Days to our wedding his family say I can’t be trusted

By Auntie Agatha, gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com, Tel: 08054500626


Dear Agatha,

I just came across your e-mail and your blunt response to this guy that said he married for money. The article is very blunt.

I don’t know if you can help me. There is this old friend of mine in school, even though we are so much in love with each other, we cannot express it because we are in other relationships.

We again met last year after we lost contact for seven years. It was three months to my wedding day. Naturally, I was very happy to hear from him. Besides being an old friend, I still have some feelings for him.

One thing led to the other and he promised to marry me if I leave the man I was going to marry in three months time.

After much thoughts and knowing I love him more than the man I was going to marry, I gave in to him.

But I also decided to ask God for help through prayers. If the signs that followed my request were anything to go by, it would appear that God chose the first man. The second man started complaining about lack of money to continue with our wedding plans, which led to him saying he wanted the wedding ceremony postponed.

Gladly, I accepted since it was in response to my request. I also tried to keep up with the relationship but he wasn’t forthcoming with an alternative date for reasons best known to him. Well, his attitude gave me room to concentrate on my relationship with my old friend.

Things were really going on well between us until we had a disagreement. Being unable to resolve them on our own, I decided to involve his family in the matter. I honestly thought their involvement was for the better. Though they actually helped in resolving the first issue between us, it became another matter entirely when the second disagreement between my boyfriend and I came up.

Rather than resolve the issue at hand, they raked up an issue, which happened when we were in school eight years ago. It has to do with me dating a married man. I haven’t seen this man since I left school, but my boyfriend’s family is pegging their stance on that. They say we cannot get married because I dated a married man while in school.

In their opinion, any girl with such tendency is not only a flirt but cannot be trusted to be faithful in her own marriage.

To my pains, I later discovered that the information of my relationship with this married man came from my boyfriend and just two months to our wedding ceremony, the family has cancelled every plan.

Despite all this, I still love him, and I can bet my life he loves me and want me just like I want him, but he has kept saying that it would be suicidal for him to go against the wishes of his people since in his side of the country, marriage is not an individual thing but a communal arrangement.

His people very much in support of our relationship until the episode of me dating the married man came up. It is one month now since we have been having this problem.

We no longer talk like we used to. I get tempted to call him on a daily basis but I find myself holding back. The last time we talked he promised to be my backbone and my best friend. He said God knows everything and that He alone has the final say.

Agatha, the issue is, I cannot bring myself to forget him. He is constantly on my mind. I see him in everything I do and in my dreams. I feel him going through the same emotional turmoil I am going through. I truly love him.

I know only God sees the hearts of men but I want him in my life.

I have a feeling the mother is behind all our problems because he keeps saying unless he has his family’s support he cannot come back.

I pray day and night that God would show me signs and lead me on what to do. It is so hard for me. I know he truly loves me till this issue came up. We are both in our late 20s. I know if his mother tells him to come back he would because he loves me.

Agatha, I don’t know what to do. Do I keep waiting till he comes back or what? What should I do? I am so confused.

Confused Lady.





Dear Confused Lady,

What do you want from life? What do you understand by love? What values do you hold precious? What makes you think God would answer you this time when you didn’t listen to Him the first time?

Deep inside your mind, you have succeeded in misrepresenting the word love. Love isn’t selfish and painful like you to think. If this man really loves you as you have convinced yourself he does, why did he tell his family about a past he knows they would never approve of?

What were his intentions when he was telling them? To edify you or to destroy within his family circle? This is a question you should ask him. demand to know what he wanted to achieve by telling his family, especially his mother about a past he knows would count against you.

If he were truly in love with you as you seem to think, even if his family got to know about this from other sources, he would be the one denying on your behalf to protect you from ridicule and condemnation from his family members.

He knows his mother more than you and can tell what would upset her moral judgment. For him to have told her about your escapades as a young lady is to give him a perfect excuse to back out of the relationship without being obvious he is the one who cannot get over the type of life you lived as a young lady.

