His parents uncooperative, but we are in love

Dear Agatha,

I am in a relationship that is four years old. The lady and I have the intention of getting married. However the problem I am having with her is that my parents aren’t in support of the relationship because we attend different churches. She has accepted to join me in attending my church but they still refused. I am not happy with the situation because I love her so much and derive so much happiness being with her. Please help me out.

Peter.    

Dear Peter, 

What kind of God do your parents worship? Is their God different from the one she worships in her Church? Are Jesus Christ and the Bible they use in your girlfriend’s church different from the Jesus your parents know or the Bible different from theirs? Are you marrying her church or the woman who gives you the most happiness? Is it the church that would give you the peace you desire in the marriage or the woman’s true acceptance of the ways of God? 

Our God isn’t one of confusion. He remains the same through the ages; just as his messages and words to us have remained same. It is unfortunate that more and more people have deviated from the words of God to the Church one attends. A lot of us are replacing our relationships with God to the Church we attend. We have made churches the religion we practise. It shouldn’t be so. 

Ideally, your parents should be concerned about your happiness as well as welfare in your choice of a woman. They should be interested in the kind of temperament, maturity, stability and support your choice of a woman would bring into your life and the family. What if you marry a woman who attends your church but who is lacking in respect for you and them, what would have been their gain?

You have dated this lady for four years. What are your assessments of this lady? How much improvement has she brought into your life? Marriage is about effective communication. It is also about being able to look the other way when one of the parties is misbehaving as well as the endurance to withstand the challenges of two strangers coming together to make a home. It is only when two agree in body and spirit to be one that they can have the perfect kind of understanding required to make an ideal home. 

This kind doesn’t come from attending the same church but from a perfect understanding of each other as well as what they want to achieve through their union. It also comes from having a clear understanding of what God requires and not necessarily from the church one attends or not.

The issue here isn’t what your parents want but what you want. In the first instance you have to be man enough to take a stance on this matter. While your parents have the right to their opinion on this issue, the choice is yours to make, not theirs. They may be your parents, but they aren’t you. What worked for them may not work for you hence the need for you at this early stage to take charge of your affairs to prevent the kind of interference that might destroy your home even before it has the chance to form its identity. 

Even though wives are generally touted to be the cause of disputes between their mothers-in-law and their husbands, reality has shown that in some homes, the men unwittingly lay the foundation for such volatile situation in their marriages even before the woman comes in. Yours is a typical example of this kind of situation. By giving your parents too much say in issues regarding your choice of a wife, you give them especially your mother the permanent key to come and go as she likes in your marriage.

Beyond the issue of church, is another reason your parents aren’t willing to tell you. If truly the issue of the church is what they are bothered about, the offer by the lady to change to your church should have taken care of that particular problem. 

By still insisting they don’t want her, underscores reasons they haven’t still told you. It demands they tell you their motive for not wanting this lady in your life. Make them understand that without you knowing precisely what they want from you, it would be difficult to fault this lady on account of what they are giving as their reason. 

As a man, you should also be able to tell them what informed your choice of this woman from among the lot you dated. You must be able to convince them that you know what you are doing by pointing out to them her unique features and how you may find these qualities difficult to replace in another woman. 

Chances are they may be worried about your readiness to marry hence their desire to help you manage your affairs by insisting on a lady from the same church as you. They probably think such a lady would be under the control and management of the church hence less likely to misbehave and cause problems for you and them in the home.

The onus is sincerely on you to tell them that not only are you in love with this woman but ready as well to brace up to the challenges of having a woman under your roof.

In addition, pray for God’s guidance. It is imperative when deciding on a life partner.

He is 12 years older than me

Dear Agatha,
God will continue to bless you for your investment in the emotional lives of people.  I love my boyfriend dearly and he also adores me. He ensures I never lack anything but the problem I am having has to do with his age. He is 12 years older than I am. He also finds it difficult to save. Please advise me as you would your younger sister. 

Worried Lady.

Dear Worried Lady, 

Is he a married man? If no, what is his history as well as plans for you? What are your own ideas too of an ideal man? Does he give you happiness? Are you always at peace when with him? Are you able to discuss with him, share each other’s thoughts, challenges and plans? Is he caring, understanding, tolerant, selfless, responsible and respectful of your person? Is he loyal, someone you can depend on? Do you have faith in each other and above all are you both friends? Is he mature enough emotionally to deal with a woman in his life? What precisely is it that makes you uncomfortable with his age? Is it the way he dresses or the simple fact that you have it at the back of your mind that he is older than you by 12 years?

These are the real issues and not the age. Granted there could be men in your life younger than he is but are they as caring and responsible? The natural law is for a man to be older than the woman in his life. From time immemorial, women have married older men because they are considered more mature and understanding than younger men who don’t have the patience to deal with a woman. However unless you are definite about what you want, you may not have the extra guts to stay with him.

You must answer the question of who is complaining: you or your friends? Has your reservation got to do with the fact that you think your friend may be mocking your choice of a man; laughing behind you at the age of your man? Or your inability to cope with what you think people are thinking when you see your friends with their younger boyfriends? Are you more concerned about not being able to visit the same places with him that your friends would go with their younger boyfriends? What exactly makes you uncomfortable about the age differences between the two of you? Until you are honestly able, you will continue to make it a problem in your relationship. In your interest, you must first resolve this uneasiness to enable you give unconditionally to this man. Ask yourself what is most important to you: a man who cares passionately about you or one who is young but lacks basic respect and sensitivity to your feelings?

