He refuses to help with the house chores

With Auntie Agatha

gataedo@yahoo.com, agatha.edo@gmail.com Tel: 08054500626

Dear Agatha, 

I have been married for a year without a child and my husband is already complaining terribly. He doesn’t give me feeding allowances or take care of his sick father who daily soils his bed.

My husband doesn’t help around the house or with his father. Even when I’m ill, he insists I cook his meals. To think he is a medical doctor beats my imagination.

Worried Wife.

Dear Worried Wife,

The issues manifesting in your marriage have always been there. Just that you never bothered to pay attention to them while you were both dating. There is no way he would change dramatically within a year of your wedding if he never had them in him.

A lot of time, women especially try to sweep fundamental character flaws noticed at the early stages of their relationships or vexing issues under the carpet simply because they want to hold on tightly to their knights in shinning armor forgetting there is a world of difference between relationship and marriage.

During courtship, how many times, did he cook for you or took special care of you when you needed the attention? Can you remember? What was his attitude to his home and surrounding? Can you recall anytime that he has helped you with the cleaning of the house and dishes?

Back then, you didn’t complain or even notice because you have a motive-to edge all the other girls out and become his wife.

There is no way a man who cannot care for his ailing father, who messes up his bed help a woman with domestic work. It isn’t part of him to care even though he read medicine.

There are two kinds of people in the world; those who have a caring and compassionate heart as well as those who function in their chosen profession mechanically.

It would have been a different story if he exhibited compassion for his father in his condition; then it would be that he has it in him to give. He simply cannot give what he doesn’t have at all. Granted, he can be taught to care but it won’t come from you being grouchy and nagging. You will only end up complicating issues between the two of you.

With this kind of man, you must learn to appeal to him nicely with the right smile as well as attitude.

Frankly, if you want this marriage to work, best you quit complaining and focus on how you can help yourself earnestly.

The first thing you have to get right is the willing acceptance of the peculiarities of your husband and marriage. Therefore quit trying to make him into your ideal can of man. Your ideal man is who you have as your husband because if you didn’t think him ideal, you wouldn’t have agreed to marry him in the first place.

Therefore, since you weren’t forced into the union, give yourself some rest of mind by sitting back and asking yourself where you as a woman went wrong. Something in your attitude too is contributing to the problem in your home.

For instance, your insistence he helps with the work load at home, if well properly handled by you, could yield the right result.

You must appreciate this fact, it isn’t a right the husband helps with the housework. If he elects to do it, the woman should regard it as a privilege. There is nothing that has changed in the primeval nature of man. Enhanced education for women doesn’t mean the traditional roles of the genders in the home have changed. The man remains the head of the home – there can never be two captains on a ship.

If you want him to help you, soothing and loving words is the trick to getting him to assist you with the housework. Even at that there are limitations. Often than not, the problem many women have in their marriages are given flesh by the “testimonies” of some women who tell all who care to listen that their husbands wash even their panties.

That another woman is able to get her husband to help with the house chores doesn’t make it automatic for you. In the first place, the women who trained the children are different. If one mother trained her child to care for a woman and another trained hers to be arrogant, except for wisdom and grace of God; the wife of the arrogant man cannot get her husband to do what the other man is doing for his wife.

To understand where your problem is coming from, take a look at the way he relates to his father. If he was brought up by his mother to care, he would be at the side of his father, tending to him and cleaning him. He grew up in a home where the mother was the unpaid servant to everybody. She cleaned after her family.

This is the kind of man, whose upbringing is focused on a woman doing all the house chores, he is.

To help yourself relax sufficiently to conceive, get a paid help who may not necessarily be a live-in- one.

Caring for an invalid can be really challenging as such a person is always in constant need of attention. Pay somebody to take the stress of you at day time. In addition to looking after your father-in-law, the person should clean the house for you; leaving you with the task of cooking his meals and caring for his person.

It will also make it easier for you to relax as you would have transferred the stress of all that you are doing now to the person giving you time to study your husband and plan the success of your marriage.

If things are this bad within a year of your wedding, then you haven’t really devoted time to engaging your marriage in a thorough study.

Ask yourself this important question every woman asks herself from time to time; where do you want your marriage to be in the next decade? This you must constantly compare with your initial picture of the kind of marriage you have always had in mind. It is only then you can bring about a harmonization between the askew one you have and the ideal you have in mind.

Also you must address the real reason for you irritations. Is it because you are yet to get pregnant and your husband is beginning to complain or the fact that you feel his father is a burden to you staying in your house?

