He lied about being single at 43 years of age

Agatha, gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com, Tel: 08054500626 Dear Agatha, Two years ago, I met and married my husband. We met in England. I am one year older than his 43 years of age. I was very happy that at my age I could get a single man interested in me enough to want to spend the rest of his life with me. Naturally, I probed into his life but he told me that he has never been married as a result of series of disappointments from women. I also asked if anyone has a child or children for him that I should know of, he also denied the existence of any. When my questions were becoming too much, he brought out his Bible to swear to me that he has never been married and that he has no child anywhere. For me that was evidence enough that he was telling the truth. Therefore, when friends pressured me not to marry him immediately, but to first investigate him the more, I ignored them all. Deep down I felt they were jealous of my good fortune because a lot of my friends like me were either single mothers or completely single. His tales and presence in my life caused my best friend and I to part ways. I took exceptions to her insistence that he was too smooth and most likely to be a dupe. She didn’t like the fact that he just came from nowhere; he said, he doesn’t keep friends and travels a lot and that he came to England for business. After our marriage, he told me, he wanted to go back to Nigeria to visit his ailing mother. Since I hadn’t met her and was determined to make a good impression, I gave him money and lace materials to give her in addition to other things. By every standard, I am successful. I own a thriving shop that deals in lace materials as well as another one that deals in grocery. I also have two other shops in Lagos run by my youngest sister. He was away for three weeks. He spoke with me every day. His mother also spoke with me thanking me for all the gifts I sent her and prayed for me to be happy with her son. When he came back, he mentioned a business a friend of his suggested to him. According to him, his friend wanted them to go into a food processing business. I encouraged him to go into it since anything that had to do with food and preservation would always sell. Given the kind of business I am into, I encouraged him to go into partnership with this friend of his. Beyond knowing he is a business man, I didn’t bother with his financial status or worth. After about six months of talking to and fro over this business, he called me one night to loan him some money; that he and his friend had secured a parcel of land along old Abeokuta road. He asked me for N5m loan. He promised to pay back within three months. I gave it to him without thinking twice. Another six months passed, I wasn’t hearing anything about the business; not that it bothered me but curiosity made me to ask him one night only for him to flare up. Rather than answer me, he said, I didn’t care enough, which informed his decision not to share the challenge they were having with the project with him. He said, they were in need of another N5m but didn’t want to ask me for it; that he didn’t want me thinking his interest in me had to do with money. I allowed that comment to pass and gave him N4m out of the N5m they were looking for. A week after he left England for Nigeria, something kept nagging me to find him. Without informing him of my decision to come home, I came to Nigeria and with the address he once gave me, traced him; only to discover he is married with children; not just one wife, he recently acquired another wife in the three bedroom flat he rented at Aina Street, Ojodu Berger, Lagos. I discovered there was no business or ailing mother. That everything he has been collecting from me he was using to live large in Nigeria. The most painful isn’t the money I lost but the fact that his wife turned out to be my best-friend in primary school. He lied to her that he and his friend who lived abroad were into food processing; exporting African foods like garri, locust beans, yam as well as bean powder. The funny thing is that he isn’t taking care of my friend who is the first wife and her children. One of the children, isn’t going to school. She obviously married him immediately after secondary school. She is a petty trader. He is busy painting the down red. I want revenge. In addition to taking legal steps, I want him to suffer for the pains, the loss and social embarrassment I have and will suffer from my friends. Besides, I want my money back. I have evidences of the withdrawals from my account. I am so pained and confused because I trusted and loved him. I don’t know why men keep taking advantage of me. I trust them but they keep hurting me so bad. Sandra. Dear Sandra, This is because you keep making the same silly mistakes. At 44, you ought to have been wiser by now. The truth is; you have become too desperate to reason rationally as well as look beyond the images of the men that present themselves to you. It will only get worse until you are ready to bridle your emotions sufficiently to look deeper into the motive and interest of any man that comes your way. Not every man that comes your way with the plate of love is sincere. Being rich and successful, you will always be a prey to men in search for women to flea on. Your age has made you even more vulnerable for me with ulterior motives; the reason you shouldn’t listen to your heart alone when these men come your way. Women are not the only ones out to dupe men; these days, a lot of men are out to rob women of their money and emotions too. One of the ways to end all these is to create for yourself, a family. At 44, you have every reason to worry about your loneliness and emptiness as a woman. These feelings will only get worse as the years roll by; especially during those cold nights and days when you wonder to whose benefit your working yourself out for? Not matter how strong willed a woman is; the question of someone to call her own is one, single women without children ask themselves from time to time. This is the kernel of your series of disappointment. When a woman thinks her hormones are about to expire, she becomes so desperate that she forgets to be careful. This is the stage you are in now. Else, why would you accept and marry a man you know next to nothing about; who claims he has not been married at 43? You didn’t stop there; you gave him N9m to pursue a business you didn’t even bother to investigate, calling to question your astuteness as a successful business woman. Why didn’t you send your sister or any other member of your family to conduct discreet investigations on his person and business? Before agreeing to marry him, who were his friends? What kinds of lifestyle did these friends maintain? No matter how vague his lifestyle was before meeting you, there would have been someone who could have given you one or two information about him. You didn’t bother because you wanted to marry. Unfortunately, you were the business he came to do in London. The best revenge in life is to move on. Adopt a child to fill the loneliness in your heart and learn to love the child as your own. The presence of the child will help water down your frustration as well as dispel your loneliness. Between loving the child and caring for it, you will forget your own loneliness so much so any man that comes next into your life; will have to compete for your attention with the child. It will give you the time to assess him, his intentions and patience. Men who are out to dupe women don’t like obstacles because they lack the time to be patient. And because you now have a responsibility of your own, you will no longer be so willing to part with money. If the intention of the man is to fleece you of your hard earned money, once he isn’t getting it, he will move on to another woman who isn’t encumbered with your kind of responsibility. Besides, the presence of the child will give you back your sense of security as a woman; a situation that will make you extremely happy and protective of who you bring into your space for the sake of the child. Yes, you can report him to the police but don’t forget under the law, you are both married; under the law, it would be difficult to argue that your husband duped you. If he has a good lawyer, it could be argued that the money belongs to both of you. The evidences you claim to have aren’t criminal. They simply show that he withdrew money from your account with your consent; when did this become a criminal offence? He didn’t forge any document whatsoever. You will only be exposing yourself to more ridicule and emotional torture. Accept the fact that love is a game of chance which one either wins or loses. It is painful but it is the hard fact of life; time for you to count your losses by moving on with your life. Good luck.