I was raped by my father, uncle, teacher and school mates

With Auntie Agatha, gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com Tel: 08054500626 Dear Agatha, I have been raped at various times by my father, uncle and our driver. My primary six teacher, also had his fill of me. While in secondary school, two boys ganged raped me in the classroom. Although all of them including my father, always came back to plead for my forgiveness after raping me, but such pleas don’t erase what they did to me. They all did it once. Till date, I avoid my father like a plague. He too is always very uncomfortable around me just like my uncle who nobody has seen since he came to plead with me. He stays in Jos and has refused to come home. Now I am in my 300 level and the only way I enjoy sex is for a man to be very rough with me. This worked for me until recently when I fell in love with my boyfriend. Honestly, love is happening to me for the first time since I became an adult. All my life, it has been animalistic urge; have sex and walk away from it all before it becomes too complex. I have never had any serious relationship in my entire life because I see men as wicked, opportunists and animals. Given what I feel for my boyfriend, I know I am very much in love with him but at times when I remember all the abuses I went through I wonder if this relationship is worth it. At times too, when I recount the many times I was raped by my father and all the other men, I wonder why me. Is there something about me that made all these men rape me? Once I went to a church where the pastor called me out of the congregation and told me to see him after service. When I saw him after service, as if looking into the mirror he told me everything about my life. since I haven’t told anybody the story of my life, I knew he was real. He told me it was done by my grandmother to destroy my life because she never approved of my father marrying my mother. He said she put an evil mark on me to instigate men to violating me at will. He conducted three days deliverance sessions for me. It was after that I met my boyfriend. Despite the signals I give him, he has resisted making love to me. He expresses the desire to marry me and has taken the steps of introducing me to his parents. He graduated three years ago and works with the energy sector. Although he has an idea of all that happened to me, I haven’t given him the entire details of the many men who raped me. Also, it is proper to tell him about my father since he has met him with him when he came with parents and extended family members for a mini introduction. Deep down, I have this urge to come clean with the story of my past. Another thing is how to respond to his love making when we eventually make love. Would it be proper to ask him to be violent with me as is my custom? Sometimes too, all the old hatred I have for men resurfaces. At such times, I keep away from him but it would be difficult to do once we are married. I am just confused about it all and what to do? Violated Lady. Dear Violated Lady, Given all your experiences in the hands of the various men that raped you, including your father and uncle, you have every reason to hate men and stay away from them completely. Unfortunately, life isn’t always about what we want but what is practicable. The natural order of things is for a man and woman to end up in matrimony. This is why you must find a way of divorcing the painful memories of your various abuses from your mind. if you don’t make up your mind to be happy, no matter the love and care your man showers on you, the understanding he offers; you will never be happy. Although the spiritual manipulations explains a lot of things about your experiences but only your efforts can really make the difference at this point in your life. You have come to that valuable point in your life when God has stepped in to make you happy. The ball is now in your court; to prove to yourself as well as all those who tried to manipulate your destiny that you have what it takes to be happy, succeed against all the odds they put along the path of your life. Most times talking about such experiences, helps to lessen the burden by more than half. Keeping all such experiences bottled up all these years isn’t healthy for your emotional growth which is why the bile comes up strongly when you remember everything you went through. This kind of experience needs time to be truly forgotten. So you have to learn to give yourself time to get over it. One of the ways to go about it is to talk to this man who has shown remarkable understanding to you. While you reserve the prerogative of telling him about what your father did to you, let him know about all the other men that have abused you and how you came to the conclusions about your sexual preferences as well as the kind of hatred you at times have for men. He needs this information to help him know what he is dealing with as well as map out how to help change your attitude towards sex as well as him in particular. When a woman has been repeatedly abused by different men, she needs a different kind of understanding from her man to help live a normal life. Another thing you must do is to admit aloud to yourself the kinds of negative conclusions you came to about yourself when all those abuses were going on. Like you said in your letter, while all those abuses were going on, you wondered why you. Even though the pastor’s explanation gave you an insight to the source of the problem, it won’t totally help you forget all those ugly incidents. You need to confront your father and uncle with what they did to you. Ask them why they raped you when their business was to support and protect you. Often than not, the answers to most of our pains and challenges are usually found in the scenes of the incidents. Drawing your father out to talk about it will help all of you forge forward. You have to know what he felt then and feels