Whatever the reasons for your show of temper is, be careful that you don’t end up destroying the fragile foundation your marriage appears to be pegged on.

For some women, conception cannot occur if she isn’t emotionally stable. Therefore try everything within your power to ensure you stay happy and calm to the point of being at ease whenever your husband is around. Let him find once again the traces of the woman he met and married. You cannot be a shrew and expect both of you to be an item. His complains may not be because of your lack of child; as a medical doctor, He knows better than that. He must certainly have another reason for his irritations; ask him instead of assuming it has to do with the lack of baby. Doing so will help you a great deal to clear the air, anger as well as put your marriage back on the right track. If apologizing to him will ensure peace in your home; do so. A wise woman will stop at nothing to bring a smile to the face of her husband. The ego of the average man will not allow him to say sorry.

Above all, ask God for His help to make your marriage work as well as give you the fruit of the womb; one that will stay with you till the end of time.

Good luck.

He insists on birth control until I get a job

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

Dear Agatha, 

There is this guy that proposed marriage to me who initially was anxious for me to meet with his mother. Unfortunately, she was of town within that period.

While in school and writing my final examinations, he would call me to come and cook for him. I didn’t mind since we were planning to spend the rest of our lives together. At a time I was really becoming worried about his plans for me since we spend most of our time holed in the house.

Finally, his mother came back and we went to see her. It didn’t go as I expected as she showed so much antagonism towards me. She went as far as making me understand that education in her opinion isn’t the ultimate or guarantee that I will end up becoming her daughter-in-law. 

She went further to tell me that I should go in search for a job in the civil service if I truly wanted to be her son’s wife. She said so many things, issued concealed threats as if she was the one who sent me to school. 

She also went on to say that a marriage between me and her son may not work since we come from different towns. 

To make matters worse, my boyfriend said he won’t walk down the aisle in any church; that he would only settle for the traditional marriage ceremony. 

He also said that, until I get a job, I must be on contraceptive. 

I’m tired of this relationship. I have stopped calling him as I used to. I’m extremely tired and want to end it all. Please advice me.

I’m 25 while he is 32.

Worried Lady.

Dear Worried Lady,

It is obvious that you are going to be married to the man’s mother and not the man. Unless he is prepared to protect you from the manipulations and interferences of his mother, you may not really enjoy being married to him. This is because it takes more than love to sustain a marriage. It takes absolute determination and if the variables that make it convenient for either the man or woman to endure a certain kind of situation in a marriage are missing, it becomes almost impossible to keep the wheel rolling.

From your account, you already have a major issue with his mother who for reasons best known to her doesn’t appear to like you at all.

Perhaps, the worst is the inability of your boyfriend to stand up for you.

The conditions he is giving you on the issue of your pending marriage are indicative of a man who isn’t in charge of his mind. What man would tell the woman he desires to marry that she would be on contraceptive until she gets a job? What if it takes you forever to get a job? Does it mean you won’t have babies? When did getting a job become a condition for a married woman to get pregnant?

Does it mean he cannot sustain a family without you getting a job?

In a marriage, it is the man that makes the effort to provide for his family; the woman only offers support to her family and not to take on the entire responsibility unless the man finds himself without a job suddenly. To transfer the financial burden of the home to you at this nascent stage, going as far as tying procreation to your finances spells doom and a total aberration of what the marriage institution stands for. Without him categorically saying so, he has deliberately transferred the responsibility of the children to you hence his insistence you must get a job first before getting pregnant.

And why would he not want to take you to either the registry or church? Granted the traditional marriage is the most important under our cultural settings but, his stance also exposes your marriage to manipulation by the family, especially his mother, in the sense that under the native laws and customs, he is allowed to marry another wife; unlike under the statutory law, where he is allowed one wife recognized under the law.

If he decides to wed another woman under the statutory law, she would automatically upstage you as his legal wife. He is leaving this option opened to enable him wriggle out of any commitment to you in future which translates to one thing; this man has other plans that do not include you in his future so, be wary of this kind of arrangement.

What this man and his mother are offering you falls short of what any young lady should accept.

The guts of this offer shows that along the line, you may have also exhibited a certain kind of desperation that gives him the impression that without him, there is no you.

That may have stripped you of certain respect you deserve as the lady he is in love with.

Frankly, if you accept this kind of cold blooded business offer that goes for a marriage proposal, you would have denied yourself the chance to be happy and respected. Both mother and son; would view your acceptance as a certificate of authority to treat you as they like.

Learn to be reasonable with yourself else you risk going into a marriage you will never be happy in. No self respecting woman would accept this kind of proposal.

