He left after making love to me

With Auntie Agatha,gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com Dear Agatha, I am a student. There is this problem, which is really eating me up. I have been in a relationship with this guy since my second year of Junior Secondary School. (JSS2). When we started, we were so much in love with each other and very close. But, he now feels I am his worst enemy because of another girl who is about 20 years of old. Recently, he called with the Olive branch of peace. He said, he has made up his mind to come back to me because of my dedication to him when he didn’t have anything. After this, he begged for my forgiveness and asked me to allow him make love to me as evidence of my forgiveness. I did. To my pains as well as surprise, he hasn’t bothered to call me since then. Instead of the reconciliation he promised me, I see him everywhere with the other girl. If this is painful, his refusal to let go of me is what baffles me the more. He engages any man he sees with me in physcial fight. He knows I love him very much. We have been together for eight years. Please tell me what to do since I am without a clue as to how to handle him. Worried Girlfriend. Dear Worried Girlfriend, Evidently, your boyfriend is bent on playing games with your heart and life. You have come to a crossroad in your relationship where you must look back, evaluate it vis-à-vis the plans you have for yourself in the future. The kind of relationship one has, often than not, determines the quality of life that person would have in the future. This is because every relationship is premised on emotions. And once one’s emotion is torn into pieces, it becomes difficult for such a person to concentrate on whatever he or she is doing. For this simple reason, you must do everything within your powers to protect your future dreams. Every man or woman needs a supportive partner at every turn in life. It takes two to tangle very well. Doubtless, you are in love with him but is he in love with you? No man who is in love with a woman treats her the way he is treating you. Coming with the pretense of making up with you; only to leave you again after sleeping with you, doesn’t make him out as a man who cares about what or how you feel. The issue here goes beyond his new girlfriend or the men he is trying to prevent from coming to you. It is a lot deeper than that. From what you have said about him, he is selfish and very self-centered. This isn’t the kind of man you need in your life to grow into a success story. His kind leaves women emotionally dry. He will only take from you and not give you anything back in return. Even though you have been together for eight years, you still don’t know him well enough. When you met him at JSS2, you were not only naïve but fresh; a young unsoiled girl. Being the first with you was an ego thing for him. While you invested love, saw a knight in shinning armour, he saw a pleasure pot and if you are not careful, get real with yourself, you will continue to be his pleasure toy until he completely gets tired of you. This is why he doesn’t want anybody near you, fights every man who comes close to you just to ensure he can go and come into your life as he pleases. He doesn’t want you to experience love with another man. He knows that once you find a man who shows you what true love really is, you will never have him back. Therefore, he is using his knowledge of your mind, body and emotions to play you like a puppet. If you don’t resist him, it would be completely difficult as the years go by to out grow him. Nobody can give you the kind of strength and determination to resist him. Your strenght of character lies in your dream as a young woman determined to take her place in history. Your key to freedom from this man is your dream. Call his bluff and tell him you are through with him. Let him know you are no robot or too weak where he is concerned; that like him you have feelings as well as the fact that only a man who respects you deserves your love. Refuse to be cowed into submission. As long as he has the freedom to advertise his new relationship, he no longer has any right over you. Just like him, you now have the freedom to look for happiness elsewhere. Granted, it may hurt you to do this given the fact that you are deeply in love with him, but if you don’t begin to fight for your freedom, this man, even if he marries you in future will never give you the kind of respect you deserve. Doubtless, love must be patient for it to grow but ths is only applicable if the person one is in love with, has demonstrated commitment as well as semblance of respect. Being in love isn’t the same thing as being stupid. The day, he tricked you into going to bed with him after he has left you for the other girl is the day he finally demonstrated the kind of feelings he has always had for you. this problem is that you were and still too much in love to see him for who he truly is. No right thinking man parades another woman to the knowledge of the woman in his life. Even if you both of you would make up later, fight and earn your respect from him. For now, try as much as possible to put him and your feelings on the back burner. You just must find your power to move away from this point this relationship has put you. The fresh air would do you a word of good as it would afford you the opportunity of getting to know who you really are. For eight years, you have put yourself under the shadow of this man; agreeing to everything and not knowing what you are capable of. You went into this relationship when you didn’t know what a relationship was all about. There is denying the fact that you have also made some mistakes in your eight years together. The time has come to go back to the drawing board; take a trip down memory lane, be objective in assessing this relationship. This way, it would be easy for you to own up to your mistakes as well as developing the right frame of mind to learn from these slip-ups. It will also inform you on how to handle yourself and relationship in future. Such exercises also have the ability of helping one deal with the inadequacies in the other person. For one to understand the shortcomings of another person, such a person must first come to reality with his or her own inadequacies. At this point, be thankful that you are not continuing with his relationship with your eyes closed. If nothing, you at least know the kind of man you are dealing with as well as his definition of love. If at the end of the day, you decide to end this relationship, take extra time to heal. True healing doesn’t happen overnight. It is gradual. Take each day as it comes. This way, the healing would be more effective because once you are healed; you won’t have to deal with the issues again. For now, it is best you don’t go into any relationship to enable you have a focus of the direction you want to sail the ship of your life. It is important you have a dream of your own. It is the only way you can be a complete woman later in life. Go into a relationship only when you are ready for it and not before. Don’t do it to spite this man and importantly, don’t hold any grudge against him. If you do, it might be difficult to get your new relationship right because of the extra burden of the past you would be bringing into the relationship. Good luck.