Learn to be very honest with yourself at this critical point because it gets to a stage in our lives when things we thought were important are no longer important. In later years, would you regret your decision to do away with this man simply because he is 12 years older than you are? One is happier when one has learnt the vital lesson of being able patent one’s life to suit one’s nature. Subjecting your own life and choices to the views of others often than not, destroys one’s happiness as well as focus. Be bold enough to live your dreams without apologies to anybody. The world is too fleeting, untrustworthy and unstable to be entrusted with one’s happiness.

Candidly, if this man meets your expectation as a woman, loves you and is caring, don’t make the mistake of ending the relationship; there is no man or woman for that matter who comes complete. What you think isn’t right with this man may be the best feature of the other man.

Learn to place your priority else you would end up with more regrets.

Good luck. 

How do I make her know I love her

Dear Agatha,

I met this girl during my primary school days and became friends during our last days in school. We had a little problem, which nearly cost us our friendship.

 About seven years after, we met each other again and she showed where she stays. I am contemplating visiting her at home but don’t know what to say or present my feelings to her. Can you help me?

Chan

Dear Chan, 

Go to her house and tell her precisely what you feel for her, but first propose friendship and not love. Considering the fact that both of you have been apart for a long time, it is best to begin whatever you have in mind on the platform of friendship.

This is because she may not be exactly the same person you knew then. To prevent something that has the capacity of transiting into something very beautiful, don’t rush anything or assume you know so much about her. By offering her friendship, the chance to catch up on old times gives you and her the chance to get to each other again, find out what has gone out of the two of you and what new things are in. This way, you would be able to know what you are going into as well as the things to avoid in the relationship.

Whatever you both had in the past is a long time. Primary school is where innocence dwells. Both of you are now more mature, focused and real on some issues you both took for granted or simply fantasised about. 

No longer are the birds and bees stories for you. You are grown enough to know that life is an institution of responsibilities and choices. If nothing you now know that falling in love isn’t the boy meets the girl thing alone. You both must take responsibilities for falling in love and be prepared for the choices that follow each action you both take.

Study each other intensely first to prevent regrets. This way, you won’t have to labour too hard to convince her on anything on your first date or subsequent ones. If the chemistry is right and you are comfortable with each other, you won’t even notice when you progress to the next stage of declaring what you each feel for the other. 

Good luck.

I want him to join me abroad

Dear Agatha,

Many thanks for your infinite effort in solving problems that have restored many lost souls.

Please I really need your kind advice on a decision that I want to take in my love life. My friends are of the opinion that I would end up disappointed at the end of the day. 

I am so much in love with my boyfriend and willing to spend the rest of my life with him. He is 21years of age while I’m 23years old

We met in Anambra State but he had to leave for Lagos to learn a trade under someone. While we were together in Anambra, he was caring and loving but things changed when he left for Lagos. He didn’t even bother to call me when I was sick. 

In 2009, I was lucky to get to travel and get a job in the United Arab Emirate. Initially when I discussed the prospect of the job and my desire to relocate to that country with him, I got little or no encouragement from me. He dismissed me by asking me to look for something to do with my life. 

Unfortunately for him, his master sent him forth without settling him. I want to bring him to this country so that both of us could be able to start up a better life, which I have promised to him that I will do.

Please tell me if it is this is a wise decision. My friends are of the view that once he settles in, he would forget all about me and begin to date other women. I am totally worn out with confusion. Please help me.

Nekky.

Dear Nekky,

The operative word here is caution. At 21, he isn’t ready for what you have in mind. He still has to plan for his future, establish himself and gain confidence in his ability as a man before he can contemplate marriage. 

Besides, at 21, he hasn’t even started his hunting years as a man. Don’t attempt to cage him by offering him incentives aimed at trapping him into something he is not ready for as well as ill equipped to handle. The young butterfly will always fly, no matter how much you desire to cage it. He still has a lot of catching up to do before he even begins to talk about marriage. Besides, he is yet to gather the maturity to deal with dating a girl two years older than he is. He would always crave for someone younger because for now that is what would keep him excited.

What about his family members and friend? Even if he agrees, have you factored the interest of these groups of people into the whole thing? Be realistic, at 21, he doesn’t have the muscles as well as the total independence to ignore the interest of his family. It would take another decade before he has what it takes to push for marrying an older woman.

The truth is at his age, he cannot function in the role you desire to have him play in your life, which means you would get hurt invariably. If he were older and established, your age differences wouldn’t be a problem at all. But given the tenderness of his age, it might be a little bit difficult for him to manage. In the first instance, you would soon be ready for marriage as a woman. No matter how much you desire this man, a time would come with the pressures from family, friends and your biological clock would push you into considering other options. Furthermore, you would one day get tired of providing for him. As a woman, a time would come when you would begin to resent being the major provider in the home, when you would begin to envy having a man who too would be the one to provide for you as well as make you feel like the woman. 

If you are not careful, you would be the one who would get hurt at the end of the day. If you want to help him and has the ability to, you could because he is your friend and not because you want to use it as a bait to get him to spend the rest of your life with him. 

You could also consider sending some money to him to begin a business. Give him time to grow if you think you have the patience to wait for him to mature into you, but don’t make the mistake of pressurising him because not only does it present you as a desperate woman but also one who lacks the confidence to move on. 