Also your willingness to jettison your boyfriend three months to your wedding ceremony with him for him when he came along could also be a reason for his apprehension. To be frank, what man would take a woman who had no qualms serious about abandoning a man she was altar bound to in three months for another man serious?

Your excitement at leaving your former boyfriend for him at short notice coupled with your past life are enough to him wonder at the type of woman he was getting married to and ponder on what moral values you really have.

Though he gladly puts the blame of his inability to keep up with your marriage plans on the laps of his mother, the truth is, deep down he doesn’t trust you to be a woman he can depend on.

He is afraid the same reasons you had for abandoning the other man for him may arise somewhere in your future and he would find himself gazing after your shadows because you didn’t stop to consider the feeling of others.

That woman you were dating her husband, how did you think she felt all those times her husband was with you, denying her and the children his time, resources and attention for you?

How did you think the man who was to marry you felt when he heard days after he started having problems, you were already in another relationship planning marriage?

You may think he knew nothing about what happened but there is nothing hidden under the sun. How did you think he felt when he complained about lack of money to continue with the wedding plans and instead of you to come up with alternative plans you left him alone to carry the burden. A wife material would do anything within her power to cover the shame of her man.

Love is about selflessness, it is about giving yourself and experiencing yourself in another human being. If you ever loved any of these men, you would put their interest before yours.

What is happening isn’t the making of this man’s mother. he is the unseen hands beating the drums. He doesn’t want you anymore having had second thoughts about your moral values.

You took a gamble and you have lost it. Forget both of them and move on. This time be honest with yourself by listening to what God tells you. Pray for forgiveness and allow His will prevail.

To completely free yourself of the burden of the past, go back to your other boyfriend and beg for forgiveness. You may have hurt him in more ways than you know. Leaving him three months to the wedding couldn’t have been easy on him, his family members and friends. From your own experiences with this other man, you now know much pains he endured when you left him.

Cleaning the slate of the past through apology to him would help the mercy and grace of God flow into your life.

There is no chance of him coming back to you. If he couldn’t convince his family not to cancel your wedding plans two months to the time, how can he now convince them to change their minds about you? He has told you he doesn’t have the will to go against the family’s decisions. What more evidence do you need to know this man’s feelings for you aren’t as strong as you think?

When next you get to speak to him, inform him about your decision to let him be.

To help yourself fair better in your next relationship, know what love entails as well as what type of man would give you the most happiness in life.

Good luck.

My family insists on court marriage

By Auntie Agatha, gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com, Tel: 08054500626


Dear Agatha,

I have been in a relationship for five years and very much in love with the man in my life. We have a very good relationship. We are close and he is very supportive.

Because he had been married before and has children, it took a while for my family members to give their blessings to the union. His ex has since remarried and lives outside the country. We finally performed our introduction ceremony last year. My people want him to take me to Registry but he says it is not for my family to lord it on him and that the decision to marry is between the two of us.

He is only prepared to go through the native law and custom ceremony and after that go to church for blessing but my family members are scared of me doing native law and custom and then going to church later.

They are of the opinion that he won’t do the church wedding. I finally prevailed on my people to let sleeping dogs lie. But I do not understand what is going on anymore. I’ve told him to come and see my dad so we can fix a date and move on, but he seems to
be in no hurry again, he hardly visits nor has time for me. He sometimes does not call and yet claims there is no problem that I am the one wasting time. He says we should have been living together by now but allowed my family to ridicule him and his family members by giving them ultimatum to go to court within two weeks of our introduction. He is also very angry that none of my family members saw him and his family off when they were leaving our house.

He has changed; each day he says he is coming to see my daddy but won’t come. I am so confused and wondering where to start from at 40. I close late from work and hardly have the avenue to socialise, people at my place of work even think I am married.
What do I do now as he keeps saying as far as he is concerned we are married and there is no problem? Yet time is going and I am tired of being single. I truly have been so attached to him and I haven’t met another person that I like. Please help.

Confused Lady.