Call his bluff by calling off the relationship. If he wants you sufficiently in his life, he definitely would come back and you, the chance to give him a piece of your mind and renegotiate the conditions under which a stable relationship can grow between the two of you.

His job is to protect you not ally with his mother to make life difficult for you. If at this stage in your relationship, when he should be all over you, wooing you to come into his life, he has already manifested this kind of behavior, you will be deluding yourself that he would change in the future. There are certain kinds of problem, prayers won’t solve because God has already manifested the dangers ahead.

If you go on into this marriage, you will spend all your days fighting one form of war or the other and will only have yourself to blame for your folly.

A broken relationship is better than a broken marriage. Be wise as a serpent in this matter. At 25, you are still young enough to attract a progressive minded man who will love and support you to become the kind of person you want to be.

Marriage is not enslavement; it is designed by God to give joy and fulfillment to a couple. Two must become one to move the ship forward. You can never become one with a man who is giving you these kinds of conditions.

When a woman comes to this crossroad in life, it behooves her to take the important retreat of going back to God for clear directives and a discerning spirit to choose right.

Next time he calls, accept his call and demand to see him so as to explain why you think this relationship isn’t going to work and what you intend to do with it.

One indisputable fact of life is, only one relationship, out of all the relationships we enter into will end up in marriage. So don’t feel bad if this relationship doesn’t work out. There is this proverb in Yoruba, that goes like this; one can endure a bad spouse but not bad in-laws since they will be the ones to cripple the marriage. If his mother is understanding and good intentioned, she will protest so many things on your behalf but in a situation where she is the one championing some of the issues, be careful because only a mother knows how best  to manipulate her child.

Good luck.

How can I be of help to my stepson?

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

Dear Agatha, 

My stepson is going to be 14 years old this year. He is a sweet and loving boy and one I care so much for.

Last week, I was in the kitchen when his phone rang. While calling out to him to come and answer his phone, a message on his screen popped. I couldn’t help viewing the image since he was in the bathroom. It was a pornographic picture. Fortunately, the picture cleared from the screen so he didn’t know I saw it.

When he came to pick the phone, he met it just where he kept it as I carefully put it back on the spot he left it.

Watching from under his eyelid, he tried reading my expression for signs of anything; I pretended not to have seen or touched his phone. Having satisfied himself from my facial expressions, he became his friendly self.

But I was worried on how to tackle it. From my own experiences as a mother, I knew how difficult teenagers can be.  I also knew that a wrong word or step on my side could mar our relationship for a longtime and cause problem in my home. 

This is because his father never sees anything wrong with his children and doesn’t like anyone reprimanding them. He is always too quick to come to their defense so I try to be careful when dealing with them.

My worry became monumental when I took the liberty of his absence to browse through his phone. The kinds of explicit X-rated pictures I saw left me speechless. I immediately knew something had to be done because it was no longer the normal teenager thing but a kind of dangerous addiction. 

I had no choice but to carefully introduce the subject to his father who typically when it comes to sensitive issues, cows away from handling it for fear of offending them, pushed the plate back to me.

This is where I need your help. It isn’t how to broach the topic that is my fear both how to do it without destroying our friendship. The boy is dear to his father and is the reason my marriage of less than two years to my husband is successful. I know without doubt that my husband would deny me if the boy begins to react to my efforts at helping him wean this habit.

How do I go about it? I don’t want him growing up to become a sex addict. Please help me.

Concerned Stepmother.

Dear Concerned Stepmother,

You have to ignore whatever your husband would say or his eventual reaction by making up your mind to helping this boy become who God wants him to become.

If you are afraid of what the reaction of this boy would be should you try to offer a helping hand, then you aren’t ready to be the mother he needs. There are no two ways about it, it is either you develop the guts to confront and deal with the issue of child discipline in your home or forget about it and allow the child a free rein to do what he wants.

You cannot be a friend to a child you want to discipline. Any parent afraid to confront and correct a naughty child compromises his or her peace of mind in the future.

If you are indeed a concerned mother and one who has had experiences with handling teenagers, you would never be afraid of any child. So what if he doesn’t like it? What child takes kindly to correction easily? I’m sure your children too don’t take easily to correction. At this age, children are between adulthood and childhood. Even though, they are still children and demand for all the benefits associated with their ages, they want all the independence of the adult world all the same, which isn’t possible as they cannot eat and have their cakes.

You must understand their psychology by going back to your own teenage years. Don’t also forget that their reactions come from a combined effort of hormones cascading through their bodies; some of which make reasoning with them difficult.

