Pleads Secrecy On His Marital Status Before My Parents

Dear Agatha,

I am 20, having a man who is interested in marrying me but he is 20 years older than I am and has three kids although divorced.

Even though he takes very good care of me, he doesn’t want me to tell my parents about his marital status. I don’t understand why he wants my parents kept in the dark. Also, I don’t understand his native tongue.
Please tell me what to do.

Jennifer.

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Dear Jennifer,

At 20, aren’t you putting the cart before the horse? Shouldn’t you be devoting more of your time to your education, planning your future and laying the right foundation for it?

Do you think getting married to a man twice your age with three children is your wise priority now? At your age, your education should be your main concern.

Besides, what experiences do you have to deal with this type of complex relationship? What is the attraction? Is it money or love? Be honest, would you consider him if he weren’t lavishing his care and money on you? This is one question you must sit back and search your mind for true answers.

Since this isn’t going to be the normal boy and girl relationship, you must also factor in how you are going to cope and manage the interests of his children and estranged wife because whether you like it or not, the mother of his children has indirect say on this matter through the children.

If their separation was bitter and unfair, the mother of his three children would not take matters lying low with you. Chances are she would think you are the cause of whatever problems she had with her man, even if she was the progenitor of the crisis in her home.

The fact that you are a lot younger would make her bitterness more intense against you. Why would you want to be involved in a situation that you know nothing about?
Have you thought of the pressures his children would bring to bear on your relationship and life? Can you cope with sharing your man, heart and life with the crowd that comes with loving this man?

Have you really given this angle a thought?

While nobody has the right to choose who you fall in love with or not, certain situations call for proper analysis before taking a final decision.

Marrying an older man comes with its advantages but in certain cases, the disadvantages are more. Being a lot younger, you have to think ahead. One of such challenges is you growing into the man and his habits rather both of your growing into each other. Having lived with a woman before, his ways are set and firm. You don’t have the experience to change them but to grow into accepting them to prevent a dislocation in your marriage. This is particularly so because of the disapprovals you may have faced with your decision to marry him at all cost.

Without disputes every marriage has its challenges but when a marriage shows defects from the beginning, a lot of caution must be exercised from the very onset to effectively manage the situation. This is the worry in your relationship. Your age hasn’t prepared you for the guts and strengths to properly propel this relationship to where you will have some space to breathe fresh air and initiatives into his life and your home.

Without this programme of your own, you will never have the chance to run your own shows but the ideas of his first wife and his children. If you must go with this man at the end of the day, you just have to find a way of injecting your control in your own marriage else you will only be a passenger in the whole setup. And if this happens, you will sooner or later get chocked by the daily challenges you have to cope with in your home.

But one of the things you must do as soon as possible is to find out why he insists you don’t tell your parents about his marital status. If he is sincere, he should place such a burden on you. As a matter of fact, it should be one of the first things you must tell your parents who in this instance have the experience to deal with him.

What is he trying to hide? Could it be that he is trying to hide something from you, which your parents would find out if they were aware of his marital status?

Have you tried to find out why his first marriage collapsed; the version of his wife? What sort of man is he? Is he responsible; has respect for people in his life?

Do you see him as one who has the right temperament and attitude to manage a woman without showcasing violence and temper? His story about the other woman may today evoke pity and anger in you but in her shoes, would you put up a better behaviour?

These are the challenges I spoke about and which you must not allow the care and financial support he is currently lavishing on you blind you to.

If your choice is to stay with him, insist he presents himself and history to your parents. He must be able to defend his past with dignity. At 40, it is too late in the day to play the prank of hiding a past that would sooner be discovered. So why not tell your parents the truth from the beginning?

In also marrying him, ensure you and his children have a reasonable relationship to prevent needless fight for the heart of your husband and their father. Remember from the beginning that this man is their father hence you must allow them close to him as well as give him the freedom to play his fatherly role to those children. To stand in their way would be creating problems for yourself and children later in life.

Once you agree to go into that house, your heart must be large enough to accommodate everybody that has a stake in his life.

There is also the issue of the attitude of your friends to him. Deep down, how would you feel with him in the company of your friends? The challenge of a young lady marrying a man advanced in age is her ability to withstand the jeers and rejection of her friends or people who see them together. You must at all times take pride in your choice of a husband. To do otherwise would spell doom for the relationship. This is one instance when love should be very wide eyed. Importantly, learn to pray and adhere to what God has to say on the matter to avoid regrets later in life.

Good luck.

Marriage Was Our Plan, But She Jilted Me

Dear Agatha,

In the last four years I have been in a relationship with the woman I love dearly. Right from the beginning we promised to marry each other. Premised on this, I introduced her to my family and she told hers about me.

From time to time, I get to speak with her mother whom I am yet to meet. Through the years, we have conducted ourselves like a married couple. The last time I spoke with her mother was in February this year when she asked me when I would come for a formal introduction. The arrangement was for me to come during the Easter period. However something strange happened before the Easter date. Sometimes in March, we made arrangements to see on a particular date but got the shock of my life when after trying unsuccessfully to get her a man eventually picked up her phone who introduced himself as her boyfriend.

I was both troubled but endured my emotions till we met in her school some few days later. Even if I had wanted to speak with her, her phone was switched off making it impossible for me to get through to her. When I challenged her about the person who picked up her phone, she didn’t say anything instead she told me to buy her a new handset, which I obliged her.

And while holidaying at home during the Easter period, I sent a recharge card worth N2,000.00 to her phone.

To make sure I got it, I called to get her confirmation only for the same voice to pick the call again to repeat his warning that I should stop calling his wife.

I felt embarrassed at the sound of his voice because it meant my suspicions about the boy were true and that I had been rejected by my girlfriend.

I made up my mind to see her in school and sort out the issue after the holiday only to be told she had travelled to her sister’s place. I later got her on the phone and as we were chatting, I noticed that at a point, her voice changed before she switched off the phone. Curious, I redialled the number and this time it was the same male voice that answered. Since it was around 9:30 pm, I didn’t need anybody to tell me she was at the man’s place.

The voice told me to let her be since we were just friends and I have not asked her to marry me. Thereafter he gave the phone to my girlfriend who confirmed the position of the boy that I never asked her to marry me.

She has since changed her phone number. Everything still looks like a dream to me. I am yet to get over the fact that a woman who pledged unconditional love and promised to be my protector, counsellor, family and everything can behave in this manner.

I can’t imagine it is the same girl, I put through school, took care of, gave all the assistance I could, is this same girl who has turned her back on me.

Agatha, tell me what to do. I have pains in my heart.

Ejiuwaka.

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Dear Ejiuwaka,

It is one of those things. Sometimes what looks so perfectly beautiful becomes ugly and painful. When a relationship gets to this point, it is always good to bury it for good, else, the one hurting will never be able to get his or her life back on the right track.

You took a gamble on love and trust which is why you weaved all your beautiful patterns on it.

Unfortunately, life didn’t make both of you for each other. Painful as this is, it is a reality you must confront and accept. Had heavens created both of you to be a permanent item, nobody would have been able to come between the two of you.

In every dark cloud there is always a sliver lining. What if she had suddenly realised after marriage to you that she didn’t want you in the same way you wanted her? How would you have managed living with a woman who didn’t love you enough? How would you have faced the world if few years down the road, she asks for divorce to be with the man she really cares about?

Take it from one who has experienced emotional torture that some of the situations we lament over are actual blessings in disguise, intended by God to empower us for the tasks ahead. Therefore you don’t have the patent for this journey and if others before you rebounded to greater things and happiness in their lives, you too can with the right attitude.

Her role in your life is to help you understand certain intricacies about human behaviour and to serve as an experience to help those whoin future have similar challenges get over the ache.