How do I make amends with my father?

With Agatha Edo, Email: womaneditor@independentngonline.com,gataedo@yahoo.com or agatha.edo@gmail.com Dear Agatha, I’m an ardent reader of your column and have garnered so much from it. My parents have been separated for quite a long time; as a matter of fact, over a decade. I’m the eldest of my siblings and over 40 years of age. I concluded my degree in History and International Studies; made a second class lower, contrary to my expectation; I expected a first class because I have always shone and the envy of fellow students. My daddy went away with another woman but they are also separated now. But before this woman came into the scene, my father has had several women in his life while married to my mother. You see my father happens to be the domineering type. Because I am very quiet, my father considers me as upright. My siblings are bursting with envy. My mother and siblings are at loggerheads with my father. Most often, the source of their squabbles comes from my immediate younger brother’s obduracy as well his refusal to go to school. While staying with our eldest sibling; he not only became unmanageable but also started selling off some of their belongings. He also refused to be educated even though my eldest sister was willing to send him to school. At the end of the day, she put him into Police custody. He has also gotten many women pregnant. He isn’t the only one giving the family problems. While another brother of mine is as reckless as he is, one of my sisters married herself off, without the consent or knowledge of my father to a pastor who is separated from his wife. All efforts by me to reconcile all parties have proved abortive. For reasons best known to my siblings, they don’t like me; they make cutting remarks about me that really hurt. Sincerely, I would have preferred to stay with my father but it is no longer feasible. I tried to make peace with my father but he ended up inviting the Police and warnings from the Police that I should stay away from my father. I tried to get his elder brother involved but that too didn’t go well as he too told me to stay away from his brother and family. Recently, I went with some non-relatives; a family friend and pastor but it also didn’t work. Despite my father’s age, he is still very strong. He kept shouting that I am a thief who has come to rob him of his property. He subsequently packed out of the house when my younger brother sold off his bus, motorcycle and other things. I am worried because most of my siblings are really behaving badly. I ‘m keen on making peace with him before he dies. I used to be nearest to his heart. I don’t know what manner of reconciliation is appropriate. He has an unforgiving spirit; my mother has developed hypertension. Bernete. Dear Bernete, We get hurt more by those we consider closest to us. Your father is deeply hurt because he invested so much faith in you more than the others. His disappointment comes from the attitude of your siblings; their attitude as well as resolve to be reckless. The fact that you appear to be in their support, left him on his own, underscores his pains and rejection of you. Try putting yourself in his position, how would you feel if after working so hard in your life to acquire certain level of comfort, your children waste them through careless and criminal living? No matter what your father has done, it is wrong for your brothers to sell off his belongings. The fact that all your mother’s children are following a certain way of behavior underscores the kind of training your mother gave you all. It is one thing for a father to be bad but another thing completely for a mother not to know her onion at all. A wise woman doesn’t allow the inability or defect of her husband stop her from molding her children right. Her inability to perform her role effectively is the reason you are all suffering. That your father left her to marry another woman isn’t enough excuse for her not to give you all the right bearing in life. At least from your explanations, your father didn’t stop caring for you all. His interest in your education paints him as a father on the look out for the future of his children. If it was only one of your siblings that was misbehaving, your mother would have been excused but almost all of them? It can only mean one thing; that your mother through her behavior drove your father into the arms of other women. The pains of your father comes from the thought that at least one of you, especially you, should have seen the contributions of your mother to the break down of the marriage; called your mother to order and insist on her doing the right things. The fact that you all appear to be on the side of your mother, actually went with her and making him appear as the problem in the marriage hurt him more than you all realised. It couldn’t have been easy for him at all. His attitude towards you could also come from the things you said or didn’t say. For his brother too to be hostile towards you underscores something terrible you may have also done. Honestly, there is no one that can settle this but you. Being close to him, you must find a way of getting him to listen to you; of making him open up his