If you are both destined to be together, God in His own way would work things out for you and not you fetching water into a basket. 

Let him be the one to want you and not you doing all the pursuing. He has to want something in you desperately for him to want to make that sort of sacrifice for you. This won’t come from the money or favour you are ready to invest in him but from a deep determination from his end that you are the right kind of woman for him. Therefore, give him the chance to see you as a woman and not a mother figure or his ATM machine. It is only by allowing him work for his money and survival while you give him all the moral support as a woman you can help transform him from a boy to a responsible man.

Good luck. 

We met on Facebook

Dear Agatha,
I want to thank you for the good work you have been doing. I am 30 years old, a Nigerian but based in Indonesia. 

Please I need your help and advice. I met a girl on Facebook network and ever since, we have both fallen in love with each other. We communicate every day. We have made love through the telephone several times even though we are yet to meet physically. She has sent me her pictures and I have also sent her mine. We are now discussing marriage, but we shall do this formally when I come back to Nigeria by December. Please advise me on what to do.
Uche.

Dear Uche, 

What is your idea of marriage? What do you hope to achieve by marriage and what role do you want it to play in your life as you get older? Importantly, what kind of woman do you have in mind for a wife?

Granted the choice of a woman is yours to make, but the journey towards marriage requires more than you have now. Marriage is a book many people are reading wrongly. From what you have said, you appear only to be interested in the cover of the book and not its contents. If you look beyond the beautiful illustration on its cover and go through all the chapters of the book, you will realise that it is one of the most difficult journeys in life. Contrary to what many people planning marriage think, it goes beyond a man and woman coming together to live under the same roof. It requires much more to make it work. 

In the first place, how much of this woman do you know? What kind of woman do you think would make love on the phone with a man she doesn’t know? Deep in your mind, do you think a woman worthy of becoming your wife should engage in such an act with someone she doesn’t know? What kind of woman do you think engages in telephone conversation with a man she doesn’t know?  Can you in all honesty guarantee such a woman capable of being faithful to you? What do you think her interest is in you? Would she consider a marriage proposal to you if you weren’t living outside the country? 

Marriage is based on trust, selfless sacrifices and a deep understanding. As a man, you need a woman who shares your dream as well as her support to make it work. You need a woman who would be there through thick and thin, to give you unconditional faith in yourself, especially when things are not going your way.

You need a woman who would be more than a partner to you, who would be a good friend, a dependable shoulder to lean on when the deep dark clouds cast their shadows on one’s dream and shine. A woman can make or break a man’s life hence the need for every man to be careful when making the choice of a wife. The fact that she makes love to you on the phone isn’t enough reason to contemplate marriage with her. As a matter of fact, it is the very reason you should exercise some restraints in coming to a conclusion about anything until you have an opportunity to meet her physically. 

Pictures don’t tell the true story about anyone. You cannot know what her temperament is from the picture, how good a woman she is or her moral values. Also you cannot tell from looking at her if she is in love with you or not. 

Drop every plan for marriage until you come to the country. Meet her first to know if you even like the physical person you have been talking to on the phone. In today’s modern world, there is a wide difference between the physical person and the picture image. You may not even like her at all so why make a marriage plan with an image of the person you are yet to meet? It is her you want to marry, not the image in the picture.

There is no hurrying into marriage because it is a journey you are not expected to return from. Once you go into it, the society expects it to be a permanent journey. Being itself shrouded in the mystery of life, anyone going into marriage should avoid taking on more mystery into it. 

Suspend everything until you come. Get to know her. Measure her temperament, find out about her values. Commence friendship with her. Look out of her strong points as well as her weak ones with a view of merging her good and bad sides together. At the end of the day, gauge your findings and find the equilibrium that is suitable for you. Use this visit as exploratory visit to determine the direction you want your future to go. Bad marriages just don’t happen; they are often than not, products of our carelessness, stubbornness and inexperience.   

Besides, one must seek the face of God first before one goes into marriage else you end up with the wrong partner. You must first begin at the feet of God. There is no right time for it but now. Before you come to Nigeria, pray for God’s help as well as direction. Ask Him to lead and direct your steps on the path to go to get the answers you seek once God is on your side, you will meet with success in this journey. 

At this stage, you need patience, wisdom to do the right thing. Don’t make the mistake of relying only on the strength of your emotions because it may not be enough to shield your marriage from the natural elements and warfare that go with any marriage.

Good luck.

I don’t understand this lady

 Dear Agatha

I am a graduate, 25 years of age and an entrepreneur. My problem has to do with the difficulties of establishing a relationship with the opposite sex. I must confess that I wasn’t brought up with the “mixing up” mentality.

I met this young lady about four years ago and we developed interest in each other. She once confessed her love for me through a friend of hers even though I have not asked her out. She went as far as telling this mutual friend of ours that she is waiting for my proposal.     

However her attitude towards me belies this claim. Although, there are times that we are so close, the other times she is very cold towards me. She acts as if we are complete strangers and would ignore me for as long as two months without reasons only for things to magically turn around after sometime.  

I have tried talking to her about this aspect of hers but she hasn’t been able to give me any good reason why she acts like that. I don’t understand this trend. Is she really in love with me?

Secondly, there is this lady that got attracted to me some years back and often confesses her love for me. She was always the one pushing for a relationship between us through her love advances, but I paid little attention to her. Recently I asked her out and she told me she would not answer my question. It’s been four months now and she has not given me any reply. She even confessed she cannot stand me dating another lady and still tells me she loves me. I saw it as the normal ‘ladies’thing, but since she expressed her interest first, I fail to understand or appreciate the attitude she is now putting up. Please help me out.