The difference between those who fail and succeed after a fall or disappointment is the determination they put into it. If you are determined to be happy and love again in spite of this disappointment, you will be and I assure with someone much better, whose qualities will forever give you reasons to look back on this moment in your life with gratitude that God prevented what would have been a huge mistake in your life.

You cannot question God but have it within you to make yourself happy. Don’t bother to call or contact her again. Let her go, wish her all the luck in the world with her Mr. Right. Free yourself from the burden of hate, regrets as well as lack of forgiveness. These are emotions that would keep amplifying the pains of yesterday. Give yourself to your hobbies to help you forget. Cry if you have to, it is all part of the healing process but don’t ever regret your time with her.

Life is peppered by both pains and happiness. There is no way you can avoid the bitter side of life if you hope for its best side. It is the lesson the bitter leaf teaches. The sweet part of the bitter leaf is only available to the one who has the determination, patience and time to wash away the bitterness.

Give yourself time to heal naturally. You will meet that special woman some day. She had to quit the scene for the real woman who will be more than you hoped your ex-girlfriend would be to you.

Next time be sure the lady wants you for the same reason you want her by learning to take each day as it comes.

Your mistake with this lady is to jump-start your relationship into the future without first living in the presence. You have to be friends first before you can be a good couple who desires to be
together forever. You must take the extra time to study each other, discover your weak spots as well as your strongest points. That way, you learn to know what to avoid and what to pursue.

Had you devoted time to the essentials, you would have discovered the little tell-tale signs no matter how she perfects the act of duplicity. When you know someone well enough you can always guess with near accuracy when something isn’t right.

The lesson is to avoid the blinding complications of sex until the time is ripe to avoid the mistake of sentimental reasoning and decision. When it comes to the issue of selecting a life partner, it
takes more than sentimental feelings. The decision has to be influenced by realistic fact to be meaningful.

But the overriding truth: allow the will of God for you.

Good luck.

My Husband Has Turned Me Into Outcast

Dear Agatha,

I am 32 years old and married with three children, while expecting the fourth.

I am grossly unhappy with the man I married seven years ago, when I was 24.

My problem is that this man doesn’t appreciate me; does not buy things for me. Instead, he spends his money on girlfriends. I on my own take care of all my needs, both financially and materially.

The most annoying is the attitude he puts up when I desire him.

Sometimes I wonder where the undying love he promised me is. Can you imagine my husband giving me a timetable of when he wants to be with me and when he doesn’t? Agatha, is it fair?

I stumble on condoms randomly in his clothing’s, and when I ask him whom the condoms are for since we don’t use them together, he usually responds that they were given to him at the numerous seminars he attends.

Most times I cry these days, and I don’t know what to do.

Please Agatha, should I divorce him or continue to endure this loveless marriage with him? Tell me what to do.

Worried Wife.

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Dear Worried Wife,

Divorce is never an option when problems come raining in a marriage. Life itself is laced with problems, which have to be tackled if we are to move to the next stage. At no time did God promise us a problem-free life, rather, He only assured of His mercy and presence through our trials.

Once a person has the right attitude towards an issue and commits it into the hands of God, everything would work wonderfully well.

You are not alone in the challenges you are facing. Every married couple has a tale to tell about their marriages. You will be shocked at what most couples are coping with, because they would make yours appear as a child’s play.

At least, you haven’t complained about him beating you or violating your person.

Every situation has a worse version, so begin by learning to be grateful that your situation isn’t something you cannot manage.

Painful as what I am about to say is, the truth is, most women are coping with the presence of other women in their marriages. So your husband isn’t doing something most men aren’t doing.

And like you, most women are also responsible for their own keeps, not because it is an ideal thing, but to ensure a certain level of peace and happiness in their lives.

The reality of contemporary marriages is that the woman has to be up and doing to make it work.

Most men simply aren’t ready to carry all the responsibilities of the marriage institution alone.

Even when they want to, economic realities make it impossible for them to do.

If he is paying the house rent, taking care of the children, providing the food, be thankful that the burden on you is only your needs.

In a lot of marriages, the women are practically playing the roles of breadwinners, even where their husbands are gainfully employed.

The dynamism of today’s marriages differ greatly from the time of our mothers, hence, you must learn to flow with the current trend, else you risk pushing your husband further away from you; into the waiting arms of those numerous ladies who are daily praying for a mistake on your part for them to come in and do those things you are complaining about joyfully.

While not eulogising as the ideal, the current marital trends, naked reality demands that the woman at home deploy wisdom in her attitude, comportment and reactions to what is happening in her marriage.

You are about to give birth to your fourth child. He must be doing something right for you to have agreed to have four children in seven years of marriage.

I am sure if he weren’t taking care of the children, paying all the other necessary bills, you wouldn’t be expecting that child.

The trick of reviving an ailing marriage is to move away from the negatives to the positives.

Learn to give him credit for the little he is doing before tabling bigger things before him.

If he has given you a timetable of when to be with him, rather than bemoan the development, make an occasion of it, by ensuring he never forgets the memories of your moments together.

Difficult as it maybe, you owe it to yourself, the children and your marriage to stop worrying about the other women.

What should be your utmost concern now is how to release him from the claws of the other women. And better means do you have than your home advantage, and intimate knowledge of him to get him asking for more.

He loves you enough not to have told you to quit his home.

That is one thing you must never forget in a hurry. You have a history together; one none of these girls has with him, so, get cracking by opening pages from your wonderful past to kick start your determination to get him back.

Give him the greatest sex he will ever have, remember you have the license. Read up books and don’t be shy in experimenting with what you read. The idea is to get him screaming for more. If you are the lay back type, allowing him to do all the thinking for fear of being labelled wayward, its time to get out of all that and give him everything in you.

Time enough to worry about what he thinks; the job at hand is to get him to forget. In war, every weapon is legitimate.

Can you remember the type of dresses he particularly liked you in? Or how he wanted you to appear way back then? Rekindle his memories of yesteryears by doing precisely that. Help him remember why he wanted you for keeps among the women in his life then.

Helping him to remember is helping you have peace in your marriage. Nagging him or greeting him with gloomy face will not change a thing, but a positive attitude from you can.

Also, learn to improve on your cooking; there is always plenty of room for improvement in whatever we do. That you have cooked his meals for seven years and he has eaten them without complaining doesn’t mean he is satisfied. He may not be able to tell you precisely, but would appreciate it, if you take the effort to improve on your cooking. Find out discreetly what restaurants he visits with these girls, go there to find out what their specialty is and make the effort to cook it for him on the days he would be home with you and the children.

For privacy, you could turn your bedroom into your love-nest. Redecorate if for the purpose of seducing him back into your arms.

If you can afford it, book yourselves into a hotel for a romantic weekend from the children and the familiarity of your home.

Use your money, body, time and imagination to woo him back. He has to come back first before you can complain about the pains he has caused you. In his present mood, he won’t listen.

You have plenty of time to remind him of his vows to you as well as responsibility to his children. But for now, you have to bury your pains and get him interested in you all over again. Being pregnant is not an excuse not to be romantic. It is just a matter of using your imagination as well as determination.

Many marriages are today running on determination.

Once you, as the woman, are determined to stay on irrespective of what the man does, the problem is half solved. You will stop worrying about his attitude and learn to focus on the reasons both of you have decided to stay together. It will also stop you worrying and crying over the situation in your home.

Simply because life hasn’t been fair to a person doesn’t make it right for that person to commit suicide, which is what you would be doing if you give up on your marriage and husband.

In addition, get on your knees. There is nothing prayers cannot change. Rather than cry to yourself, why not direct your cries to the One person who has the heart of your husband right in His palms? There is no man or situation God hasn’t absolute authority over. Cry to Him for strength, courage, wisdom, patience, tolerance and selfless love to make your marriage work.