now. Going by what the pastor said, your father may not even understand what prompted him or how it all happened. The fact that he feels uncomfortable around you shows he too is suffering emotionally. There is nothing like self condemnation; if you don’t take the steps of talking about that one time he raped you, both of you will always be miserable. He has to understand what went wrong that day he did the abominable act of sleeping with his own daughter. The talk will definitely go a long way in kick starting your complete healing process. One that you can do from all these is to find ways of using your experiences to help others. The more you talk, the better you become and happier you will be at the end of it all. This way, you will be able to learn to love yourself again. Talking about it will help you meet the woman inside of you; the one whose growth was stunted by the bitterness of your experiences. Talking will help the woman to come out of her shell, find her confidence in life and her womanhood. You have to help yourself discover the strength, beauty, resilience and character of the woman in you. A woman isn’t all about rapes; she is created by God to be a companion, valuable partner to her man. By the time you finish sharing your story with your man, you will discover that life has much more to offer you than what you know. It is this discovery that will help you tolerate and enjoy the company of your man the way God wants it between a man and woman. You are not an animal; you are a woman created to be loved, cared for and protected by a man. Above all, ask God for help to be a complete woman. Good luck.

I want her to accept another man’s proposal

With Agatha Edo, Email: womaneditor@independentngonline.com, gataedo@yahoo.com or agatha.edo@gmail.com Dear Agatha, Thanks for your immeasurable advice and solutions to people with relationship problems, I pray God will also help you in solving your own problems. I have a problem that needs your attention. I have a girlfriend, we have been together for four years now and thanks to God, have been able to abstain from sex all these years. I just graduated while she is in her final year, even though she is a year older than my 23 years of age, we love each other very much that people around us think I am very much older than she is because she accords me my due respect as a man. But the problem now is, she does not want to accept the many suitors coming her way, because of me. I love her and would want to marry her but the reality on ground may not favour this. What if after national service I am unable to procure a job to provide the right financial platform for me to execute my plans to marry her? Would she be able to wait for me to be ready? The issue is, do I advice her to marry one of her suitors? I will appreciate your advice. Thanks and wishing you compliment of the season. Worried Lover. Dear Worried Lover, If you both have been together for four years, this is an issue you can both discuss as frankly as possible. You have to make her understand your fears for her future; putting special emphasis on her age and the biological lifespan of a woman’s life. While at it, be honest enough to also tell her what your own fears are as well as the details of what your real plans for the future are. For instance, let her have the idea of when you really desire to marry as a man. This is because as a man you have things you must put in place before thinking of settling down. And unless you come from a very rich family and pressure is on you to marry urgently. At 23, you are still very far from being ready to marry as a man. Whereas, at 24, she is almost ready for marriage. One thing is to be in love another thing is to be realistic about certain things in life. once she graduates and serves, pressure would be on her to marry. It is when she gets to that junction, that she or you would know if she has what it takes to wait for you or go with another man who is ready. This is because, the journey of marriage goes beyond what both of you perceive it to be. It is a long journey of ups and downs, of choices, sometimes very critical and tough ones; it is also about doing the right thing at the right time. Even though marriages begin with the seed of sentiments, it becomes a journey of reality as the days go by. At 24, how long can she afford to wait for you? What kind of sacrifice is she ready to make for the relationship? This is one choice she has to make on her own without any help from you because it is more about her happiness than yours. By laying the cards face-up before her, you give her the rare chance of choosing the path she is most comfortable with. Beyond this, you must also ask yourself this question; how do you really feel about the age difference between the two of you? It may never have bothered you as boyfriend but now that you are at the juncture of making the relationship permanent, how do you really feel about marrying a woman older than you? You may not have on the surface considered it important but deep in your heart, it maybe. This is because no man, no matter how bleak the future appears to be would willingly encourage the woman he claims to be in love with to consider the proposal of another man. In all these, both of you have to be truthful about your desires as well as your plans for the future. If at the end of the day, she feels she cannot wait for your plans to mature, lacks the necessary patience to appreciate the situation you both found yourselves in, let her go. But if after having this talk with her, she agrees to wait for you to be ready, allow her be. Once she makes up her mind to wait for you, don’t try to persuade her against it in order not to hurt her and insult the love she has for you. There is no risk a woman in love cannot take, as long as the man in her life is very honest with her. Discussing it is to ensure both of you don’t feel the pains of regrets later in life. Good luck.