Iyke.

Dear Iyke, 

At 25, you should by now have an idea of the kind of woman that is right for you, the one that would help you grow your home, family and business. Unless you do that, you would continue to misunderstand so many things about women generally and particularly those you come into contact with.

In addition, you must help yourself by placing friendship first instead of relationship. If you have been having the challenge of establishing relationships with members of the opposite sex, you must first clear the hurdle by learning how to be in the company of female friends. See women first as human beings you must have as friends, people you can talk to confide in, lean on in times of difficulties as well as trust. To be able to conduct a successful and meaningful relationship with a woman, you must have a clear idea into the workings of a woman’s mind. 

Going straight into a relationship without you first knowing the complexity of a woman’s mind and attitude is just like writing an examination on a subject you know nothing about beyond the cover. 

Being in company of female friends would give you a clear idea of the different kinds of women there are as well as the common attribute of all women. You are unable to relate with any of these ladies because you have no inkling into what they want or how to respond to them. In a way, they remain an enigma to you even if you do the basic thing of communicating with them. 

They have done their bit by indicating interest in you. It is more than any woman can do. The onus of taking the relationship forward is now entirely your business. You must therefore define what you want in your ideal woman to know if any of these women meets your requirement in the first place. 

Since both of them appear to have similar issues with you, the best thing for you is to find out why they are playing both hot and cold. Call them separately, to first apologise for any shortcomings from your end. Having declared their interest in you, inactivity from your end would definitely be interpreted by any woman in their shoes as rejection, which in turn would make any average woman shameful at making the first move. You have to clear whatever ill-feelings they have first to be able to get them to talk about what they think of you. Have the patience to listen carefully to them, the humility to learn from them because you would always need these pieces of advice as you progress in life.

Have it in mind that a relationship goes beyond a man meeting a woman. There are so many things that must be adhered to in every relationship. Before love can be conclusive, you must be patient, understanding, tolerant, caring, respectful and responsible in every way. You must have the maturity to deal and live with a woman because relationship and marriage can be a very tasking journey despite its anticipated emotional fulfillment.

One thing you should however never do is to engage these two women in a relationship concurrently. Be friends with them. At the end of the day, you would have gained better because the woman you will end up with would in addition to being your woman be a dependable friend, one who has a thorough understanding of who and what you are.

Good luck. 

She’s bad tempered, threatens to break relationship

Dear Agatha,
As a regular reader of your column, I have been inspired by your great ability in solving relationship problems. I am currently a 23-year-old undergraduate and have been dating my girlfriend for almost six years. 

One thing I noticed about her is that she is rather a hard-headed girl who neither complies nor compromises whenever we have squabbles. Almost every time she would insist that I am at fault and I would have to be the so-called bad guy to plead for her forgiveness even though I feel pretty much obligated deep down in my heart. We have been trying to solve this issue peacefully and I have been working hard to let her know my feeling, but I get so disappointed at the end of the day because she just wouldn’t comply. What’s more heart-aching is the fact that she likes to use the term “breaking up” almost every time we quarrel even if it is just a small matter.
On top of that, she is short-tempered over little things. Personally I don’t mind the fact that she gets angry at me but the frequency at which she does it is beginning to bother me. She knows her greatest weapon to conquer me is her anger and because of this she is using it to the fullest. It makes me feel so hen-pecked to succumb to this rule of either she’s right or we break up. Seriously, I just can’t accept the latter because she means so much for me. But I don’t want to get hurt almost everyday in this relationship. I am in a serious dilemma, which I can’t share with anybody at all. I do have a family but I don’t have any best friend whom I can share with. There are some reasons I don’t want to share with my family because I don’t want them to see her in a negative light. 

Agatha, could you please advise me how to solve this issue? Thank you so much I really appreciate your time.   
David.

Dear David, 

A relationship is meant to be enjoyed. And one of the ingredients for its fulfillment as well as enjoyment is respect. No matter how deep your feelings for her are, you must make her appreciate her need to respect you always. Love comes with respect for our mates as well as for ourselves.

You may think you can cope with her attitude now but a time would come when you would require more from her. No matter how much you love her, it might not be enough to erase the psychological build-up of the negative effect of her attitude towards you. No matter how elastic our feelings are, when a bad situation persists, we could break completely not minding what the consequences are at the end of the day.

To prevent a situation of irreconcilable differences between the two of you, you need to sit her down to re-map your relationship with each other. As the man in this relationship, you must begin to act your role as the head of this relationship. Allow her to escape with constant threats of leaving you is not a solution rather, you are postponing doom’s day when something in you would rebel and completely reject her attitude. 

Sometime in life, resentment would creep in from your end when family and friends begin to mock your inability to organise your home effectively. We are products and subject to the dictates of our environment. Even when we don’t want to react, something in us propels reaction at an unnatural situation we have endured for years. 

Relationship that draws strength from threats cannot survive too long. Therefore, if you really love her and don’t want her out of your life, you have to help her understand that this attitude of hers would eventually hurt her. 

However, you have to understand something of her background to know where to come in. Chances are if her mother is the strong one in her family, she may not appreciate that she is doing anything wrong. Therefore, she would need more than one discussion to make her change her mind. You have to expose her to the kind of lifestyle that would educate her more than words from you on the need to treat the heart and related affairs with more caution. If this is the case, you will require patient and dedication to make her change from what she is now to what you want her to be.

