Three Men Want To Marry Me

Dear Agatha,

Thanks for being there for people like me. Three different men are currently proposing marriage to me. The first one is in love with me, but I don’t love him. The second one I love so much just as he loves me, but the he isn’t ready to marry. He says I should give him till 2014. I am already 26 years old, add five years to that and I would be 31. For me this is a little bit tricky. The third guy is in love with me and seems ready to settle but I can’t read him at all. He is always giving excuses when the matter of marriage comes up.

What do I do?

Confused Girl.

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Dear Confused Girl,

There is no way you would be able to make the right choice with three different men asking for your hand at the same time unless you have always had a clear impression of what you want.

At 26, you should have been better prepared for this moment. Had you done a lot of thinking, had your own solid ideas about the right kind of man for you, there would have been little confusion in your head over the suitability of any of these men for you.

This is because from the very beginning, you would have recognised in them the one with the most quality of your ideal man.

Therefore the process of elimination comes from the choices you have made as a woman. If you are the kind of woman who is only concerned about the physical looks of a man and not about his inner qualities, chances are you would settle for the most handsome of them all.

And if your concern is the one with the most money to spend on you, your choice would favour the man who has the money to lavish on you.

Unfortunately, these aren’t the right prerequisite for a happy marriage. A lot of things go into it. For a marriage to succeed, there must be a physical, spiritual and soul meetings. Unfortunately, many intending couples concern themselves only with the physical which is why many marriages are running into troubled waters.

What are your choices? What excites you in a man? Something on the periphery like his looks or money or something deeper than these?

You may have to excuse yourself from the pressures of these men to enable you retreat into yourself; that is, if you don’t know what you want already in a man.

In arriving at your decision be careful, you don’t over-value what isn’t valued. Life is not perfect hence no one is perfect. In looking at the shortcomings of these men, consider your own first then look for the one that best complements you. Your own weakness should be his strength and your strength his weakness.

You must look at the one who has the potentials of being your best friend and why you think you don’t love one and love the other the most. Sometimes, your current values may be the reason you think you love one and don’t love the other one.

Having a crystal vision of what you want helps put a lot of things in clearer perspective. Why do you think you don’t love the first guy? What values are you using to judge him? Has it to do with the possibility that he doesn’t have enough money like the others or lack the right kind of qualification?

Why do you think you don’t love him? You see, some of us don’t realise what we have until we lose them. That is when we come to realise that values we thought were important never were.

Delete his name from your list of suitors only after you are sure you will never have reason to look back later in life and regret not constructing your tent with him. Many women are so much in a hurry to get married that they forget to pay attention to what is important in a marriage. At 26, taking an extra year to ensure your marriage would do you no harm is not a big sacrifice.

Why is your second option insisting on waiting till 2014? For a woman in a hurry to marry, that is a lifetime to wait. Unless you trust him and be in love with him, this could be an endless wait.

Such a proposition takes planning, massive involvement in his affairs while at the same time trusting him enough to give him the liberty to achieve his dreams for that period.

Beyond being in love, what other things are on ground between the two of you? Frankly, this is a huge sacrifice he is requesting of you considering the fact that you would be 31 when he is ready.

For you to accept this, you must have a firm commitment from such that its terms must be known to every stakeholder in your families. Importantly, you must know why he needs that length of time to be ready. Because marriage is a journey of endless sacrifice, you must also be convinced about the workability of the promises you go into.

If your heart is in tune with this man, work something out with him along the lines of a more acceptable date for the two of you. Like you, he must be willing to make the necessary sacrifices to help the relationship grow. If he insists things must be done his way, it underscores problem and possibly what would be the pattern of your relationship. At every point, a couple must be able to negotiate their differences in such a way it becomes acceptable to both of them. The moment a couple is unable to reconcile its differences, the relationship becomes tiresome and bumpy. It is best to avoid taking into the institution too many garbage because they would eventually be the ruin of it.

Since the third man who is ready to marry is indefinite and secretive and you cannot say what he wants, it is best you allow him be rather than force him to do what you want.

In all these, learn to be honest and realistic in what you do.

Good luck.

I Can’t Forgive My Husband

Dear Agatha,

January, last year, I caught my husband in bed with my supposed best friend. For me, it just wasn’t the fact that he was unfaithful to me but that he did it with my best friend. The humiliation was more than I could tolerate.

I felt so bad too because our marriage of three years was yet to produce the fruit of the womb. And this is a friend he never approved of from the beginning. Although I knew his people were already putting pressure on him, I naively thought our love was strong enough to withstand the pressure.

He was and is still my only love. We met when we were in secondary school. He was in his SSS 3 when I came in as a JSS 2 student. For both of us it was love at first sight and from that early beginning we knew we would end up as man and wife. Different girls had come and gone in his life but none of them could threaten my position in his life. Our love was that strong.