If you leave, your four children will be the greatest casualties of your decision. Even if you have the financial resources, you don’t have the emotional ability to handle four children alone. They will always demand for their father’s presence. So, its best you make it work rather than go it all alone.

Doubtless, you are hurting, but be wise as a serpent and deploy the meekness of the lamb to smile again in this marriage.

Good luck.

She Duped Me Of All I Had, Bolted Without Trace

Dear Agatha,

I am in my late 20s. At best I can describe my life as a live in hell since I lost my parents.

As a result of my simple nature, a lot of people around me including members of my family are beginning to mistake my simplicity for stupidity.

Agatha, can you believe that the one woman I trusted the most, the one I planned to spend the rest of my life with, who knows everything no other person knows about me, defrauded me of the only possession left for me by my brother out of our father’s property, the only thing that gives me income to continue my education and keep body and soul together?

I am so ashamed to mention it here because no member of my family is aware of what I have done.

The tragedy of my situation is that I come from a family where every person is on his or her own. My undoing was to have trusted her with the secret and document of the business I inherited from my father due to my love for her.

While we were dating, she took me to meet a woman in a remote village in Ondo State whom she introduced as her mother. When I went back to look for my girlfriend and the woman, I was told they didn’t know anybody by the name or description there. She seems to have completely vanished into thin air.

I couldn’t believe what was happening. It appeared like a scene from a fictional tale. In retrospect I think she must have used a spell on me because I told her things I have never told anyone, shown her secrets about me no one else knew. I was really in love with her. As a result of her betrayal, I have stopped my part-time programme for lack of finance. I have taken to menial jobs to survive the hard times I plunged myself because of my sheer carelessness.

Three weeks after she left, she wrote a letter explaining why she did what she has done. She said since it was the culture of the Ibos never to marry outside their people, she would send me the money she took when she makes it.

Being a Christian and one who fears God, I can’t curse her or go to a native doctor to avenge what she did.

Agatha, is it a crime to desire inter-tribal marriage? Why did she do that to me? The worst is that my friends warned me of her sincerity but I thought they were merely jealous.

I’m writing you for help because of a childhood friend who promised to help me in January this year. As a matter fact, he introduced me to this column. He says he reads it everyday online.

I can’t reach him anymore through his cell phone and since I don’t have a phone then he too can’t even reach me.

Please, Agatha I need your help to contact him. I want to know if he still interested in helping or to forget all about it. I am so frustrated and can’t continue like this anymore.

I want him to please contact me through this e-mail address: robbertuzoorji@yahoo.com

I don’t know how to beg him anymore. I wish I wasn’t so stupid to trust when I knew next to nothing about her. My mistake was falling in love with someone I felt something very special for. I thought her claim of love was genuine. Not once did I think she was after my money.

From my experience, I just want to warn everyman out there to be careful because not all that glitters is gold. Most ladies are simply out for the money they can get from men. Obsessed in their greediness, they forget nothing lasts forever, and that punishment waits at the end.

Robert.

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Dear Robert,

I really sympathise with you and hope your friend gets to read this.

It is unfortunate you lost everything to love and trust. If this is any encouragement, a lot of men before you have suffered the same fate but are today better and happier in other relationships.

The good, the bad, and the ugly people the world. Life always has a flipside. Only those who are fortunate experience the ugly side of life in the beginning, when they have all the time in the world to learn and make necessary adjustments for a happier ending.

Your story may present itself now as a nightmare to you but what this woman has done in the long run is simply to give you the strength to be stronger and be more focused in life. Without her bitter pill, you may never have what it takes to go the extra mile, think deeper and access your ultimate strength as a human being. In life, the best can only be purchased when we go deeper into our inner reserve to drag out the genius lurking inside of us. Behind many of the great stories and successes we all admire are countless number of failures, disappointments, despairs, pains, mockeries and abject poverty. It takes a determined mind to make the difference in life.

What she has done is simply to help you look beyond your inheritance to your own abilities as a human being. It is only expected that you go through period of discomfort to get to your promised land. An expectant mother knows that to get to her new baby, she has to experience and endure the excruciating pains of labour.

Don’t allow your experience with her limit you or make you resentful of everywoman who comes your way because just as one woman is capable of destroying a man, another has been placed to uplift him beyond measure. If you refuse to let go, refuse to forgive what you now think is your mistake, it might be difficult for you to love again or give another woman the chance to heal you the way you deserve to be healed.

What you should do is to learn to take each day at a time. Love can be intoxicating but can be managed just as effectively. Learn to trust with just a little bit, your smile before you can trust with friendship. When a woman is able to make you smile effortlessly, continue to make you smile when you are moody, has the tolerance to understand your moods and willing to stay when you are not saying anything to her, still has the caring smile on her face when you are unbearable, then you can trust her with your friendship.

True love is without creed, colour, gender and tribe. It is pure. There is no harm in loving someone outside your state. She is only using the excuse of tribe to mask her true nature. What she did is inborn in her and has nothing to do with where she comes from or where you are from. Again don’t allow yourself to be sucked into her nasty nature by refusing the love of any woman who may not be your tribe. To do that would be handing over to her and your past, the power to perpetually hurt you.

God works in ways we don’t see. He knows you can survive without that money, hence allowed her to take the money to enable you enter into His covenant for you. Being a Christian should make this time easy for you; make you appreciate that it takes nothing for God to make something out of it.

God wants to take the glory for your life so surrender to Him and allow His will come through in your life.

What you should do is to seek the face of God. If He hasn’t destined this friend to help you, there is nothing you or he can do. But when you first seek His face before sourcing for help, things would be a lot easier for you as He would have paved the way for your success and breakthrough.

As for the lady, your approach is commendable. It is always best to leave the fight for God. When He fights, there is usually no appeal. Don’t get discouraged by all that have happened to you or question the Will of God for you. Everything He does is always perfect.

Good luck.

Lonely Hearts

Dear Agatha,

I am 26, a virgin, and lives in Lagos. I want a girlfriend who would end up as my wife. The lady who should be between 18 and 26 must be God fearing, educated, trustful and religious.

Any interested lady should sms only to 07055118379 or 07040671234

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Dear Agatha,

I am 41, single, tall, energetic, from Edo State based in Lagos. I am a businessman who desires a matured, financially independent lady who is ready to settle down as soon as possible. Tribe and age is not an issue as long as she is loving, respectful, serious minded, kind and caring. I promise to spoil the woman of my dream with love.

Interested woman should call or text me on this number, 07059289199. Please, no beeping.

He Blames Alcohol For Seducing Our Neighbour’s Daughter

Dear Agatha,

I thank God for using you to proffer solutions to relationships and marital problems. The good Lord will continue to strengthen you.

My relationship is seven months old. Until I began to receive different calls and read several text messages from his different female friends. I was very much in love with him and also trusted him too.

Recently, I was invited to a programme but was unable to go back home because the programme ended very late. I had no choice but to call him to inform him of the development. He agreed but called later to request I should inform my neighbour’s daughter of his desire to sleep in my house. Since she wasn’t a stranger to my house I agreed but something about the arrangement didn’t sit well on me.

But I had no choice since the day was very late. The next morning, I rushed to the house only to see him arranging the house. I was surprised at this development because it wasn’t his nature to housekeep. When I made a comment about this he replied by informing me that my neighbour’s daughter took his money. According to him, she took his money on the allegations that he touched her. He denied knowledge of the incident on the grounds that he was drunk.

He told me the girl said the money was to buy her silence and keep the incident from me.