It is also a sign of insecurity. A woman that is secure in the love and warmth of her man would not need threats to beat him into line. Secured people aren’t brash, manipulative or deploy threats to have things done their way.  If this is the case, you have to help her build the required confidence in herself as well as the relationship.

Do this by helping her appreciate that misunderstanding is part of a relationship. Help her understand that dialogue and not threats is what keeps a relationship together and that when a couple has a disagreement, it isn’t necessarily a bad sign but a positive evidence of growing the relationship. 

She has to see that you are no longer comfortable with the way she is conducting herself. If for six years, you have given her all the freedom and chance to change, the time has come for her to effect a change in her attitude towards you as well as the relationship. In plain terms let her know you are fed up of being constantly under threat of her leaving you. The best way to cure her of this habit is to call her bluff when next she threatens to go. You must understand that if she truly loves you, she won’t use threat on you constantly. You have to make up your mind on what you want from life and this relationship. Don’t for the sake of fear or being broken hearted continue to endure a situation you are not happy with especially as you would have to live with for the rest of your life with the decision you take now.  If the relationship is meant to be, it will survive, if not give God all the glory because He sees and knows what we don’t know.

Good luck. 

I’m in a fix, my Philippine lover pregnant

Dear Agatha,  

This issue has been disturbing me and making me weary of the future. I’m a Nigerian living in China, I met a Philippine lady who also resides in China through the Internet and we were always charting till one day she decided to visit me in the city I stay. We were happy to see for the first time and ended up making love.

Two days after, she went back to her city, a month later she informed me she was pregnant by me. I asked if she was sure the pregnancy was mine. She picked offence at my question. Thereafter, she refused to discuss the matter again even though we were always communicating.

Six months after, she told me she would be travelling to her country. With pains and tears, I asked her why, she told me that there was a secret she had been keeping away from me. However, she opened up to me that she was six months pregnant.

Seriously I was shocked and didn’t know what to do. I am not financially capable of discharging my responsibility as a father to a child in a foreign land. Besides, she is also a foreigner. I don’t know what to do.

Confused Man.

Dear Confused Man, 

What is the confusion about? The issues you are raising now should have been put into consideration by you before having unprotected sex with her. When a man sleeps with a woman without protection or ensuring she is protected, he should expect to be a father anytime whether he is ready or not for the responsibilities that go with fatherhood. 

At the time you slept with her, didn’t you know she was a foreigner? Didn’t that factor in your consideration of her as your girlfriend? You saw in her a woman you liked and valued hence your willingness to have her in your life. If her nationality mattered to you at that point, you would have insisted on some form of protection before being intimate with her. 

What you should do is a simple matter of going to her side of the city to personally and discuss the matter with her. First, you must apologise to her for asking who the father of the unborn child is when she first told you about the pregnancy five months earlier. 

Responsibility isn’t just about having the money to execute your role as the father of the child, but acknowledging as well as accepting your own contributions to the situation. A woman doesn’t get pregnant by herself, but with the help of a man.  

Frankly, you didn’t act like a responsible man. No matter what you thought at that time, you erred by not insisting you both discussed the issue again. When a woman tells a man she is pregnant and refuses to discuss the matter again, the man should ask questions. Because you were running away from accepting responsibilities, you deliberately didn’t encourage her to talk about it. 

Rather than bemoan the fact that you aren’t ready for the challenges of being a father, why not begin to think of how you can make it easier on both of you by discussing your fears, limitations as well as plans for the future with her. From all indices, this woman isn’t expecting anything from you. Having kept the pregnancy for six months without telling you about it despite the fact that you communicate everyday, shows she is more than ready and able to function as the father and mother in the life of the child; an indication she isn’t expecting anything from your end.

If you allow this happen, you not only deny yourself the opportunity of being involved in the life of your child but might lose any right to claim the baby as yours either now or in the future.

Seeing her would enable you both come to a conclusion on the baby’s welfare. The secret about fatherhood is that no man ever has enough to kick-start a family, but when he begins with the little he has, God always steps in to provide the rest. All you have to do is to offer her what you have. What matters to women most time isn’t just the money but the presence of the man who has put them in the family way. 

During pregnancy, the woman is most vulnerable; feels bloated and unattractive even though she may actually be prettier than before. It is a psychological feeling which only the husband or the man who puts her in the condition can dispel. Whatever your situation is financially or otherwise, it behooves you to contribute in anyway to the welfare and progress of the pregnancy as well as the baby when it arrives. 

This is also not the right time to discuss the issue of her nationality with her. Don’t forget that you both found pleasure in each other’s company and that when it comes to love, what matters is the amount of happiness you are both getting from each other’s company. Besides, your current environment would certainly dictate the kinds of women you fall in love with.  Life is about making do with the choice we are presented with. For now, she is the choice of mother to your child. This is a fact you must accept and do everything you have to do to make it work. You not only owe it to the child but to yourself as a man. This is your first fruit, that child that tells the world that you are man in enough to father a child. 

Even if you have doubts about the paternity of the baby the responsible thing is to first accept it and do a DNA after birth if still convinced the child isn’t yours.

Good luck. 

