Tuesday, December 4, 2012

He doesn’t want me anymore

With Auntie Agatha, gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com, Tel: 08054500626 Dear Agatha, I live with my boyfriend whom I love dearly and one I don’t want to lose. Recently, he stopped making love to me saying he doesn’t feel me anymore. But we still sleep on the same bed which is very hard for me because I get horny and want him to fulfill my sexual desires. How can I make him have sex with me again because I don’t want any other man? I don’t understand how he can resist me while most men say I am beautiful and sexy, which is true. Sexy Lady. Dear Sexy Lady, I smell certain measure of arrogance in your attitude; and this maybe the problem in your relationship with this man. You are not doing this man a favor by sleeping with him. You are the one whose value is diminishing because a man has nothing to lose by the number of women he sleeps with. While a man can announce to the world the number of women he has slept with, no woman, no matter how permissive the society has become will have the boldness to put a figure to the number of men she has slept with. It will also do you a world of good to appreciate that a woman’s beauty and appeal don’t last forever especially if she isn’t the careful one. A woman’s true beauty lies within her; in the choices she makes in life as well as her determination to elevate the right virtues of her unique positions of being a woman, wife and mother. If sex is all that interest you in your destiny, then you are denying the wholesome pleasures that come from the diverse roles women play in the society, home and life of her family. A valuable woman is one who can multi-task, be a little of everything not the one who selects just one role and stays on it. Sex is good but if that is all you are good at, no man wants a woman that is every man’s darling in the bedroom. There is more to life and relationship, than sex. A woman must be able to deposit something extraordinarily positive in the life of her man to remain relevant in his life. If all you care about is sex, of what use are you to this man as a woman? Sex is something a man can get anywhere; and sometimes of a better quality and pleasure. Besides, if really pressed for it, he can pay someone for the pleasure. It is that cheap and certainly not criteria any man would push forward in his choice of a woman to spend the rest of his life with. While a man can teach a woman to give him good and quality lovemaking, he cannot teach her how to be a good, responsible and worthy woman. These are qualities a woman must have to sustain the interest of the man in her life. There is no way a relationship based on sex alone will last because no man can live on sex alone. Granted your beauty and sex appeal can attract the interest of men but these are things that don’t last. These same men will soon lose interest in your person when they find out that you have nothing else to offer them. This precisely is what the attitude of your boyfriend is telling you; that, he is tired of a woman who has nothing to offer him beyond the pleasure of her body. Since you don’t want to lose him, get serious about your life and priority. All those men you think desire you today, will one day look through those things you think are important to you because right beside you, is another young lady with better sex appeal. To get him back, sit down to take stock of your relationship since you started. Also, take into account your own attitude towards life, the things you play up as being more important to you as a woman. Then ask yourself this vital question as truthfully as you can; if you were a man, would you stay with the kind of woman you come up with? There is no way this man would turn cold on you if you know other secrets about him; for instance, as the woman who warms his bed, how far have you been able to read his other needs? For instance, do you know the kind of foods that excite him the most? Many a time, women, generally feed the men in their lives with convenient foods without pausing to think if the man likes what he is eating. As a woman, you should endeavor to make yourself so relevant in your man’s life that it would be impossible for any other woman to steal him from you. To get him interested in you again, learn to pamper him because he is really your first child. Every tribe has a peculiar meal; go and learn how to make his native meal. Forget the rice and stew story most of them give; there is always something special about a man’s native soup that makes a huge impact in his subconscious. Even if you don’t have anybody to teach you, why not learn; get a friend whose passion is cooking to teach you how to cook real food, assorted native soups as well as good vegetable soups to make him want to come back home anytime he is out of the house. You also have to teach yourself how to clean the house and keep your environment clean. For instance, how often do you change the bed-sheets you both sleep on and make love? How clean and organized is the room you both sleep in? How observant are you of his moods? A good woman must be able to read the moods of her man, knowing when to push the agenda of sex and when to back off. For example, you don’t even know what issues are bothering your man. All you care about is the fact that he isn’t having sex with you whereas, he could be going through serious challenges that make sex the last thing on his mind. Your place as the woman in his life is to find out and offer him whatever assistance you can. This will make him appreciate your feelings for him and also tell him that he isn’t just a man that satisfies only your sexual needs but one you care so much about. Just like you won’t want any man to value your body more than your happiness, men also don’t appreciate a woman who limits all her interest in them to his sexual performance. This man outside the bedroom has needs, dreams, emotions and disappointments. Without the right frame of mind, there is no way he can perform in the bedroom. The total summation of his well being is etched on his happiness and fulfillment as a man. If you learn to think less of yourself, you might just discover that his disinterest in sex has nothing to do with you but with himself and his business. Develop the habit of constant communication. There is no moving a relationship forward without knowing how to discuss your challenges. Both of you must be ready to talk, listen to each other and take a joint decision that will grow a better understanding between the two of you. This is important and one of the secrets that sustains a relationship. Once a man and woman are able to overcome the issue of keeping secrets from each other, appreciate the essence of exchanging information, they develop a bond nothing can penetrate because they have become not just lovers but good friends as well. Even if the love side of their relationship has problems, their friendship side will step forward to save the relationship from collapsing. Often than not, this is the ingredient that helps difficult relationships to survive the storm. No matter how compatible a couple is in bed, if unable to sustain a relationship outside the confines of the bedroom, sex becomes a mere function, an animalistic urge lacking in power to patch up leaks in the wall of the relationship. Therefore, you need to find ways of getting through to the inner person; to help you find a better understanding into the direction your relationship with him is headed. This relationship needs more seriousness on your part as well as a clear cut idea because vision drives one’s dreams. So rather than concentrate on the mundane issue of sex, look into the more serious issues of his well being and happiness. Once you deal with the issues making him unhappy, it will be easier for you to get him to cheer up in the bedroom. Good luck.