Baffled and desirous of getting to the root of the story, I instantly called the girl in his presence to hear her side of the story. To my shock, the girl right in his presence told me exactly what happened. According to her, my boyfriend gave her money to sleep with him only for him to turn round to ask for the money when she refused to give in to his request.

Right in his presence the girl told me he said he was tired of me, and looking for a way out of the relationship.

Fortunately, he did not succeed in sleeping with her and her mother is ignorant of what happened.

Since then he has been begging me for forgiveness, attributing what happened to the influence of alcohol. He also denied being tired of the relationship and me.

Please, Agatha advice me on how to go about this. Do I continue with the relationship or quit? You are the only one I can share this with.

Worried Lady.

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Dear Worried Lady,

You shouldn’t even debate something obvious like this at all. Quit this relationship. It isn’t healthy for you. Had he slept with the young girl and gotten her pregnant, what would have been his excuse, alcohol?

Had the girl told her mother, how would you have handled that, the attendant embarrassment and all the issues that go with such an act?

This man clearly isn’t responsible and lacks respect for you. You would be risking a lot of things by continuing with a man you cannot vouch for. It is obvious from the story that his actions were premeditated. He came with the sole purpose to lure the poor girl into his bed when the opportunity offered by your absence presented itself. All along, he had his eyes on the young girl but your presence prevented him for pursuing her.

Can you trust such a man with your sister, female relatives or friends? To continue with this type of man is to expose yourself to all sorts of emotional and social ridicules.

Leaving him is only a part of the solution. You also have to work on your values to avoid making more fatal emotional mistakes.

Seven months is too short a time to move into a house with a man or allow him the privilege to sleep over in your house.

You are lucky this incident didn’t go any further else you would have been mopping up a situation you know next to nothing about. In the seven months you have dated him, what do you know about him? What if he weren’t just a philanderer but a hardened criminal or into human ritual? What excuse would you be giving the Police? That you are innocent or don’t know the man you claim to be your boyfriend whom you sleep in his house or allow to sleep in your house is a criminal?

What if he had raped the girl? How would you have explained to your neighbour you didn’t know about his intentions considering you were the one who called the girl to allow him in?

If you are wise, you shouldn’t debate staying with him. Quitting should be a natural conclusion. The implication of what he wanted to do far outweigh whatever consideration of love you may have for him.

It is clear he doesn’t love or care for you in the same way you care for him. If he had any respect for you, he wouldn’t go to the length he went. For the girl to have told you right in his presence the things he said shows that he did say those things.

His conduct should serve as a vital lesson for you in your next relationship. That a woman allows a man free access into her body is no assurance the man would stay faithful to her. A relationship that will work doesn’t need the help of premarital sex. No woman can force a man into giving her what he isn’t ready to give, no matter how great a lover she is. It only presents a woman as being desperate.

A man who really cares for a woman, would never place sex as priority or insist on having it at all cost. Men only make it mandatory for women they have no plans for.

Your level of intimacy with this man you met seven months ago was too hasty. You didn’t give yourself enough time to study the man before you allowed him that much. You simply jumped into bed with him without investigating the stranger in him.

It takes more than a declaration of love to trust another with your body and space more so if you are a woman. The man has nothing to lose as evidenced by what he did and told the girl. A woman is supposed to protect her body, reputation and ideals as jealously as she protects her child. When a woman leaves her flanks unprotected, she becomes vulnerable to all sorts of male attractions.

Men are hunters by nature, which is why a woman must be very discreet and discriminatory on who comes close to her. Once a woman makes the mistake of picking the wrong sex partner or allows herself to be goaded by sentiments, she ends up opening herself up to derision unless she realises early enough and makes the effort to clean up her act.

Unless you are sure of a man, don’t encourage him to come to your place especially if you stay alone.

Love can happen at first sight but its needs the patience and wisdom of time to grow into something special and wonderful. Like raw gold, there is no hurrying the process of refining. To do that would be to come up with something inferior and substandard in nature. Only the goldsmith who is ready to endure the intensity of the heat and its attendant pains come up with the finest of gold. Any man who loves you must be ready to exercise patience and endure his emotional discomfort to have you for keeps.
When next you go into a relationship, give it time to grow naturally. From the beginning, state the ground rules. Don’t be afraid to let go because you can only keep what you have, not what you don’t have. No matter how advanced technology and permissive our ways of life have become, some things don’t change. When it comes to the moral values of a woman, men are still very traditional about it.

Therefore learn to exercise constraints for the sake of your self-respect.

Good luck.

Your Take On Office Dating?

Dear Agatha,

I so much appreciate your column and the way you handle issues. I pray that the Lord will give you more wisdom and understanding to carry on.

Please, I need a little advice. Is it right to date a colleague in the same office?

Favour.

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Dear Favour,

There is no categorical answer to this. It depends on the couple involved. Provided they can manage their emotions, and are matured about what they are doing, understand the laws of the different environments they daily subject their relationship to, handle the gossip and the excitement of being in love, there is nothing wrong in it.

The problem comes when the couple is unable to keep sentiments out of office, cannot maintain a fine balance between official hours and private time or unable to harmonise the different official relationships they have with their personal feelings for each other.

A lot of the time, couples find themselves conflicting their private feelings with official responsibilities. They allow problems at home come into official matters making impartial decisions impossible. The victim of this impasse between a feuding couples that work for the same employer is the organisation, which is why many managements discourage it.

As long as you can manage your feelings sufficiently to conform with the different structures you place your relationship in, there is no law against a couple working in the same place.

Good luck.

Can’t We Kill His Love For Alcohol?

Dear Agatha,

You are doing a marvelous job. I don’t know if you can help us because it is not a love matter, but we don’t know where else to turn to.

We are helpless. Our son is an alcoholic addict. He went to best of schools and was in the university when he dropped out without our knowledge. When we found out we did our best to encourage him to change but all to no avail. He was at a rehab and was much better but I took ill and was not there to supervise him, and so he relapsed. We have prayed and fasted and we do not know what else to do. He refused to go back to rehab. Please can you help? We are Muslims by the way.

Worried Mother.

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Dear Worried Mother,

Like I always say, parenting is about the most difficult job in the world. Although it appears to be very simple to the uninitiated, often it requires the grace of God to come out of it smelling roses.

This is because children are constantly under the influences of so many people and happenings around them. For the most part of it, making a success of it isn’t entirely dependent on the training the child gets at home but the exposure the child gets outside the home. The adulterations come from outside influences, like friends, the media, and social values as propagated by global trends.

Your child may have had the best training at home, and gone to the best schools, but what sort of friends did he make and keep company? What sorts of homes do these friends come from? What sorts of trainings did they get from their homes? What sorts of values did these children come with? That you laboured to send a child to the best schools doesn’t insure the child against negative influences.

Whether parents realise it or not, peer’s influence is one of the strongest, sometimes stronger than family ties or values. Only few children can withstand the pressure of peer’s influences. For this few reasons, it takes special kind of grace to make them withstand the taunt, condemnation, discrimination that come from not being part of the large crowd.

For most youths, they cannot withstand all these emotions hence give in to the influences of their friends. At this point, they jettison everything their parents taught them at home. A discerning parent can always tell when the child begins to take the first fatal steps by the lies, missing money, sudden urge to be alone, irritations when one sneaks into his or her private area unannounced, vague friends and the signal of wanting to do things his or her own way. But once the child escapes the stage of detection and masters the act of living in two different worlds, it becomes almost impossible to find out.

This is where the real challenge of parenting presents itself. Once the child is old enough to mingle with a large crowd of friends; when the rebellion of the teenage years mingles with the natural curiosity of the human mind, parenting can go either way.