Re: Men superiority - a myth

Dear Agatha,

I had wanted to ignore this topic but I have just realised that the more I try to move away from it the more I tend to return to it! I am a man, a married one at that but I’m surely not an apologist for men to take delight in abusing women – though it is true that God Himself will help some women! However, when a woman (like the author of the mail you published under this heading) wants to cause confusion for other focused women, I find it difficult to stand by awatcah.

 It is true that before God all (men and women, all humans) are equal but that same God arrogated roles and responsibilities to each with an expectation of complimentary functionality for both. I don’t know whether that woman is a Christian in the first instance, if the answer is yes, does she read and understand the Bible (the word of God)? I would like her to answer a couple of questions for me like what is her understanding or the true meaning of the word “helpmate” as opposed to “alternate.” She should also help us to interpret the God’s pronouncements at the latter state of man (after the fall of man) as contained in Genesis 3 and that of Ephesians 5? God is not the author of confusion! 

Agatha, I do not harbour any gloated grin of satisfaction neither do I bask under these verses above to rub in on God’s provision, but have been very wary (and worried) of events that have befallen us all through the madness-blinded quest for equality with men by some undiscerning women! In their quest, they have led many astray, or what do you think is the source of the upsurge in divorces, separations and murders among couples which has taken the place of patience, endurance, prayers and faith in God in our women of today? Our women now go around town in the nude in the name of expressing their equality to men, baring their chest and barely covering their nudity forgetting that a man’s chest and body hardly any special attraction (ormotivator) points! 

 Lastly Agatha, God will continue to bless you for teaching our women and men values that are deep seated in God’s principles for life. On no account should you allow the likes of Letitia Akinyemi to intimidate you or make you colour your counsel to those in need. She should measure her popularity and that of her views on the a column like you have done and see how many will write back to thank her as thanks and praises keep flooding into your box daily. 

Thank you and remain blessed. 

 Essien 

Dear Agatha,

I read with amusement Letitia Akinyemi’s letter on the above subject. Her piece was dripping with anger, sarcasm, scorn and unbridled feminism. She is angry with men for claiming to own the world; she is sarcastic at the differences between the two sexes; she scoffs at men who cannot ‘measure up’ to women’s attainments in life and she is utterly embittered that men tend to take leadership roles.

There are today millions of women who think and act like Letitia. By their self-imposed jaundiced views, they make themselves misfits. They find it difficult to work with men, because by their predisposition, they misconstrue even the most innocent action of a man. They are rebellious in marriage and are generally suspicious of the intention of every man. It is such women who would not let a man take a space ahead of them in traffic, even if it was the man’s right to be allowed such space. They look down with disrespect at their male subordinates and superiors at work, because they just have to prove that the subordinate is not their match or their bosses are not better than them. If they are more intellectually endowed and excel in academics, they are obnoxious in displaying their brilliance, just to make the point that they have excelled above men. Such is the tormented world of these women.

While they are at this battle with themselves, nature is busy running its course and not paying any heed to their bitterness. For try as much as they will, these women who are jealous of men, cannot change the fact that a man and a woman are not the same biologically, emotionally, and spiritually. Basic knowledge of human anatomy shows that there is a world of difference between the two sexes. A mere look at the body structures will reveal that the man is coarsely built and the woman is more supple. The former is so built to be able to handle the rougher things of life and provide physical protection to the woman, while the latter is made receptive to the finer things of life. In this way, the two sexes are actually complementary. There are women who are as rough in their physical features as the average man and there are men who are effeminate in their appearance. These changes occur through careless cultivation of the exclusive attributes of the opposite sexes over time, in each instance.

The differences between the sexes are so abundant that it would take deliberate mischief to deny them. Even the strongest women wrestlers would be circumspect in challenging a male wrestler to the canvass. So it is in boxing, athletics, etc.

The real myth is in the claim by ‘women liberators’ like Letitia that they are the same as every man. That is not the way nature intended it to be. Letitia’s piece had many examples of how ‘powerful’ a woman really is over men. She struck the right note when she pointed out that the strongest of male rulers, despite their outward display of strength go back to the woman at home for guidance in decision making. And this is how God intended it to be; that the woman should be the real power behind the brute physical strength. Feminine intuition is therefore not an empty expression. 

The woman is not meant to be beneath the man, she is to be beside the man. So, the sexes are different and complementary. 

Letitia alluded to male physical brutality, but did not talk about female verbal brutality. She talked about the woman procreating, but fallaciously kept quiet about the vital role of the male to provide the sperm to fertilise the egg. The truth is that the roles assigned to each sex can be abdicated. And they have been largely abdicated, by millions who are seeking excuses to envy the other sex. They have simply failed to be good specimen of their own gender. Badness is not exclusive to men. Members of both sexes are steeped distorting their attributes and sink into debauchery and licentiousness. That is why the world is decadent and our values eroded, no less by arguments like the ones she advanced in that acidic piece. My alarm is that a diet of this thwarted philosophy is daily being fed our daughters by such enraged ‘evangelising’ women.

Let Letitia (no pun intended) learn to be a true woman and stop envying men’s wrong ways. A woman who abandons her role as a mother and wife, can only do so at a great cost; a female body coarsened by physical exertion would have difficulties in childbearing. And if such a woman must return to childbearing, she must allow the body to regain its suppleness over time (it may take some years!). A woman who envies men’s public office roles, will do so at the cost of her innate delicateness and refinement, not to talk of the well-being of her children; the hallmarks of a true woman and mother.