He’s nice, but too old for my liking

With Agatha Edo, Email: womaneditor@independentngonline.com, gataedo@yahoo.com or agatha.edo@gmail.com Dear Agatha, I am 20 years of age and reside in Abuja. Before I gained admission into school, I was working and met this man who declared his love for me. He is actually responsible for my care and stay in school. But the problem is I don’t love him at all, already he is talking about marriage. He is 38 years of age. I don’t know what to do because I am in love with a guy who is 24 years old. Please tell me what to do, as I cannot displease myself to please him. Anonymous. Dear Anonymous, You cannot displease yourself yet you are willing to make him displease himself by paying your schools fees as well as picking your other bills? If you know you have a boyfriend you are in love with, why are you making this man take on your responsibilities and investing his time and emotions on you? Why haven’t you told him to go his way; that you don’t share in the kind of dreams he has for both of you? Why are you accepting all the attention, support and care from him when your mind is given to another man? And do you even know the meaning of love? If you actually claim to love your boyfriend, what kind of sacrifices are you willing to make for the sake of the love? Love comes with so much sacrifice. You should be willing to endure discomfort for the sake of love. If you don’t teach yourself now to endure certain situations, when would you learn to do it? What you are doing now is eating and having your cake. You want the comfort the money of the other man can give you and at the same time you want the thrills of the company of your youngish boyfriend. Life doesn’t work like that. Something must give way to something for a wholesome life. What you are doing isn’t right at all. Even though you haven’t said it in explicit terms, you don’t want him because you consider him deep in your heart to be too old for you. You don’t love him because you think he lacks the excitement your current boyfriend is giving you. Sincerely, what you are doing is akin to defrauding the man of his hard earned money and that could actually spell doom for you later in the future. This is because this man is doing this on the understanding you will become his wife. This is a fact you are aware of. He is training you in the university as his wife, to better your lot in life and to take away some pressures from him later in future. At 38, he is under the impression he has reached his final bus stop, hence is holding nothing back to ensure you don’t lack anything. It would therefore hurt him beyond measure when you finally tell him that all his investment, both financially, emotionally, materially, spiritually are in vain. By then you would not only be hurting him physically but spiritually as well. And this is where the problem usually comes in situations like you have created for yourself. Although so many women think there is really nothing to it and often laugh or scoff at the ideal of a spiritual angle to these issues. The fact remains that the spiritual implications are more often than not very disastrous for a woman who intentionally leads a man astray knowing fully well that she would never marry him. It is always better not to begin something you cannot finish, refuse the sponsorship of a man you are not ready to marry. To forestall any future pains and plenty of regrets later in life, do yourself a world of good by coming out with the truth concerning your feelings or plans. Let him know now that you cannot marry him because you don’t feel the same thing he feels for you. The worst that can happen is that you would lose his sponsorship and care. It isn’t right for you to allow one man to train you only for you to marry another. If you truly love your boyfriend and believe in his person, you won’t disrespect him by allowing another man to train you. Besides, have you thought of the implication on your relationship if this boyfriend of yours finds out that you are involved with another man 14 years his senior in age? You are just as capable of losing the trust and love of this young man in the same way you would the care, attention and support of the older man. Whatever happens, please tell him the truth. Make the choice today before it’s too late for you to redeem your image as well as protect yourself against the backlash of what you are doing. Learn to be honest with yourself, it is the only way you can live life without hassles. Good luck.