One thing you should never do is to blame yourself unduly for refusing to act when the signs were all over. The danger of doing that would only make you more guilty and unable to help him. Take the blame for those mistakes you know you could have avoided and manage those you know you had no power over.

At this point, it is no use dwelling over the past. The past that brought him to this point no longer has the power to influence him or change him. The harm of the past has done the worst. You and his father can’t change that.

The only heritage the past has to offer him and you in his current state is the memorial of your own youthful years. What was it like? How did it go with your parents? On those occasions your parents were spitting fire as a result of your misbehaviour, how did you feel? How did you want them to handle you? What were the things your parents did which in retrospect you wished they had done differently? What words did you crave to hear the most from them, which never came your way?

Can you think of any point in your yesterday as a teenager or youth when you wanted to go contrary to all the training you had? When you wanted to revenge your parents’ seeming high-handedness? When you wanted to shame them for not allowing you have enough of the things you wanted? Or when you wanted to do something outrageous simply to get them to devote time to you?

In your own past, what mistakes did you make that given the benefit of time could have contributed to his current travails?

Can you think of any? Knowing and appreciating the many thoughts going on in his mind would make it easier for you.

He may have rejected everything but he cannot reject love and friendship. It is long past time the period of condemnation, regrets and accusation. From his reactions to your absence by his side, it is obvious he needs you around him and to get over his challenge.

What is the nature of your sickness? Would it allow you go to the rehab at least once a week or twice while you employ someone to care for him for the rest days of the week?

Is there an interim arrangement you can work out with him if he isn’t keen on another person taking your place by his side at the rehab?

Why has he relapsed at home? Is there any condition at home he isn’t comfortable with? Has he ever complained about anything at home? Learn to listen to those salient things he is telling you. They may not make sense to you but sensible to him and important enough to change a lot of things about his condition.

If your inability to be with him at the rehab is the reason he relapsed, shouldn’t being at home with you exclusively help him stay focused on his recovery?

What changed between the times you visited him, fell sick, and his coming home? Can you think of anything? What have you done since his coming home to recreate the type of environment at the rehab centre for him?

The people at the centre must have done something right to make him change, can you get them to teach you? What tactic did they deploy in getting through to him? Is there something special in the décor of the place he particularly liked that could be recreated in the home to help him relax?

Go to the rehab if he refused to discuss ways they can help you get him off the habit. Ask if they render special home services. Even if they don’t, find out if something can be worked out for your son, a sort of arrangement that would involve them either coming to your house to counsel him or having him come over as an outpatient? Combining their professionalism with your maternal love is essential for his recovery.
If they are unwilling, seek professional help somewhere else.

There is also the need for you to impress it on your husband that money alone doesn’t make things right. He also has to get over his disappointment as a parent and be the friend he needs now to go back on the right track. In all his haziness, he has to find true love and friendship in your eyes to make him snap out his situation. He has to see a different kind of concern, one different from everything he is used to make him want to change.

Don’t ever get discouraged on those days he wants a sip of alcohol. His recovery cannot be without such incidents from time to time. Old habits are often the hardest to beat. On the days he shows remarkable recovery, reward him with a compliment on how good he looks or proud of him. Work on his vanity at times to get him interested in life and happenings around him. We all have egos we want massaged from time to time.

Another area you should work on is his source of supply. Where does he get the money? Who gets him his supplies? Who are still his friends, his collaborators in this macabre dance? Ensure you find out everything you need to know about his movements, his friends and even the level of assistance he is getting from his siblings. Ensure you also clear away your valuables so he doesn’t have easy access to funds to continue his habits.

This is one task you cannot do alone or afford to do with hostility. Despite the pains inside of you, you must learn to play down your own feelings and adopt wisdom in all of these.

As his mother, don’t give up on him even if everyone does. Keep praying for him because God listens always. His condition may appear discouraging, but you owe it to him never to lose faith in him because to do that would be to condemn him forever. Always speak positive words into his life.

Once you learn not to be affected by the opinions of others and concentrate on ensuring you help him get over this challenge, giving him your love and support would be a lot easy.

Good luck.

Her Presence Threatens The Pastor’s Wife…

Dear Agatha,

I have a friend who is 19 years of age, and has only senior secondary school certificate.

Her parents sent her to stay with their village pastor who promised to render assistance to her. She had been living with him before he got married. For reasons best known to the pastor’s wife, she didn’t particularly like the arrangement leading to constant problems for my friend in the house. She is almost due and the situation between her and my friend has degenerated to the point that my friend has been sent packing to her father’s house.

A few days ago, the pastor called asking her to come back to the house.

The question is do I tell her to go back or stay put in her father’s house? She has knowledge of computer, which in my opinion can fetch her employment on which she can begin life with.

But this man being the village church pastor gives the entire issue a different dimension and makes it a little bit more complex. What do I say to my friend?

Worried Friend.

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Dear Worried Friend,

The best thing is for her to stay back at her parent’s to avoid being cited as the reason for another woman’s marital problems.

Being a single lady makes her a potential threat to the other woman who may never truly comprehend the true reason her husband is interested in having her around him. Irrespective of whether the man involved is a pastor or not doesn’t stop the wife suspecting the nature of their relationship.

This is particularly so because she wasn’t involved in the process that brought the lady to live with her husband, or is she close to the lady’s parents for that matter. Had the girl come from her, she would be able to endure her presence.

Even, if the woman is ready to accept this lady what about her family and friends? There is always the fear of the unknown, the temptation of the flesh. A single girl staying alone with a man has its implication and is bound to attract comments from people around. His being a pastor would not stop the imagination of people conjuring up scenes in their minds or stop gossips about them from spreading.

The picture of the two of them living together before the appearance of the wife, is one whose image will never fade for a long time. Whatever attitude the wife may have put up might not be unconnected with the stories she has heard. No woman, no matter how trusting of her husband would ever be comfortable with her man sharing his space and home with a single girl without a chaperon.

If she has displayed any hostility towards this girl, it is only because she is trying to protect her home from the unknown danger of another woman taking over. She may not be justified in her attitude but when a woman is out to secure what is hers, fairness is the least of her worries.

In her shoes too, your friend too might find herself behaving in like manner. Only a few women would gloss over the fact of a single woman who is unrelated to their men staying together all alone in the same house. Life has taught many women and men too to be careful. Being a pastor especially, such situation is one he should not have allowed because a village community is too small a place for suspicion and gossips about them not to flourish.

The inability of the man to protect her from whatever attitude the wife may have put up is to dispel whatever suspicions and misreading may have been generated by the presence of the other girl in his house. Should he insist on the wife being polite and accommodating of the girl beyond what he can defend, it would compromise his own happiness at home.

Sincerely, there is no way the wife would ever be completely happy having her around. Going back would only cause more complications for your friend later. Being a first time mother, the pastor’s wife would naturally require assistance with the baby. For your friend, there is no escaping offering help as often as she is required to while staying in their house.

To complain would make her appear like an ingrate, to stay on would make her very resentful of the situation her parents’ financial inability has placed her because each day always bring along with it fresh challenges.

Again, it is doubtful if the pastor would be able to fulfill his promises without the full support of his wife. There are limits to how far a man can help an outsider without the wife’s support. Given the relationship between your friend and the pastor’s wife, it would be almost impossible for the pastor to make good his promises. The pastor is after all still human and subject to what is happening in his relationship.

Beyond his spiritual responsibility to his sheep, he is not under any obligations to take on the responsibility for your friend’s education. Doubtless he may have made a promise but if the conditions for fulfilling the promise are causing him problems in his own private life, he has every right to back out of that promise. To hold him accountable to that promise at all cost would be stretching things too far. The man may not have been destined by God to help her at all. In life we come with our special helpers from God, sometimes people we don’t even know while those we know and think would be of help don’t help. Had he asked God before making the promise, this challenge he is facing from his wife wouldn’t have happened.