It is a matter of choice, but let these women know the price they should be willing to pay before they make their choice. Letitia wants women to be respected, but she needs to encourage her female folks to know that respect is earned not given where it is not merited. Most men believe they can ‘drill’ gracefulness and humility by brute force into women. They end up being mere violent men and batterers. What a proper man seeks to do is to withhold respect from a woman who is not fit enough to be given the queenly title of ‘woman’. Women that believe they can trample over men by vile methods of blackmail and scheming would not earn the respect of men, no matter how forceful they argue their case. Love begets love, respect begets respect and scorn only begets loathsomeness. Woman, play your God-given role in life and help lift your men out of their wrong paths; don’t seek to replace them or envy their wrong ways. Such thoughts are the fountain of the competitive spirit that drives some women to want to excel men in their vices. ‘Does the man think it is his exclusive right to be promiscuous?’ they ask. ‘He wants to be loose, I will be loose too,’ such women think and in the process throw away their dignity. As if at the end of the day, their Creator would judge them by the actions of their partners.

Joseph

Our sex life died when my husband got born again

Dear Agatha, 

Thanks for the advice you usually dole out to people, may God continue to grant you wisdom. Please help me before it is too late.
I am in my mid 30s and got married seven years ago to a wonderful friend of mine. We actually dated for two and a half years before getting married. We have a son. At the time we got married, none of us was born again as we had very active pre-marital sex life which we both claimed we cannot get elsewhere since we both had relationships before providence brought us together. 

About two years into our marital life, my husband became born again, months later I had no choice but to follow suit. We both became active in the church, serving on different committees. We became a reference point in the church as we became the epitome of what the ideal couple should be.
Unfortunately, the same thing cannot be said of us in our private life. Since becoming a born again Christian, my husband refuses to perform his duties to me as before. Initially we made love everyday and only went on break when I am having my period. We also experimented with different positions it was good and nice. After his new found faith, my husband does not care about me any longer, he believes there are better things to do than sleep with me.

 I am lucky if he agrees to make love to me once a month even at that I would have to cajole and cry before this and during the act he would say I should not hold him and he prefers a particular position where I can never achieve orgasm.

Agatha, of what use is sex if I cannot enjoy it? I believe in the sanctity of marriage and the faithfulness of the parties concerned. But I am dying in silence, I am not a nymphomaniac but I believe I should derive maximum satisfaction from my husband. St. Paul’s letter to the Corinthians in I Corinthians 7:3-5 concerns intimacy between couples and how it should not be denied but this has not changed my husband’s attitude. 

Right now he has not made love to me in six months! He believes he has a calling and that sex will be a huge distraction to him. He is becoming so selfish and doesn’t care about my feelings. I am scared of reporting this to the pastor because I believe this is personal and then how will people look at us in church again? I had to re-establish communication with an ex-boyfriend but I am scared of doing this because of the repercussions. Please Agatha, help me before I do something bad to myself.

Lizzy.

Dear Lizzy, 

This is a very serious matter that requires utmost wisdom and caution to save your marriage from collapse. There is no way you can on your own resolve this problem without getting help from the people who are experienced in marriage and the ministry. 

You need the help of your pastor to get through to him, to remind him of the importance of his marriage to his ministry. Don’t be ashamed to seek for the help from those in the best position to educate him because it is your right to enjoy your husband and marriage. 

If you continue to depend on your wisdom, with the extent he has gone, you may not be able to get him to listen to your reason or get him to appreciate the loneliness crowding you. For this reason, you must act quickly before you are tempted to do something you cannot tell the pastor or his wife. Begin with the wife because as a woman, she may be in the best position to appreciate what you are going through. One-on-one, express your fears and the challenges you are going through, including the fact that you are on the verge of having an extramarital affair with your ex. At this junction, don’t be shy to own up to the challenges you are facing in your home. We all need help from time to time to make things work in our homes and lives. 

Once the pastor and his wife are involved, it would be their duty to use the appropriate words of God to remind your husband of his duties to you and point him to the danger both to his image and ministry of having a broken home. Sincerely, it is not your voice or those of his family members he now considers spiritually inferior to his newfound faith that he needs. 

He needs the voice of those he has now formed confraternity with to educate him on the danger of leaving a full-bodied woman used to constant sex fallow.  

You also need the help of the marriage counsellor in the church to tutor on the place of sex in marriage, as well as the naked fact that God gave it as a special gift to married couples not just to procreate but to help them relax, bond, communicate and appreciate the values of being together. 

He has to stop seeing sex as being dirty but something God gave to mankind to enjoy within the bonds of marriage; that having sex in a marriage isn’t a sin hence he should not feel guilty at expressing himself in intimacy with his wife.

However, if the orientation of the church is such that sees sex as functional only for the purpose of procreation and not for recreation between a couple, in addition to prayers, you can also get books written by renowned religious leaders on the place of sex in the marriage. 

Spiritually, you need to resist this moment because a lot of times, the devil uses the things we are weak at to prevent the designs of God in our lives. There is no contesting the fact that your problem started even before your husband joined the church. 

From your letter, it is also obvious both of you didn’t cultivate the culture of discussing your desires before taking the decision to execute. He changed church without seeking your opinion while you followed to please him. 

By right, it is an issue both of you should have agreed on because the tenets of marriage demand that a couple must be in agreement on everything. You should have demanded at that point for his reason as well as his focus. Marriage isn’t just about having good sex, it is a combination of everything. You made the costly mistake of premising everything about you marriage on sex so much so you didn’t even give yourself a chance to study the behaviour and mindset of the man you were married to. 