Dear Confused Lady,

At 40, you ought to know better than allow your family members too much interference in your affairs. You are no longer a child in need of protection neither are you too young not to know what you are going into.

You are already at the junction of reality and realistic choices. If you don’t know what you want by now when will you?

Your man is right; marriage is an agreement between two persons. You and your man should have agreed on a common ground before going to your family with your wedding plans. And if both of you had already agreed on it, it was wrong for your family to insist on something else. You should have been more firm and equivocal on what you want.

If his attitude has changed, it is because he is beginning to have second thoughts on the kind of influence your family has over you. The cold reception he was given by your family is enough to question the kind of support he would get from them when he marries you as well as your own ability to withstand their interest whenever it conflicts with his.

In his shoes, chances are you will also get scared if he is unable to stand up for you in the presence of his family members. Irrespective of what your family felt, you should have escorted him and his family when they were leaving. They may be strangers to other members of your family but by virtue of their intentions to marry you, they have become yours. A wise woman must learn from the very beginning of her relationship to play the politics of balance between her family and her in-laws.

Don’t lose sight of the fact that he has every reason to be wary of entering into another marriage that has the hues of problems. He has already gone through a terrible marriage enough for his ex to have re-married. It takes a lot for someone who has gone through a terrible experience to want to do it again. Like snail recoils at the sight of trouble, he is bound to be frightened by the seemingly hostility of your family. It couldn’t have been pleasant for him to have been so rejected by them all. His family members too are bound to ask him questions too, concerning the workability of such a union. It would be emotionally suicidal for him to go into another union with a woman he isn’t sure of.

Unlike a single man who hasn’t the kind of history he has, he must be careful not to give the world the impression that he is the one with the problem especially as his ex is already re-married.

Don’t also forget that he has the interest of his children too to factor into this marriage. If you are unable to make up your mind about the kind of wedding ceremonies you want, what assurances does he have your family won’t tell you how to treat his children?

If he is refusing to come to your father, it is because he isn’t too sure how he feels about the whole thing anymore. He may truly care about you, but isn’t too sure of what he is going into. He needs to rethink and ask himself some vital questions concerning the workability of marrying a woman who appears not to have a mind of her own.

Had you tried to find out from him what he went through in his first marriage, you would have known how to approach the matter.

Like he asked, what do you want? The issue here isn’t whether he marries you in the Registry or not, but simply that of trust. Do you trust him? Why is your family insisting on the Registry? Has it to do with the fact that if anything happens to him, you can claim his property? Has it to do with the fact that he has children from his previous marriage and marrying you at the Registry would give you power and say over his property? These are the questions that would naturally occur to him with the ultimatum being given to him by your family.

Frankly, if you want him, you have to do more than telling him your father wants to see him. He has to be given fresh reasons by you why he should go ahead with marriage plans. To do this right, you also have to ask yourself what you want from him and marriage. One thing is for someone to desire something another thing is for the person to know what to do with it. You may want to get married simply because others are doing it as well as the fact that age isn’t on your side but deep down is this what you really want? It may sound a very silly question but unless you want this marriage and this man very desperately, you won’t know how to fight for your freedom from your parents.

If at 40, you are still being treated like a young inexperienced girl by your family, then something is very wrong somewhere and until you are aware of its source you may never get out of it.

Everyday, you stay on the market shelf; your chances of getting the perfect man depletes so are the kind of choices you can insist on. While a younger girl in her 20s can afford to make all the demands you are now making, you don’t have that many choices.

Marriage is sacrifice. Any man or woman who isn’t ready to make sacrifices for his or her marriage isn’t ready for the journey.

And come to think of it, do you know what demands the next man would make of you?

Even if you have any reservations about his stance, it is always best to dialogue with your man instead of exposing him to your family or outsiders.

Marriage is premised on the feelings and interests of two persons, not the majority.

He needs you to assure him he isn’t about making another mistake before he can have the confidence to come to your family. I am sure once you go to him to talk and discuss his fears, things would change positively between the two of you.

Good luck