In order not to cause problems for herself, whether now or in the future and to protect the pastor, his family and reputation, she should consider other options available to her.

Her secondary school certificate is more than what most people started out with. If she is industrious and determined to make something out of her life, her knowledge of computer operations is an added advantage.

She doesn’t have to stay with the pastor and his wife before she can go for further study. Let her stay with her parents. If for nothing at least she would have the peace of mind to source for a job.

What happened to her may be God’s way of telling her that this arrangement would not favour her and that it would be in her interest to look elsewhere for help.

With whatever she makes from her job, she can save to further her education to the level she wants to.

Besides, life is about sourcing for self-opportunities and not relying on people to think for one.

As a friend, you should not stop encouraging her. She would always need your support to reach her zenith in life. Join her in praying for her God given helper.

Good luck.

Any Wisdom Hooking A Lady That Makes Unreasonable Demands?

Dear Agatha,

I’m 30 and deeply in love with a 400 Level student of Lagos State University, LASU.

I met her three years ago and have gone out of my way to ensure I make her happy, meeting her needs. I even assist in paying her school fees when the occasion calls for it.

I haven’t made love to her because she says she is a virgin and I have indicated my interest in marrying her. I do take her out, buy things for her and even assist in her study.

Sadly, she seems to think I am a big boy due to the efforts I put into making her happy. She has taken to making unnecessary demands.

My question now is whether she can make a good wife?

Worried Man.

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Dear Worried Man,

It depends on what she wants from life. If her vision is to live on the fast lane and doesn’t care about where the money is coming from, she may not make a good wife but if it is just a habit she recently picked up from friends or on account of your willingness to meet her every need, it is something you can still change.

To help make up your mind, you have to go back to the very beginning. Was she like this when you first started? At what point did she change if she wasn’t always so demanding? What are your contributions to her new person? What impressions have you given her of yourself?

It is always easy to blame others for our own mistakes. In your bid to impress her, you may have inadvertently given her the impression that you have a deep and bottomless pocket. Like a young child whose parents are forever doing everything to please, she would always ask for more because you have never done or said anything to make her think you are incapable of meeting her every demand. Until you complain, she would never know her limits or your capability for that matter. You have to make her know she cannot always have everything she desires in life that she has to make the choice between what is important among her desires.

It is also in your interest you teach her what responsibility is all about. If you go out of your way to provide her with all she needs, don’t complain you can blame her for asking for me. It is the nature of man to ask for more and more.

Only very few people can apply the principle of constraint when it comes to going over board with liberties.

This doesn’t necessarily make them insensitive or of bad character but only reacting to man’s age long insatiable quest to acquire more than what is required to be happy.

In a way, you are to blame for her reactions as well as demands. You gave her everything she wanted in your bid to present yourself as the ideal man for her, one capable of taking care of all her needs. How was she supposed to know about your limitations and fears?

If you are really serious about marrying this girl and having a peaceful future with her, tell the truth concerning your financial status as well as the apprehension her ceaseless demand is generating inside of you. She has to be made aware by you that you are not looking for just a relationship with her but a relationship that would lead both of you to the altar, and that her behaviour and attitude is beginning to make you wonder at the wisdom of her choice. Tell her precisely what those fears are especially that of her suitability of being a good wife given her attitude towards money and material possessions.

It is pertinent she knows how her attitude is affecting you and causing you to do a rethink of your future together.

Giving her the benefit to think of the implications of her actions is to give you enough opportunity to watch her. If her interest in you is simply for the money she is getting from you, chances are she would begin to show resentment when you refuse to give in to her demands.

If she sulks sufficiently to change dramatically from the loving person she currently presents herself to be to one who has little regard for you, then you have every reason to worry about her suitability of being a good wife to you.

At this point, resist the urge to be sentimental or else you end up with a woman who may not support your early days of struggle or difficult storms when they appear, as they often do along life’s journey.

Furthermore, it would also give you opportunity to study her other qualities as a woman you can trust with your life and destiny. It is important if you two are contemplating marriage, you find the right rhythm in terms of fundamental qualities a man and woman need to have a good life together. Without either of you taking the time out to zero-in on those qualities, work on your deficiencies, find a point of acceptable equilibrium as well as the willingness to make things work, it might be difficult for the two of you to live together in peace and harmony.

From this early, you must teach her to apply the rule of being satisfied as well as moderation.

In addition, you must also find out how much respect you have for her and she has for you. When a relationship is going into marriage, it is important the couple understands all that is involved in making it work for them. You must look for traits in her character you may not be comfortable with after a while. For instance, be sensitive to her attitude now and after you must have discussed with her. Granted, relationship and marriage are products of sentiments, but the real challenge is knowing when to be factual and realistic in the choices we end up making. If you make the mistake of allowing yourself to ignore important flaws in her character, it won’t just be a case of her endless demands you would be worrying about but that of not having the right soul-mate.

This is why you should be very honest and opened about so many things happening in the relationship.

Good luck.

I’m Betrothed To A Father Of Two

Dear Agatha,

I am a regular reader of your column. If you can recall, I wrote to you twice last year concerning two men who had had children and were seeking my hand in marriage.

After praying and seeking counsel from people and my parents, I decided to go for the one with a girl after considering that the girl would one day get married.

We have done the introduction and even agreed on a January date for our traditional marriage, but owing to reasons beyond our control, it didn’t hold.

Unknown to me, the unforeseen situation has to do with a married woman who became pregnant by him. The woman ran away from her husband on account of being childless after about seven years of marriage to her husband.

Though the woman isn’t a stranger to me and very much aware of our relationship and our plans to get married, I didn’t know she was that unhappy. Now she has given birth to a baby boy.

My boyfriend and his family are begging me to forgive him because what happened was as a result of the devil’s work. His family members insist I should forgive him because I am the only woman known to them.

He insists he will never marry the woman. Since I discovered what he did, I have cried myself silly. The pain of his betrayal is too much for me to bear.

Agatha, why me, why is this happening to me? Why do I have to go through so much heartbreak? Why women are naturally wicked to each other? What have I done to deserve all these pains?

My greatest challenge is my reactions to him. Despite the pains he has caused me, I can’t help the surge of joy that engulfs me anytime I hear his voice.

I also want you to confirm if the baby really belongs to her husband under our native laws and customs. This is because the bride price paid on her has not been returned to the husband and family.

I feel so bad because at 35 years of age, I should be married. I have fasted, prayed over this issue and marriage. Does it mean that God doesn’t want me to get married? I have never been married. What have I done wrong?

Worried Lady.

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Dear Worried Lady,

You haven’t done anything wrong. Whatever is happening to you still falls under the plans of God for you because He sees so many things you don’t see and knows things you don’t know about yourself.

Besides, God’s time is never too early or late rather, it is always perfect.

He understands and knows more than you know. The best thing for you is not to question or nag Him. Instead, give in to His wisdom and authority.

At 35, you have every reason to be apprehensive but do you have the powers to hasten your desires to fulfillment? If you had, I am sure you would have done that by now. So, stop worrying over the things you cannot change or make happen.

There are two types of answers we get to prayers. Some come the way we desire them, some come first masked in pains and disappointment. Only the patient person who has absolute trust in God appreciates His ways even when things appear wrong.

This man may not be your choice of a husband because God is never the author of confusion. Irrespective of what the laws and customs of this woman’s husband people say, it cannot erase one thing, that he is incapable of being faithful to you.

If he had any respect for you, he wouldn’t sleep with another woman after going to see your people. Not only did he sleep with another woman but one who is close to you and your confidant. Chances are this is not the first time he has been sleeping with her. If she hadn’t got pregnant, you wouldn’t have known the extent of his duplicity.