He deflowered me on his graduation day. I got pregnant from that incident and we agreed to terminate it. Since then we took precautions to prevent pregnancy.

Even though we were having difficulties getting a baby after marriage, I thought he would stand by me.

After that incident, I packed out of his life and house. I didn’t bother to go to my parents’ or any of our friends. I instead went to my childhood’s friend place in Abuja. I changed my phone number after calling my parents to appease their anxieties over me and to prevent them arresting my husband over my sudden disappearance. I refused to tell them anything. I was determined not to have anything to do with anybody until I was strong enough to withstand the shame of my best friend taking over my home.

Incidentally, I discovered that I was with child. It was more than enough compensation for me.

It turned out that the pregnancy housed a set of twin boys. My friend was very wonderful all through, giving me both moral and financial support. Knowing how stubborn I could be, she refrained from trying to persuade me to call my husband or family members.

My twins are now over a year and though I had escaped my past but that is not to be as my husband, his family and my parents came knocking last month begging me to come back home.

I didn’t need a soothsayer to know that my husband must have gone through a lot of emotional pain. It was very evident from his haggard appearance. It was also obvious none of them knew about the babies from the surprised looks on their faces when they saw the children. The twins, who never allow anybody except my friend and I come near them, not only allowed their sobbing father get close to them but even cried after him when he was leaving.

I still love him but I cannot forgive what he did. According to him, he didn’t know what came over him and swore on his life that he had never been unfaithful to me since our marriage until that day when my friend came in some few minutes after he came in.

I am so confused and don’t know what to do. Something tells me he is telling the truth because before the incident, my friend had gotten herself involved with some strange friends, whose ways I warned her against. I am so confused about everything. I don’t know if I should go back to him or continue to stay on my own because I don’t want to get hurt again.

Please, tell me what to do; I promise to do precisely what you tell me.

Felicia.

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Dear Felicia,

Go back to him. What more do you want? God has vindicated you before his family through those twins. Besides, they must have found you worthy enough to agree to come with their son to beg you without even knowing about the twins.

I am sure the incident was meant to teach everyone involved some fundamental lessons. Had you listened to your husband’s objection over this friend, none of this would have happened. Friendship must be symbiotic to be beneficial to those involved. He must have observed many things about her you didn’t notice on account of being too close to the scene.

Sometimes it pays to listen to the voice of caution of others around us on issue we are very involved in. This is why we have partners. As your partner he is supposed to be on the look out for your interest, protect you against yourself and help you see things differently. I know the tendency is for us to get uppity when our partners find fault with our friends or family. From your experience, you now know that some people we call friends are really nothing but devil’s advocates. So, be careful whom you bring into your home as a friend from now on.

Believe me, there is no marriage or situation in life that is problem-free. As a matter of fact, problems are meant to help refine and distill us into better human beings. If you run away from marriage on account of this challenge, what happens when your boys grow into being teenagers and unintentionally make your life a mini-hell during this difficult stage of parenting? Would you also quit motherhood? Give up on them and allow them go wild all because you are too afraid to try?

Fear is one of life’s most destructive and limiting weapons. It is a weapon the devil uses to stop people from being happy, fulfilled and joyous in the presence of God. Your marriage and husband are your destinies. It would have been a different kettle of fish if he hadn’t taken the steps of coming to beg for your forgiveness. He has come to ask you to forgive him.

There is no denying the fact that his act humiliated you, caused you endless pains and embarrassment but he has promised to change. To find you must have caused him a lot of time and resilience. Remember you didn’t make it easy for anybody to find you. It couldn’t have been easy for him at all. He failed, realised it and has gone all out to atone for it. Give him a chance to make up for all the pains he has caused you.

We all come with DNA wired deficiencies. No one is perfect. Although you are the one who has been hurt, it doesn’t make you the most perfect in this relationship. There are certain things you must have also done in the past that may also have caused him pain but which he overlooked for the sake of love and your over all happiness.

Marriage is a continuous process of fine-tuning, of re-investment, of sacrifices and being stupidly patient. It is also a process of indulgence and unconditional forgiveness. If you fail to forgive him now, chances are your children too would find it extremely difficult to forgive you for not giving their father a second chance in your life and in their lives.

It is no longer just about you or what you want. Your children not only have a say but a major stake in this. You must also consider what is best for them. From their response, they want their father, crave for him and desire to be with him also.

Going back would give these children the chance to be with their father and you some peace. There is nothing like having the support and love of one’s partner in the process of raising children.