Most of the time, they too cannot control their behaviors or feelings. It is a phase all adults have gone through except in some cases, the consequences remain with one for life.

The mind of the average teenager is always vacillating between two worlds especially when it comes to sex and their sexuality.

Besides, sex is such a powerful interest that even adults find it very difficult to ignore. Once maturity sets in, there is no escaping the awareness in the mind of a normal human being.

This is why the curious nature of the teenager is always tuned to sex because the activities of the hormones make it inevitable for him or her to ask some questions and find answers, where the supervising adults aren’t forth coming with information.

As a parent, you owe it to this child to help him understand the basic facts of life. Unlike you and me, the present generations of children can access any information they want with the help of the internet. They also have sites they can go to watch all the lucid details about sex that you don’t want to talk about so, not talking about it so as not to get him angry, won’t help either of you at the end of the day.

Since he has, despite the pampering of his father warmed up to you, sees you as his mother, step in as a good mother and sit him down for a realistic discussion on sex.

He doesn’t have to know you saw the graphics sent to his phone. Begin by asking him about his girlfriend. Joke about it for a while before settling down to the tedious task of educating him on the difference between pornographic sex and the one between two adults who are in love.

Since he has already seen the graphic details, don’t hold anything back from him in your discussion. Let him have the fun part of it as well as the consequences of it and how a little mistake on his part could make him a premature father. Also educate him on the implication of developing too much interest in sex as it could be very engaging and eat into his productive time.

The problem come with the way parents present the issue of sex to the rebellious teenager. More often than not, parents practically order the child against developing interest in his or her own sexuality forgetting that it simply cannot be helped. In dealing with him, appreciate what he is going through as perfectly normal but explain the consequences, implications and responsibilities involved with the costly road he is about to walk.

Since it is going to be a general talk about sex, call the other children so it doesn’t appear you are singling him out because of something you already know about him. Let it be a sort of family discussion time, even though he is your target audience. Try also to make it interactive as much as possible.

Allowing them talk will help you know one or two things about how their minds work. Don’t worry if this first session doesn’t go down well with them. Since teenagers are always excited about sex and relationship, once they know you can be of help, they will always come with one issue or the other, which from my experiences they often pass off as their friend’s. Even when you know, play along with them.

By being the friend they want, you make it possible to be really involved in their lives as position yourself  to influence their decisions.

As for your husband’s attitude, he will come to appreciate your position in the lives of the children once certain you are not the kind of woman who will make his children suffer needlessly. This is his fear; one you have to appreciate is real given the examples of how wicked some women can be to other people’s children.

Good luck.

In addition to the issue of trust, she also bed-wets

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

Dear Agatha,

 I have been reading your responses to issues on relationship and I must say, I have learnt a lot. Whenever, I read people’s stories, I’m baffled at how you manage but now, it is my turn to share my story.

 I met a lady at a friend’s wedding where I was the best man. I didn’t get her details not until five months after. We started dating and she told me about only her boyfriend who resides in Port Harcourt and how she wasn’t too keen on the relationship. I further inquired from her if she was dating any other person, she said, no. With this response, I believed and trusted her. However, I just ran a check on her phone and discovered she was discussing wedding with the guy in Port Harcourt. I also discovered the guys she claimed were just her friends were in fact more than that from the details of her chats with them.

 At one time in the course of our relationship, I asked if she had ever dated a married man, to which she replied in the positive but said she didn’t go as far as sleeping with the man.

The annoying part is the fact that the man is living very close to her street. All these, have made it difficult for me to trust her.

 However, recently she opened up to me about her past telling me how she slept with about three married men and countless number of single guys just because the guy she was dating then cheated on her at some point. She even talked about sleeping with her cousin at some point just to get back at her boyfriend and that she has had three abortions for the same guy.

 Although, she swore with her life as well as those of her unborn children, that she has never cheated on me since we started dating, I can’t really confirm or deny the truthfulness of this. I must say, I’m having second thoughts about the whole thing. While a certain part of me wants her, another part of me, is calling for caution and termination of the relationship.  

 To add to my confusion, she told me, she sometimes bed-wets. She is 25 years old. She said she came clean on her life story to enable me know what I am getting into.

 I really can’t think of what to do with her, whether to go ahead or not? My intentions are to marry her, a fact she is aware of. Kindly help me out.

Confused Man.

Dear Confused Man,

First and foremost, you had no right to go through her phone even if you are in a relationship. Just as you will never appreciate her going through your phone, don’t do it again. Despite all that you have found out about her, no relationship survives on suspicions. It is always better to confront challenges in a relationship as they come and not through sneaking through your partner’s phone or things.

