeling that goes with so much responsibilities as well as sacrifices. Love is also about wisdom; to know what is right and what isn’t. How would you feel if your husband had been the one who abandoned you with 10 months old twins and a son to be with another woman? How would you feel if he came back only after the other woman left him to be with her own family?
The questions you need to ask yourself before looking for ways to beg your husband and family is this; do you want your family back because you are now convinced that you really love him or because you have been left high and dry by the man you thought loved you as much as you loved him?
This question is critical to your recovery of your home and happiness. Your honest answer to it would determine the length you are ready to go, the humiliation you are ready to suffer in the course of getting your husband to take you back.
It is only after you have done this that you can ask God for forgiveness. The reason being if you aren’t convinced that you have come to stay through thick and thin with your man, chances are you would still hurt them beyond reason.
Forgiveness from God would help make things easier for you to redeem. At this critical stage, He is the only one who can help melt the heart of your husband, make him forgive you completely.
However, be realistic enough that it won’t be automatic and may not come very soon. Find your way back to your parents. No matter how badly you have behaved, you are still their child and only one at that. Their stance is normal. You not only disgraced them but presented them as bad parents who didn’t instill the right discipline in their child. I am sure if they hadn’t been this hard on you; you won’t realise the depth of pains you caused everyone with your behavior.
You must understand that they are under extreme pressure to ensure you don’t derail forever. Go to them and let them see how sorry you really are. Bear in mind that they have to see that you are truly sorry for them to ever trust you again. It might also take a while for them to take you back. The thing is for you not to give up; to win their hearts back and have access to your children.
Once you are able to win their trust again, they would be the ones to do the major job of reconciling you with your husband. The fact that he trusts them to care for his children shows the high regard he holds them.
If you patient, really sorry, responsible, respectful and steadfast in your resolve to win back your husband, overtime he would come back.
Just be prayerful that he hasn’t closed his mind against you forever. If he has, it would take the extra grace of God to make him change his mind.
Good luck.
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