My husband is very jealous

Dear Agatha,

Please I need you to help me on this. I am 40, while my husband is 70. I didn’t see this as a problem when i met him 11 years ago. We got married
10 years ago and we have been blessed with three children.
The problem I have is that my husband will not allow me to associate with people; go out to see friends or have anything to do with people.

If I go out to work, what he does is to police me around with phone calls. From the story he told me about himself, he enjoyed life while he was young and I don’t know why he’s preventing me.
I am a very beautiful and decent woman. I hate women that play around and my husband knows this much about me.

 I don’t even go to parties as such because I know I have a responsibility to my family. But once in a
while when friends invite me, I go but most time my husband will decline to go for no reason.
Agatha, my life is very boring. We don’t even go out to refresh, all we do is sit at home, watch TV, and go to church. I have
tried to make him understand my feelings.

He doesn’t trust me at all, suspects my every move. Is a 70 year old man too old to make a woman happy? Is this how I’m going to
spend the rest of my life? Whatever makes me happy doesn’t concern him. Honestly, I
hate this boring life. Am I supposed to die unhappy? I wish I can be more open to him; there is nothing I say to him that will not be used against me in future. I wish we can go out together, to places of fun,
but my husband sees it as waste of time. What can I do?

Anxious Wife.

Dear Anxious Wife,

You don’t have the patent for this problem. Most young women married to older men have the same complains.

But the bottom line is patience. More than women married to their age mates, you have to learn to be extra unwearied by all that is happening in your marriage and home.

First you must understand and appreciate the huge differences in your ages. At 70, he is 30 years older than your 40. There is no way he can have your kind of passion and interests in life anymore.

What you desire to do now are the things he did when he was your age so they don’t hold any form of excitement for him anymore. He has seen all there is to see in life and has since moved to another bus-stop.

Whereas, at 40, you are yet to explore, experience the excitement of life.

You must as a good wife learn to marry your passion with what makes your husband happy.

You need to understand that life is in stages. That your husband’s stage is one that he has to slow down to enjoy the little things we ignore, take for granted when younger.

To fight him would be fighting nature. It is a battle you cannot win else you ruin the beauty and harmony of your home.

You simply have to make up your mind to grow in wisdom and attitude to be able to cope and appreciate the sedative stage of your husband’s age. It is a matter of growing into him and seeing the world from his perspective.

This is the only way you can hope to earn his trust and make him listen to your needs.

There is always an incubation period in marriage, when the woman in particular learns the ways of the man. After a decade of living with this man, by now, you should know certain things about him; how to relate with him as well as how to manage your differences.

To win him, you need first to understand his fears about you and your ways. Why is he afraid after 10 years of marriage to you? This is the junction you ask yourself certain questions concerning your conduct, approach to life, devotion to him and respect for his person.

Understandably, there are certain kinds of fashion that will appeal to you at this stage of your life but which may not sit well with him. To avoid him suspecting you always, you may have to tone down on your taste for contemporary fashions. Bridge your taste to moderation to make him more comfortable around you. Being young and beautiful, certain kinds of clothes will definitely enhance your attractiveness and make him wonder at his ability to satisfy you sexually. Granted you abhor unfaithful women but sometimes our choice of clothing and the company we keep, tell a different story from who we really are.

This could be the crux of the problem you are having with him. At his age, he will always worry about his agility as a man hence the need for you to be more devoted to him and his hobbies.

Besides, being around your friends may not be comfortable for him because the issues that you all would be discussing might really not appeal to him. He is scared that being around your friends would make his age very obvious to you and that your friends could begin to pressure you to take on a lover.

Staying at home is to prevent people from talking about the two of you. He doesn’t want to be ridiculed by anybody or you made to feel uncomfortable for marrying him.

One way to get round the problem is to encourage your friends to come more to the house in order for him to get used to them. Once he becomes friends with one or two of them, it would be easy to convince him to go for a closed outing with your little group of trusted friends.

This might not be instant so, you have to get his permission to throw some nice and quiet parties in your house at intervals.

With the help of your children, you can instigate his interest in one or two places. Fortunately, we are developing a culture of relaxation around shopping malls. Urge him to come shopping in any of these ultra modern shopping malls springing up in the country.

While there, insist on window shopping with the whole family after which you all would rest in any fast food within the complex. Since he is already there with you and the children, he won’t have a choice but to tag along with your plans.

If you are not ashamed of parading him, touching and hugging him in public, he would want to do it all over again because you massaged his ego well the first time.

Although he isn’t saying it; he is scared of losing you to a younger man. Once he has your assurance through your actions and open display of contentment in your marriage to him, he will warm his way to the heart of your desires.

You must also learn to create your own fun games as a family. There are so many things you can do together besides partying. You can decide to take a walk around the neighbourhood with him in the evenings or around the compound.

Ask him about his passion; the kinds of game he liked as a young man; encourage him to teach you; by so doing, he too becomes part of the whole thing.

Rather than get angry with him over nothing, a situation he cannot help given the naked fact that he is too set in his ways to change because of your desires; you are the one that has to make the most change in this marriage.

His age and position in  your life demands that you learn to respect him always. Honestly, this is the only way you can be happy since you knew his age, the challenges of being married to an older man before going into this marriage.

By submitting to the will of God in your life as well as the desires of your husband, you will eventually find that happiness you wish for.

Good luck.

Share a problem with Auntie Agatha  on gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com Tel: 08054500626