How do I tell my wife her friend has a son for me

With Agatha Edo, Email: womaneditor@independentngonline.com, gataedo@yahoo.com or agatha.edo@gmail.com Dear Agatha, My wife and I haven’t been able to conceive since we got married seven years ago. There is no kind of treatment we haven’t done or place for solutions we have not visited to solve our problems. Just mention it and we will be there or taking the treatment. All the results point at her as the one with the 50-50 chance; I have no fault but having made a vow to her, I can’t abandon her. Besides, she is not completely without hope of conceiving which is why I haven’t discussed the option of adopting a child. Sometimes, she gets very depressed about it and expresses the fear that I would one day look for children from another woman like my mother has been suggesting. Her fear is entrenched in the knowledge that I am the only son of my mother. Despite these pressures from my family, I have however stood behind my wife because she is a good wife and I love her very much. I have also tried to behave but I sometimes fail especially when I am outside Lagos. Apart from respect for my wife, she has a very bad temper and is generally insecure as a result of her condition. In all my strays, I have often cautioned myself, putting the safety of my wife above every other consideration. I go armed with my own packets of condoms if I have to. However, I have a situation on my hands now that I don’t know how to handle. While my wife and I were still dating, almost close to the time we got married, I had a brief affair with one of her friends. This lady was compellingly attractive. I couldn’t resist her. It was very brief but intense. At the end, she actually broke up the affair and disappeared to the North. Nobody had any inkling to where she went to in the North. We all actually thought she was dead as nobody heard from her all these years. You can therefore imagine my surprise when she surfaced at my office with a young boy. Even if I try to deny the obvious, this child looks like me. From the moment she walked into my office, I didn’t need her to tell me the motive of her visit; the young man’s features told its own story. But I allowed her to tell me what she came to do. She said, she didn’t know about the pregnancy until it was too late. That the pregnancy wasn’t even supposed to happen because a previous abortion attempt damaged her womb as doctors told her. By the time she knew, aborting the baby was out of it. She said she didn’t contact me because she wanted the baby all to herself but the child is daily making life difficult for her over his demands to see his father. Besides, the man she eventually got married to has asked her to return the child to his father. She has another son for the man. After introducing me to my son, she announced she was going back without him. I immediately contacted my mother who came to pick the child from the office. That was three months ago. The child stays with my mother. I want to know and live with my son but don’t how to tell my wife about the child. My sisters, mother and a few of my friends in the know insist I tell her before she finds out from elsewhere. The issue is, I don’t know how to present the matter. I know my wife; she is capable of anything when angry. This is what I fear the most. She could harm me and herself. The fact too that the woman involved is her one time friend will make her more deadly to handle. In the last couple of years, her insecurity has given rise to her bouts of temper. How do I get around this problem? When is the right time to tell her? I am so confused. Do I allow her to find out on her own or hide the existence of this child from her until in later years? Tade. Dear Tade, When will she not find out about the child? Whether she finds out now or later in life, the fact remains that she will one day discover you have a love child outside your marriage. The outcome will still be the same; she will feel bad at the knowledge that another woman succeeded where she couldn’t. By then, the issue will shift from you having a child to you deliberately hoarding information about the child to mock her situation. As it is now, the child isn’t a result of an affair you had after marriage but the one you had before marrying her. Even though you had it with her friend, at least, the conception of this child wasn’t as a result of the situation you are having with her. The presence of this child is an accident that happened long before the challenge in your marriage reared its head. Though in a way, you wronged her by sleeping with her friend, it is imperative she understands that you had nothing to do with the decision to keep the child or his existence for that matter until his mother brought him to your office. Even if you wanted to, there is no way you can turn your back on the child; it is too late in the day since the issue has gone beyond what you want to what is practicable. The existence of the child can no longer be wished away. Faith has sealed that and only a man headed for destruction wrestles with his destiny. However, for the reasons you have explained, don’t be alone when you break the news to her. There is the need for you to involve her family members in this whole thing. Exclude your family members from it all because with them in the audience, she will never have the presence of mind to hear you out. Rather than make things better, it will only complicate things for you due to the huge misunderstanding between them and her over the issue of her inability to give you a child. Besides, the idea that your people would silently, be celebrating the vindication of their opposition to her; would make her support difficult to obtain on this matter. No woman enjoys being shown the failure of her womanhood in the presence of her perceived enemies. So preclude your family members from this initial discussion. The presence of her family members will no doubt water down the intensity of her reactions. They are in the best position to explain to her that you didn’t go outside your marriage, had no knowledge of the kind of challenges that awaited you in the marriage when you dated the mother of this child. Besides, hearing it from you will make it easier for her to tolerate. If she hears it first from other sources, she may not be ready to hear anything from you or she could go to the extreme of hurting herself terribly. After explaining the sequence of how the thing happened, beg her for forgiveness as well as an assurance that you will never leave her. For now, don’t bring the child home. Give her time to heal and adjust to this new knowledge of a step-son. But if after a year, she still refuses to allow you bring the child home, go ahead and bring him in, even if it is only during weekends initially. Don’t worry, your marriage will survive and become stronger after this. Every marriage has a storm to contend with from time to time. Good luck.