I regret shunning his wedding idea

Dear Agatha, I suspect my boyfriend is in another relationship. We have been dating for five years and planning to get married next year. We are live-in lovers and have a child already. What we are waiting for is just the formal ceremony. I have always wanted a big wedding while he says he cannot afford it. He said he would prefer to pay the bride price first before saving for the big wedding. I refused then because I wanted it all. But since the arrival of my baby last year, I have been pressuring him to go and pay my bride price but he seems not to be in a hurry anymore. Severally, I have questioned the changes in him; asked why he is no longer engrossed in our relationship; although he keeps assuring me otherwise but I am sure I know all the signs I am seeing. I noticed certain things about the way he relates with me have changed. For instance, he forgot my birthday for the first time in five years and when I reminded him, he simply said he was too busy. And took him another two days to even get me a gift. I also noticed that these days, he appears to be more interested in the baby, his appearance and the state of the house than my feelings. He is always on the phone and when I succeed in distracting him, he practically rushes through the conversation. To make matters worse, he has taken this new attitude to the bedroom. He rushes the process of initmacy to the extent that the magic of the moment is lost. He began by telling me he wanted to recover from the stress of childbirth. It has been six months since the birth of the baby but things have continued to depreciate in our relationship. His mother keeps assuring me that nobody can take my place in her son’s life but deep inside me I am scared that there is another woman somewhere. I confirmed as much from the way he hoards his phone these days. He doesn’t allow me come near his phone even taking it to the toilet with him. My friends are urging me to trail him to the unknown woman’s place to warn her to stay away from my man. I really don’t know what to make of this. Agatha, what can I do to make him come back to me? I know I can be stubborn at times, always wanting things done my way but we have been through a lot together. Besides, I love him very much and ready to forgive him of anything as long as he is by my side. Please help me. My son and I miss him very much. I don’t want to fight anyone. I just want him back. Dorcas. Dear Dorcas, Thank God for your wisdom. I am glad that you know nothing positive would be achieved by fighting him over mere suspicions. Even if your suspicions eventually turn out to be right, still refuse to bow to the counsel of your friends. You really don’t have any business with the other woman if the truth must be told. Your business is with your man. Iron out whatever the issues are with him instead of fighting a fight you may never win especially if the issues that drove him into this woman’s arms persist in your home. Although not every man needs an excuse to go into another relationship, but in most cases, the problems can be traced to the main woman. In your case, stubborness as well as lack of understanding of the nature of your man. Only very few relationships can survive this imbalanace. Most men aren’t equipped to deal or put up with very stubborn women. In their opinion such women are great turn offs because they are difficult to manage. Insisting you wanted a big wedding when he told you he didn’t have the money to finance it was wrong. Another woman would have asked him how much he had and agreed to manage it as long as it meant being with her man. Men are not so emotional about marriage as women are. Therefore when a man makes a demand for marriage, insist on it; but not getting the kind of support from the woman, his interest will soon begins to fade. Your man may have gotten fed up waiting for you to accept him the way he is. And now that you appear to want it as desperately as he once wanted it and on the terms he gave you then, he appears to have moved on. There is no challenge love and determination cannot overcome in a relationship. The first thing is for you to retrace your steps. Be truthful enough to admit your mistakes. Once you do this, it simplifies the entire process of reconciliation with your man. One thing is for sure, if he has really made up his mind about you, he would have done one of two things: pack out of the house or ask you to leave. Beyond the child between the two of you, he has nothing else to consider because you are both just live-in lovers. There is no document or action under any law protecting your stay with him. Therefore, if he actually wanted you out of his life, it would have been very easy for him to show you the way out. For this reason, be careful you don’t set off a chain of reactions in your relationship that you will later regret. And for all you know, he may just be acting this to break you down, make you accept your place in the relationship as well as jealous enough to make you think of the damage you are doing to the relationship. There is no relationship that can survive with two masters. You must learn from this early stage how to befriend your man, make him do things for you without you makng a fool of him or obvious to him. Humility is still one of the tools a wise woman uses in managing her relationship. Even