Even among married couples, the phone is private to the owner, unless freely volunteered by the owner; the other person should try as much as possible to stay off.

As you have found out, going through private stuff of one’s partner can destroy an otherwise successful relationship as some messages can be read out of contents by the other party.

Whether men and women like it or not, being in a relationship or marriage for that matter, will not stop other people from expressing their interests. A test message from such an interested person could be interpreted by the other party as evidence of cheating on him or her whereas nothing of such is happening.

It is for this reason, couples should learn to stay clear of prying too much into items considered private property.

That you got away with it this time doesn’t make it right, whatever the shortcomings of your girlfriend are.

Having said that; appreciate her guts to come out with the truth, even though she initially didn’t tell you her story at the beginning of the relationship.

The fact that she confirmed what you glimpsed from her phone underscores a woman who has made up her mind to go straight.

Another woman would, despite the overwhelming evidences you gathered through her phone, denied everything and still accuse you of infringing on her privacy. She didn’t do that but chose to come clean with her past. The fact too that she could tell you about her problem of bedwetting, also signposts her as a young woman who has made up her mind about so many things in her life.

If she had wanted to deceive you, she wouldn’t have volunteered that particular information knowing how that piece of news can torpedo her relationship with you. You would agree with me, that more than the issue of the men in her life and her moral conduct, is the deep worry of having a wife who bed-wets.

I’m sure the moral aspect of her previous lifestyle you can gloss over but, the concern of managing a wife with her kind of challenge is the real reason you are deeply worried about the future of the relationship.

The way to solving this kind of challenge is not to hide behind other extraneous issues like you appear to be doing now.

Deep down, you know that for her to tell you everything about her past life means she is ready to settle down finally. No woman would make that kind of confession without knowing why she is doing it. She must have seen some elements of seriousness on your part as well as love to make her come clean with her past.

While not making excuses for her, she didn’t tell you at the beginning because she didn’t know what to expect as well as the selfish reason of not wanting you to go.

Sincerely, only a few women would tell a man she is just meeting that kind of story about her lifestyle. If she had told you the truth from the beginning, would you have given her a chance in your life? Be truthful.

Truth about human nature is that we all respond to emotional crisis differently. Unfortunately, innocent people end up becoming the victims of unpleasant past experiences.

Ironically too, she didn’t know she was destroying herself by her determination to get back at her boyfriend. This is what becomes of anyone who allows pains of rejection and disappointment becloud his or her reasoning.

To move on, you have also to be honest here. How much do you love her? How has the discovery of her previous lifestyle affected the person you fell in love with and want to marry? Haven’t you too done one or two things in the past that you are now ashamed of? Can you say you are perfect? It requires someone who is absolutely perfect to demand for perfection from another person.

Unless you are able to reason objectively, you may never be able to get round this issue and, forgive her of the mistake of not telling you at the beginning.

If you leave her now, it means her fears of concealing the truth from you at the beginning weren’t misplaced; just as the decision to share her past records with you, would appear misplaced, a fatal mistake that might send her into an emotional abyss she might never recover from.

This isn’t to say, you should not let her know, how hurt you are about her decision not to carry you along from the beginning. By all means, let her know what your fears are about her as well as the nagging issue of whether she would have told you if you didn’t read her messages. Making it clear that, your fear and anger with her are pegged on this, would help her realize the essence of being truthful at all times, even when the truth is difficult to uphold.

Explain to her, that her past life isn’t the issue here but that you are afraid from her conduct what other secrets she still hasn’t told you about which to you is a breach of the trust.

Help her to understand that you would need time to trust her again, which isn’t exactly easy on account of her concealment of sacred facts from you.

It is absolutely important she understands that you are not reacting to her former lifestyle but the very decision of her not telling you  from the beginning.

As for the issue of her bed-wetting; this certainly calls for the extreme in you. Do you love her enough to stand by her: take on this challenge of helping her overcome this?

I say extreme of you, because it is more than the usual kind of love.

Doubtless, she needs both medical and spiritual help. Ask her what kinds of solutions she has sort for the problem; as well as the origin of it. If she grew up with it, chances are it could be a medical problem and could also be spiritual.

You must first of all know what you are dealing with before you can make the decision of whether to stay or not. Nobody can make this decision for you since you would be wearing the shoes. But it would help you a great deal to be very rational to avoid regrets that come with rushed decisions.

Pray about it before taking whatever decision you deem fit.

Good luck.