As long as he was ready to satisfy your sexual urges you were happy to allow him the freedom to fly. In a way you unwittingly nurtured him not to consult you on anything, take decisions on your behalf and implement without recourse to your person. His attitude really has nothing to do with him changing church but simply a demonstration of who he really is, the person you previously ignored. You two didn’t grow friendship because you were too involved in the sexual aspect of your union. The consequence is that you both don’t have anything to fall back on, to pull you out of this abyss your relationship is going into.

Because his habit is formed and beyond what you can do on your own, there is also the need to commit this side of him to God in prayers. By not blaming the church and instead focusing on your own contributions to the problem you have on hand, your prayer point would be easier to define. 

Don’t for the sake of your children and essentially for your own peace of mind, do anything to compromise your marriage. There is hardly any marriage that is free of challenges; if nothing, be grateful that you are not losing him to another woman. It could have been worse if he is rejecting you for another woman in his life. 

No matter how frustrating for you, you shouldn’t have re-established contact with your ex. You didn’t act right; besides, it makes you appear too desperate to have sex without caring about the consequences. 

While your husband is wrong to have abandoned his responsibilities to you, it is also wrong for you to be overtly desperate for sex. If your husband were away for a year on a course abroad, won’t you cope? If you were caught the focus would remove from what pushed you into it but to you betraying your husband. Hard as it is for you, good judgment demands you put a strong restrain on yourself.

Frankly, this is when you need God the most, as well as learn to train yourself for the challenges of marriage. It isn’t every time we get what we want from our spouses. Marriage is learning about sacrifices, as well as adjusting to the demands of the moment. You have to be ready to key into his vision for him to understand what you are going through as a woman. Don’t worry, God will help make it right for you provided you are ready to rely on Him completely. 

Good luck.

My love, his sister, mum unfriendly

Dear Agatha,
I am a 25-year-old lady. My boyfriend and I have been dating for close to three and a half years.  

I am having problems with his elder sister and mother. For reasons best known to them they don’t like me. It is really strange because the sister and I used to be very close until her attitude suddenly changed towards me. I have gone to her to ask why the change in attitude towards me, she insisted nothing was amiss. 

Along the line too my boyfriend’s attitude towards me also changed and when I asked him too why he changed, his only excuse is that he doesn’t want his sister to insult me. Recently we had a misunderstanding, which made me to send him a mail. He sent a reply that I should never send him anything again.  Please Agatha, does he love me? I really need your help. 

Confused Girl.

Dear Confused Girl, 

The picture you painted now shows that even if this boy has plans to marry you, you may not have the support from his family members to enjoy the marriage. It isn’t just the typical case of his mother not liking you but also his sister. How far can you go with a man whose entire family is up in arms against you?

Rather than desire this relationship, you should be glad that it is happening before you both walked down the aisle. A Yoruba adage says that good in-laws are more desirable than a good husband. The belief is that when a husband is bad and the in-laws are supportive, the marriage can still work because they know the man’s weakness as well as his strength and would use this knowledge effectively to make him capitulate to their desire. Unlike when the man is good and his people bad, they will make the home ungovernable for the woman to stay with their son. 

If his sister has joined her mother to wage a silent war against you, it is only a matter of time like your boyfriend has just exhibited for the man to begin to look for faults where none previously existed.

But beyond that, there is the need for you to look inwards.  There is no smoke without fire. Why is everyone in the family turning against you? What quality of behaviour have you been exhibiting? Often than not, we are quick to blame everyone around us but ourselves for our deficiencies. There must be something you are not doing right that is making all of them turn against you. 

Granted this relationship may not be going in the direction you want it to go but be wise to use the opportunity provided by it to reappraise yourself as honestly as you can. The tragedy of life is to think others are wrong and we are right. Life is a mix of the good, the bad and ugly. We all have the tendency to misbehave at any particular time if we are not careful. It takes the grace of God to save us from the lure of our flesh. Although you are hurting now, help yourself to refine your character so that you can avoid the mistakes you made in this relationship. 

Being in love goes beyond one’s partner. It is a feeling one must extend to the close family members of the one you are in love with. For a man, his mother and sisters are very important. You cannot love a man without making all attempts to love his mother or sisters. Only a few men would brave marrying a woman who has an issue with his mother and siblings. 

Had you studied your man, you would have known what his weakness is. Obviously his mother and sister are his area of weakness and strength. Because you didn’t bother, preferring to isolate your feelings only to your man, you lost out. His mother and sister had always been there before you and know the string to pull to push you out of his life and that is precisely what they did. 

A wise woman should always be generous with her feelings for her man. It doesn’t cost her much to be nice to members of her man’s family but a lot to be nasty or show indifference to them. 

By checking on your own mistakes, you give yourself the greater opportunity of becoming a new person, one who would make that special man and his people want her in their family. 

Furthermore, if God had intended you and this man to be an item, nothing would have made him change his mind about you. That he did, should tell you that you need to pray more so that God can help you in identifying the special man he made just for you. 

Pointless pushing yourself or desiring a family that clear doesn’t want you. No matter what you do to keep this man by your side or declare his love for you, if he isn’t yours, you are simply wasting your time on him. So instead of wondering if this man really loves you, be grateful that God loves you enough to save you from the folly of your own desires. Losing your three years of relationship is nothing compared to a lifetime of unhappiness.

Good luck.