While the choice of whether to go back to him or not is ultimately yours to make, be careful else you end up unhappier with yourself than you are now.

Already, he has children by two women: a boy and a girl. If the first one was a mistake, how do you classify the second one? Would he also claim this one is a mistake? What mistake when he has you in his life?

And if it was, why didn’t he tell you immediately she told him about the pregnancy? If he is asking you to forgive him, what are the conditions of your coming back to him? Remember, you are not going to live with his family but him. His family can only facilitate things but he has the final decision on his desires in life. If his desire is to keep sleeping around with anything in skirt, there is little his family can do about it.

You have to be sure of what you are coming back to. It isn’t just a matter of insisting he can’t marry the other woman. It takes two to tango and this tango has a baby to show for it. He can afford to deny the woman but can he deny the baby? What arrangements is he putting in place for the sustainability of mother and child?

Whether this woman ran away from her husband or not isn’t the issue here. Reality on ground is that she has a baby by your man. He is the biological father of that child. The woman didn’t rape him, he did it of his own free will hence would be grossly irresponsible of him to abandon the baby he helped bring to the world.

Don’t because you want to get married at all cost ignore this salient fact of the issue of his responsibility to this woman. Yes, she was desperate for a child but your boyfriend allowed himself to be used so he should face the music.

Any man capable of denying responsibility to his child is capable of doing anything. There is no way you and your children would have peace if you refuse to address the issues of his two children now. Marriage to him means having to live with these women and their children. Can you cope?

There is also the issue of his sincerity towards you. Do you consider him a man you can trust in your old age? There is more to being married than bearing the name of a man. Marriage without respect, trust and sincerity cannot stand the test of time. A marriage where you constantly worry over the reliability of your man especially where your female friends and relatives are considered isn’t the ideal at all. The time that would have been devoted to building the relationship and inserting happiness would be spent worrying over issues you knew about but decided to sweep under the carpet.
If you must marry this man, do so without illusions because to go with the illusion of happiness after could be your undoing.

But it would pay you to listen earnestly to the voice of God and not the voice of your desperation to marry at all cost.

Good luck.

My Man Insists I get Pregnant Before Marrying Me

Dear Agatha,

After a long wait and search, I recently met a man I am interested in enough to contemplate marriage with. Although he isn’t my ideal man, but I have grown over the years, to be able to look beyond the physical appearance of a man, to what he is inside.

Honestly, in times past, I wouldn’t be caught dead with this man, let alone consider him as a husband, but like I said, a lot has happened to me in life. At 33, age isn’t exactly on my side and with majority of my friends already married; I have been forced to re-arrange my priority, with being finicky about the physical presentation of a man being the least.

Lets say, I have outgrown the age of illusion, and had transited to the age of reality; which is why his insistence I get pregnant before we fix a wedding date is driving the daggers into my heart. I have known him for only six months, and right from the beginning, he hasn’t hidden his desire to have me permanently in his life, considering that he too has stayed on the shelf for too long. He is in his early 40s.

I have tried to argue the point with him, but he insists he cannot afford the mistake of marrying without the woman first getting pregnant.

When I asked him about love, his declaration is that certain things are inexplicable, and that his desire for me to get pregnant has nothing to do with his feelings for me.

Agatha, having waited this long, I feel I deserve love. I can’t help this feeling that he isn’t really interested in me for myself, but only sees as an appropriate woman to, as well as someone to bear his children.

I am so confused. Some of my friends say there is nothing wrong in what he is asking of me, while others think it is wrong. Deep down, I don’t feel it is right too. I have never, ever planned to become pregnant before marriage.

What do I do? I am so confused. He wants us to get married as soon as I get pregnant. He is making me feel deep inside me that given my age, I don’t have a lot of choices, hence, must do as he says. Agatha, to be candid, what choices do I have at 33? Wouldn’t it be simpler to give in to his demands and get on with our married life? Like I said, I am so confused.

Ladun.

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Dear Ladun,

Being married is more than having children together, and one of the easiest things to achieve in a marriage is to make babies. Unfortunately, it takes a whole load of efforts to give those children the right foundation than it takes to bring them into the world. A lot of inputs are required to give those children a good life and keep them happy. Without a united home and happy parents, these children he is asking for will never have the type of life they deserve.

From the tone of your letter, it is obvious both of you are applying individual approach to an issue that requires joint inputs from both of you.

Why does he want you to get pregnant? Any particular reason? Still, take time out to listen to his reasons, no matter how vexatious his reasons may sound to you. Listening to him doesn’t automatically mean you are about to submit to his wishes, but it’s a way to demonstrate your willingness to subject every issue between you to discussions. In getting him to talk sincerely about it, you have to listen to his real reasons; understand the fears he isn’t saying out loud, as well as navigate things towards an amicable settlement.

Listening to him, offers you too, an opportunity to talk about your anger without getting angry; get him to listen to you without anger and stubbornness in his heart. Such discussion opens up to you a new way of getting issues resolved without suspicion, anger and stubbornness. This way, you are able to talk frankly about your own fears, especially. For instance, rather than fret silently over what would happen to the relationship should you be unable to conceive quickly, raise the scenario during your discuss with him.

The creed of a successful marriage is premised on honesty, wisdom, patience, tolerance and boldness. There is no way both of you would be able to make a good decision without first coming out with your fears, anger and frustrations.

You should be able to bring up the issue of love and friendship in this arrangement that appears to you to have been contracted by him primarily for baby making. Anger would only make him defensive, but dialogue will enable him talk sincerely about why he wants things done his way. Your cue as his wife to be, is to always find ways of ensuring you express those views that are potentially inimical to the growth of your relationship.

Let him understand your fears about the uncertainty of his proposition, that marriage isn’t about sampling the future, but about risks. Marriage is premised on promise (hope), something we don’t see, but which we belief in and are willing to take the risks to realise.

Asking you to have a baby is another way of telling you that he doesn’t belief in the promises he is making to you. Insisting you do it before he walks you down the aisle is asking you to perish any hope you might have built round his promises, and on the declaration of his intentions to spend the rest of his life with you. To do it his way, would risk causing yourself pains.

To help him understand your feelings about his insistence that you take in before he sets a date, ask him how he would feel, if you insist too that he shows you physical prove like his bank statement and property, as evidences of his ability to care for you and the children. Tell him that is what he is trying to make you do by telling you to get pregnant first. You have to find a subtle way of getting him to think beyond his world, his sentiments and reason with you. He has to see you as his woman, his proposed better half, and the marriage you are both planning, as one without guarantees of money back when things don’t work according to plan.

He has to know that marriage is finding a friend; one who supports and encourages his or partner to incredible heights. He has to know that a couple can be blessed with children, yet failed to find the happiness required to live together as two adults. He has to discover your strength as a woman, your uniqueness, as well as the necessity of spending the rest of his life with you. If you fight him on account of this, you would be like all the other women he has met in his life.

Sincerely, quarrelling with him would not change him; rather, it would only destroy whatever chances you both have of making this thing work between you.

You also have to make him see that you are a reasonable woman, one who is ready to meet him more than half way to make him happy. You have to point out that he has to learn to trust your past, just as you are willing to trust his, and that babies are not ordered like goods from the supermarket, but given by God as symbols of His love and trust.

However, if he insists, you have to make the ultimate choice of the many ifs attached to his demands. If after becoming pregnant something happens to the pregnancy after the wedding what are your chances with him? If in that event, you are unable to take in thereafter, what are the assurances he would not get another woman to give him what you cannot give? Importantly, do you think he has what it takes to endure the unforeseen circumstances like you being childless for instance?