if you wanted an elaborate wedding, you would still have listened, considered his options and made allowances for his reasons. If you are so obstinate on the kind of wedding you want, what assurance does he have that you will listen to him in other matters? This is one angle you should work on in your attitude. No man wants to end up with a woman he would argue with for the rest of his life. The fact that you made a dramatic u-turn from what your position was without any reason, is enough signal that you are only bothered about what makes you happy. At the time he wanted you at all cost, you didn’t want him enough to give up your dream of a big wedding. Now that you have a child, afraid that you would lose everything if he fails to marry you now that you are a mother, you are willing to do things his way. Life doesn’t work like that. If actually he is in a relationship and has found the woman who is selfless, willing to make him her man, invest in his happiness without weighing things in her favour first, it might be a little difficult for you without first making dramatic changes in your person. Five years must have given you some vital knowledge of him. You should know by now how to get him to listen, know the things he likes best as well as what he expects of you. One thing my experience in life has taught me, is absolute patience. Patience and selflessness go hand in hand. You now have to stoop to conquer what you unwittingly gave up. No matter how forbidden his looks are, beg him. Tell him you are sorry for being such a selfish person. Tell him about your resolve; this will tell him the thoughts and time you have put into making him happy again. It is also important he knows that you are really sorry because you love him and not that you want to marry him at all costs. It is essential that your change of mind is from a heart of love and not one of desperation. There is something you are doing right that has kept you in his life for five years. Go back to the drawing board, find it and amplify it. Once you get it right with him and your relationship, the other woman would become a thing of the past. In addition, learn to pray. Good luck.

Her passion is to get married

With Auntie Agatha, gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com, Tel: 08054500626 Dear Agatha, I’m an ardent reader of your column and I must say you have touched and saved lots of relationships through your work. I pray God bless you real good. I have a girl I have been dating since high school. I’m 25 years of age while she is 22. Right from the beginning she has always nurtured this passion for wedding ceremonies. She practically attends all weddings ceremonies in her church because it makes her happy. After high school, I left the country to study abroad. In fairness to her, she remained good and there for me. Our communication remained efficient. I came back to the country for the first time since I left in December 2009. Back in school she told me she was a virgin. Deep in me, I didn’t believe and anytime I tried making love to her, she would allow me touch her but sex, she won’t allow. I couldn’t force her but, when I returned to the country after two years of being away she allowed me. I was shocked to discover she was still a virgin. I’m in my final year now and hoping to further my studies. I know she misses me so much and I do too. I miss my family so much too. By God’s grace, I should be through by next year and return home. The problem now is, in the last few months, whenever we are talking on the phone, she would bring up the issue of marriage. At first, I told her I wish to have her as my wife but right now, there are things I need to achieve before settling down. I told her everything without holding back anything from her. I won’t be ready until about four or five years from now. She told me she wants to get married before she turns 25. I know it’s the dream of every woman to get married and start her own family but she is making it appear as if husbands are on sales in the shop and that a woman simply walks in there to buy one when she desires to marry. She doesn’t seem to appreciate that people need to date and plan for marriage and the days after. There was a certain time she got upset over something I knew nothing about. I tried but she wouldn’t tell me the cause of her anger. I thought she was fed up of the relationship so I sent her an sms telling her that since she can’t tell me what her problems were and has decided to keep to herself, I was freeing her of all obligations to the relationship so that can try someone else. I told her it would give her the opportunity of understanding herself better. She called immediately she got the message to declare her acceptance of my proposal. After a month without calling each other, she called and we continued from where we stopped. After sometime, she told me her friend informed her, that I told my friend I have a girlfriend somewhere I intend to marry. To be honest, I never discussed such a thing with any friend of mine. I immediately knew she believed the story because friend mentioned is more like a brother to me who knows so much about me. Agatha, she has started again with her marriage talk. I expressed my discomfort with it. Recently she told me she would accept another man into her life if he is right for her. I was hurt