heart to you all over again. If it means staying at his door steps everyday, do it. let him understand that whatever mistakes he thinks you made were done with a child’s mind. That at the time he left your mother, you too were hurt at the lack of his presence in your daily life. No matter how hard hearted he is, there must be one person somewhere in his life who can talk to him. get that person to talk to him or his brother who he seems close to. Explain the urgency you feel in making peace with him. tell them that while you are not wishing him to die so soon, your desire however is to ensure that you make peace with him before he answers the final call. This explanation is important for them to understand why you are suddenly interested in making peace. Your father must know that your interest is not in his property but in his well being and relationship with you. because of his experiences with your siblings, he may be naturally suspicious of your motive in wanting to get back into his life. a man that has been disappointed severally will find it difficult to recognise a good gesture when he finds it. The thing is for you to go all the extra miles to make him see how you really feel. There must be a reason for the decision you took to follow your mother. Let them know why you didn’t immediately go with him as well as your own pains too as a child. For a man like your father, you must also learn to pray. When a heart is as hard and pained like his, only God has what it takes to bend him. By praying for him, you are helping him make amends too. Just like you need his forgiveness, he also has to make peace with is God and every other person. It is also necessary for you to get your mother involved in all these. Don’t forget she laid the foundation for all these mess. She has to be involved in its cleaning. Both of them go a long way back and know what it takes to get the other to listen. When some men hate a woman, they automatically hate her children too. She has to make that essential sacrifice to ensure that your father doesn’t take his hatred of you all to his grave. This is very important because other interests are also involved in his life. It is the only way to ensure whatever bad seed she has planted now doesn’t go into the next generation. She must be ready to make that important sacrifice that would insure the rest of your lives. Going to her husband and in-laws to plead would make it easier for you to have access into your father’s life. Good luck.

My children disapprove of my remarrying at 50

With Agatha Edo, Email: womaneditor@independentngonline.com,gataedo@yahoo.com or agatha.edo@gmail.com Dear Agatha, I will be 50 this year. I have been divorced for over 20 years and I have four children. I had three for my ex- husband while my last child came from an affair I had with someone else. The father of my last child was very much interested in marrying me but I didn’t love him enough to be his second wife. Besides, I didn’t want to be involved with the hassles of struggling for a man with another woman. I had enough marital problems from my previous marriage. The decision to remain single was also taken to give me time to invest in my children’s welfare. I didn’t want to lose them too which in my views would happen if I had married at that time. My first and second children are married. The third one is in her third year in the higher institution while my baby is about to write her Senior Secondary School examinations. Without knowing it, I am almost alone. In the last four years, I have been in a relationship with a widower who is interested in marrying me. With all of them almost out of the house, I decided to give matrimony a trial once again. I cannot stand the idea of staying alone. Rather than my children to be happy for me, they are all angry with me. My two married daughters are dismissing my reason for wanting to get married saying being a grandmother is enough work on its own; that I can always rotate visiting them. They further argued that they indeed need me more than before to look after their children and that at my age, I am too old to marry. Even though my two younger children are not so vocal but they have to stand with their elder sisters in solidarity. My younger sisters all support my move and have told my children to allow me be. How selfish can children be? Can you imagine my second daughter asking me what I need a man for at my age? Am I too old to have feelings anymore simply because I have reached menopause? After devoting my life to them, they are not ready to allow me be. I love them; they are all I have and live for but I also need to move on. At my age, I need companionship; what do they expect me to do when I need the comfort of a man? Is it wrong to crave for happiness again? Their father, since leaving us, has remarried. His only contribution to their lives was coming on the day of their native and white wedding ceremonies to play his role as father of the brides. I have shouldered single-handedly all their responsibilities. All I am asking from them is their understanding. I want to be a woman all over again. Is it too much to ask? What do these children want from me? I am very hurt, Agatha. Help me deal with