Besides, there is the issue of compatibility in terms of having the right temperament and attitude. From what you know of him, is he responsible, respectful, selfless, understanding, compassionate, understanding, caring, supportive, and, a friend?

Do you see yourself being able to live with the person he is throughout your life? These are concerns more important than the issue of babies. Without you two being able to achieve uniformity in these areas, your marriage may not be able to survive the attendant storms. Where would that leave the children?

Whatever, some developments in or lives are God’s way of telling us to pray more and trust Him further. If God says he is yours, this storm would pass, but if He has other plans for you, despite what you consider the limitation of your age, the right man meant to give you the happiness that has eluded you all these years would come.

In matters of marriage, it is best to leave the decision to God.

Good luck.

From Dating To Marriage: Sex-free Relationship Speaks Morality

Dear Agatha,

I am actually an old man and probably do not personally need the good advice you give to people. However, your wonderful counsel to people on problems in relationship has always fascinated me. I found them helpful in my vocation as a counselor. I would like to thank you profoundly for the counsels you give. They impact on me, in spite of my ‘old age.’

There is, however, a recurring decimal in all the relationship problems involving ladies. The problem as I see it is that dating relationship is being mixed up with marriage relationship. In my capacity as a counselor on family issues and for youth, young single adults and parents, I have seen this mix-up as the underlying factor of most relationship problems.

My idea on this issue is that dating relationship is not a marriage relationship. Sexual intimacy is appropriate in a marriage relationship between a man and woman. Outside marriage, sexual intimacy is not acceptable. I am unequivocal about this statement regardless of the possibility of being termed archaic, given the permissiveness and perversion of our time. My licence is based on the fact that if we analyse the cases of ladies who write to you and similar columns in other newspapers and those who use my free services to seek counsel on their relationship problems as statistics, we can safely say that close to 80 percent of them are in relationship where they started having sexual intimacy with those they are dating. In each of the cases, I see the cart before the horse instead of the horse before the cart. No reasonable man worthy of a reasonable woman’s hand in marriage would marry a woman because of her sexual prowess. In all marriages resulting from sexual intimacy as its foundation, a woman has ended up with a man who is not worthy of her if she was forced into the sexual act. If she was not forced, then, you have “avis of identical plumage here.”

I would also like to state at the onset that when a relationship has shifted from dating to courtship, it is still not appropriate to indulge in sexual intimacies. In fact, engagement is not a licence for sexual intimacy with a man or a woman. The only licence for sexual intimacy with the opposite sex is Marriage. In this day and age, I would counsel that marriage should be according to marriage ordinance (law), legal marriage. I state this, hoping it is sounding strong enough because engagements have been broken off in the last minute. If during the course of building a relationship with the opposite sex one starts sexual intimacy and the relationship is called off, the only person whose loss may be manageable is the man. The woman loses completely and lives her life with a scar that hurts and hunts, even when she pretends it doesn’t. The men do not go unscathed either. They live with the thoughts of it and spend their lives comparing their earlier sexual encounters with the sexual performance of their wives. My experience dealing with relationship problems show that the men suffer also but without knowing its source. “The rich also cry,” remember.

I don’t know how mothers forgot or stopped telling their daughters the well-known line “boys want sex, they play at love and girls want love and they play at sex.” In 90-plus percent of times when a boy/man say he loves a woman, he actually means ‘I want to have sexual intimacy with her.’ And when a girl/woman tries out their charm on a man, she is actually saying, ‘I need someone, the man she is targeting, to care for me.’

The value of sexual intimacy in a relationship is either over-emphasised or wrongly emphasised or both. Sexual intimacy is an integral part of the man-woman relationship. It is, however, not the foundation. All relationships between men and women when founded upon sexual intimacy must crumble regardless of how far it was taken to: dating, courtship, engagement or marriage. This is the bedrock of almost all relationship challenges faced by mankind. Such a relationship could be likened to a drunk driver who is “an accident looking for where to happen.” Remember the house built by the foolish man on a pack of sand when the rains came, the wind blew, and the house came crumbling down.

We must have heard about people seeking counsel or dissolution of their marriages in six months or less. This is common in a sexual intimacy laden relationship that leads to marriage.

The foundation for lasting relationships that lead to growing marriage relationships are friendship, mutual respect, honour, faith in God and faith in one another, clarity of purpose, integrity and virtue.

Find a relationship that has endured and you will find these elements at its foundation. Find a relationship that has collapsed and you’ll find that these virtues were lacking or were not strengthened over time. Those men/women relationships that are still there that lack these elements are one of the hundreds of millions of marriage relationships that are mere caricature of the real thing. Many involved confess being trapped, confused, and running high-blood pressure. It takes a lifetime to sustain the marriage relationships that are well founded.

Most relationships are hanging on because children are involved, or the partners are afraid of what people would say or being seen as failures.

Dear Agatha, I would like to support your cause by suggesting that you be upfront with our female folks and let them know that the evil of premarital sex is not a mere religious jargon. It is a foundational issue for success in marriage relationships. Avoidance of premarital sex would enable ‘girls to get what they really want which is who would care for them.’

I cannot remember the name of the movie where I heard this quotation. I would use it anyway. “Love is one product you cannot sell by giving out sample.” The predominant mindset of the ladies, especially those who feel time is running out on them on account of age seem to be “give the man a ‘little booty’ if you want help them decide to marry you.” Nothing can be further from the truth. We have countless cases, but no one seem to be ready to learn from their past mistakes or the mistakes of their peers. If you give a man a little booty, if you allow a man who has not signed the dotted lines before your Church or the Law (Registry) and your parents to see your nakedness or have sexual intimacy with you, you reduce the chance that he will marry you by 90 percent. That is a big risk to run if you ask me. At the same time, you erode the elements of mutual respect, trust, faith, honour and virtue by 100 percent, meaning: if he ultimately marries you, there would be no strength in the foundation of that marriage to produce happiness and make it endure.

There is a higher doctrine of marriage the world needs to seriously be, considering at this time. This is the eternal dimension of marriage. The popular thing known to man is “till death do us part.” Marriage is part of the eternal plan of God for His children. If we plan marriages on ‘till death do us part’ basis, we increase the chance of failure and heartache. But if we plan marriage with a vision of the eternal relationship in mind, we would make the foundation sure before hand.

Sexual intimacy, no matter how thrilling, has no capacity to sustain a relationship beyond ‘one hour.’ I want to be quoted on this. I want to be proven wrong on this with evidence too.

The late Lucky Dube cried “my mother didn’t tell me the truth; my father didn’t tell me the truth…about the government.”

Dear Agatha, please tell mothers to tell their daughters the truth. Tell fathers to tell their sons the truth. Let fathers tell their sons the reason why they have no respect or why they have great respect for their mothers. Let them open up as to why they are not happy in their marriages to their sons’ mothers.

Mothers, instead of telling your daughters to “deal” with men because you suffered in their hands as a result of your mistakes, help them to stop ruining their lives. My people have a proverb that says, “The sheep is messing its tail up, thinking it is messing up the shed for its owner.” When premarital sex is involved in a relationship it is the girls/women who lose the most whether it continued into marriage or failed. The men always get what they want, ‘sex’ and the girls always lose what they really want, ‘love’ (care).

Sexual intimacy outside the bond of marriage is immorality. Dating is not a licence for sexual intimacy. Ladies, protect yourselves. Cheers.

Francis O. Nmeribe is a Marriage and Relationship Counselor.
Email: nmeribefrancis@gmail.com

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Dear Francis,

Thank you so much for your rich words of wisdom and experience. I sincerely hope a lot of our young girls, especially, and parents go away with something precious from this article.

God bless you.

Agatha.