by her by this and asked her how she would feel if I am the one saying such a thing to her. She didn’t answer but apologized. In my opinion, it seems she is just keeping the relationship until she finds her so called “right person”. We have been talking, but I don’t want to be an obstacle to her since she sounds very desperate and I don’t want any pressure from her about getting married when I’m not ready for it. I have been thinking and have decided to tell her to move on. I thought I could make up for her patience and support for the five years I was away but she is bent on me getting married at all cost. Her deadline isn’t just right for me. I have talked to her and I do honestly love her very much just as I know she loves me. But her passion for marriage is threatening to tear the wonderful relationship we built for the past seven years. I really do need your help on how to handle this situation because it is tearing me apart. Concerned Friend. Dear concerned Friend, There is no knot true love cannot untangle in a relationship. As long as both of you are ready to shift grounds, arrive at a workable compromise, there will always be a way out for both of you. You are having all these tensions because none of you is willing to move an inch. Both of you are rigid in ensuring only your way is the right one. Relationship doesn’t work out like that. If you are fair to her, she has been the one making all the sacrifices for the survival of this relationship. You must also make the effort to see things from her angle. She has never hidden her passion for weddings from you. If you knew you weren’t ready for immediate marriage, you should not have bothered sleeping with her. Doing so meant you were ready to marry as soon as possible. For her kind of person, it meant you were ready for the final step which was why she held back when she felt you were not in a position to marry her at the time you first demanded for it. From your own account, she waited for you while you were out of the country. Not many women would keeep their virginity for a man they are not sure would come back to marry them. That she kept herself for you, even when you doubted her claim shows a woman properly brought up well and who has very deep feelings and respect for you. That you meet her intact underscores her values as a woman. I am sure, while there, you had one or two flings. A lot must have gone into keeping her promises to you. Granted, her current attitude can be very frustrating and annoying, both of you need to go beyond you telling each other what you want to what would work. She needs marriage urgently while you want it in five years time. Your challenge is simple as long as you both have the maturity to overcome the stalemate you have both imported into your lives. And the earlier you faced this personality defects in your natures the better for the relationship. From what is happening, you both have the same attitude to life-having things done your way. Despite being together for seven years, your relationship is still wrapped in egoism. No relationship survives if a couple is unable to make the essential sacrifice for the sake of the other person. If there is a will, there is nothing stopping you from changing your plans a little to accommodate her plans. Both of you can marry but not have children immediately to enable the other plans you have to take proper roots. No plan is unalterable. Frankly, this is a true test of your compartibility as a couple; your individual ability to go the extra mile for the other person to be happy. One thing is to be in love another challenge is to have the maturity and right attitude to make it work. Situations like this will always come up from time to time in your relationship even after you get married. Unless you find the right key to unlock gridlocks like this early in the life of a relationship, it often gets to a point when it becomes almost impossible for this kind of differences to be resolved. This is because selfish tendencies not addressed early in the life of a relationship soon becomes like a dreadful cancer eating at the life giving values of the union. Even if both of you part, if you don’t individually work on these aspects of your natures, finding a person to live or accommodate either of you may not be easy. Relationship is about living your life in the body of another person. Unless both of you make the other person’s passion your own; nothing would work. Try putting yourself in her shoes; in five years time how old would she be? What if you decide not to marry her or suddenly realises that you still have certain things to accomplish before marriage and want more time, what would have been her gains? Like women before her, is scared of the unknown; isn’t another woman wouldn’t get pregnant for you and you would have no choice but to marry her. If she is anxious, she needs your assurances and one of the ways is to shift grounds a little bit for her. Another mistake you are making is refusing to hear what her real fears are. Yes, you have been honest enough to tell her about your plans but what about encouraging her to share her real fears with you? The missing link is trust. Insisting you have things done your way cannot earn her trust. Once you are able to earn her trust, a lot of the tension you feel now from her pressures will disappear. Good luck.