this challenge because I am saddened by their attitude and meanness towards me. Theresa. Dear Theresa, At 50, you are more than ripe to make your decisions. You don’t need their permission to be happy in life. Children, by nature, are very selfish especially when their parents are separated. They usually cling to the parent they are with, refusing to grant the parent any freedom to chart a life of his or her own. They see any attempt by the parent to have a life with another person as shutting them out permanently. It is usually a very difficult and emotional time for the parent whose emotional needs also must be satisfied. That is why some parents rush into other relationships or marriages once they obtain freedom from a previous marriage. The reason is to prevent a battle of monopoly in later years. Mostly, they are reacting to the fear of complete abandonment by their two parents. Irritating and absurd as this may sound, your children are afraid that allowing another man into your life means they will become irrelevant in your life and their movement in and out of your life will be restricted because they now have to knock on doors, they never had reason to knock on before entering. It is obvious that you still need to make them understand some basic facts about life, especially the two of them that are married. They are the ones that you have to work on the most. Like you said, the younger ones may not think anything of you remarrying as long as it doesn’t affect their access to you or pocket money, the only ones on the other hand want you entirely for the sake of their own children.If you remain single, it will be a lot easier for them to dump their children on you anytime; the only kind of company they reason you would need at your age. Without your undivided attention focused on them only, they are afraid you may come up with excuses as to why you cannot have the grandchildren at a particular time. This is why the older ones are more infuriated at the idea of you remarrying. Normally as women, they should be the ones campaigning for you to remarry considering how lonely it would be for you now that they are all almost out of the house. Like my mother once said, if a mother isn’t careful or wise, she would end up being her children’s unpaid as well as unofficial house-help. They are being both malicious and mischievous if they say they don’t need a man at your age or that you are too old. The third semester of a person’s life could be the loneliest particularly if that person is single. It is the time of an adult’s life when companionship is most desired because the children are all leaving to start their own families. What do they expect you to do? Call them for a private meeting with you. The meeting is not to plead with them about your decision but to ask them what you have done wrong to them to deserve their opposition to your decision to be happy. Perhaps the time has come for you to tell them how you managed all these years to stay sane emotionally. Let them know what it cost you to stay alone for their sakes. Tell them if you had intended to abandon them, it would have been in your younger years. Make it clear to them that you may have attained the wisdom age but you are not without feelings as a woman. And to brand you old and worthless as a woman is unpardonable. This is no time to massage whatever ego or right they think they have over your life. As a mother and parent, you haven’t given them any reason to be ashamed but now that they are passing out of your home, the time has come for you to drag the woman in you out of the cupboard of time where you have kept her. Demand to know from them if they would have tried to stop you if you were a man.End it by asking how they would feel if each time they come for visits with their children, they meet a different man in your bedroom? Let them chew on that possibility for a while. They don’t have to apologise now but eventually when they see you are determined to go ahead with your decision; they will eventually come around to your way of thinking. But, you must ensure the man you are marrying is the kind of father figure they need. Their resentment is a clear indication that deep down they haven’t really gotten over the issue of their father and you. They are really scared that they would lose you too as they did their father once he got himself another woman. Ensure the man is the kind that can bring all of them together, has the maturity to overlook their initial response to him. His interest in them would make it easy for you to function in your roles as grandmother and mother to both your children and his. By doing the very things they fear you may not be able to do for them once married, will make them thaw towards you and your husband faster than anything else. Encourage him to stop by in their houses to greet them without you. If he understands all the issues involved, he will know the politics of ensuring harmony in all your lives. Involving his children too in this integration plan will indeed help smoothen things better. The young have a way of communicating to each other better than when older people try to talk to them. Above all, just give yourself up to the will of God. Good luck.