He has fallen flat on his face, your duty as his wife, is to set aside your own pain and help him get up again. Also, don’t give your friend the chance to continuously gloat at her ability to destroy your home.

It isn’t so difficult once you put your mind to it. There is no running away from the responsibilities and sacrifices that go with your marital vows. This is the time he needs you to be a man again; don’t deny him because a time would come down the road when situation like this won’t have much meaning. There is no perfect marriage, couple or relationship but only flawless and unconditional act of forgiveness.

God will help you get there.

Good luck.

Must I Visit Village To End My Tribulation?

Dear Agatha,

I am almost 37 years of age. Three years ago, the man I dated for seven years walked out of our relationship and life without offering me any explanation.

He simply disappeared without trace. No member of his family or his friends could tell me anything about his whereabouts. His office too was baffled and actually took a public announcement concerning his whereabouts.

As at the time he left, I was already five months pregnant. But for the grace of God, I would have lost the pregnancy. His mother in particular set aside her grief to help me through the trying period.

Fortunately, I had a set of twins, a boy and girl. They, more than made up for his absence in our lives and being an only child, for the first time, I had people I could lay complete claim to.

I grew up with my mother’s immediate younger, who though wasn’t cruel to me, was completely indifferent. I would have preferred cruelty for all the attentions she showered on me. Beyond responding to my greetings and asking me about my schoolwork, she didn’t say anything to me. She dutifully paid my school fees to the university level, took care of my needs but was never friendly with me. Her children too tried to avoid me like a plague. She bought us the same clothes, ate the same food, rode in the same car to school, went to the same schools but we were like strangers to each other.

It was something I couldn’t explain. We never quarreled but we just weren’t on speaking terms. We spoke to each other only when absolutely necessary.

After a while, I stopped trying to analyse the behaviour of my aunty and her children. After graduation and the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC), she and her husband presented me with a car gift as well as a three bedroom flat. She influenced my employment with an oil company. I wasn’t sad to leave her house because there was nothing there to miss despite the comfortable life I lived there.

Since packing out, I can count the number of times she or any of her children have visited me even though they each make it a point of duty to call me twice a month to know how I was faring.

Just before my man disappeared, I told my aunty about him and she told me I shouldn’t hurry into anything now. She said that I should first go to my father’s village to seek their approval before going into marriage to avoid regrets.

I didn’t know what to make of it and couldn’t ask her why since our relationship was devoid of such intimacy.

I am writing you because of the sudden change in the attitude of my fiancé’s mother who came back from the village very hostile. Not only is she blaming me for the disappearance of her son but is insisting on taking away my children before I infect them with my bad luck.

She also accused me of being responsible for the disappearances of my parents and that if she allows me have the children, I would also make them disappear without trace.

I later got to know from a concerned friend of the family that my fiancé’s mother was told in the village to avoid being close to me and that she should take away the children from me because I come with a spell that make people around me disappear at the approach of their happy ending. It was from her I got to know that my parents actually disappeared at my birth.

When I confronted my aunty, she confirmed it and said it was the reason either her or her children for that matter did not want to get close to me. That she took the risk of bringing me to her house when others rejected me because she and my mother were very close and couldn’t bear to see her only child suffer. She said, the spiritualist she consulted before taking me to stay with her said the only antidote was for her never to get close to me.

She said a woman he got pregnant and was supposed to marry before ditching her for my mother, placed the spell on me from my father’s village.

My aunty said, she couldn’t tell me because she was forbidden to but now that I know, I should go to my father’s village to meet his family who would take me to the child of the woman my father abandoned for my mother. She said only the forgiveness of the child who was born crippled can neutralise the charm.

I am so confused and at the same time very bitter against my aunty who kept all these from me. What do you suggest I do because my pastor is insisting I shouldn’t go? He thinks prayers, fasting and deliverance would do the magic. But after praying and fasting on my own over the matter, I have this strong urge to go. What do you think?

Ngozi.

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Dear Ngozi,

This is not the time for you to be confused, angry or fight anybody. It is the time for you to act fast before anything happens to the person you are supposed to see in the village.

It is unfortunate that you had to go through all these but the important thing is that God has made a way out for you. Whatever I think is irrelevant. What is important is what God is telling you. If your instinct tells you to go, please don’t hesitate to do just that. Besides, why are the pastor’s reasons against your going? Has he any superior reason different from what God is telling you? No power or person is greater than the God you serve and who has told you to go.

This is one situation where you must move to make your deliverance complete. Yes, prayers, fasting and deliverance are necessary but so also is forgiveness. Since you have the opportunity of meeting the person whose heart is still hurting by what your father did, go and plead on behalf of your father and yourself.

Ideally, your pastor should offer to accompany you on the journey to provide you with the spiritual cover he carries as an anointed man of God, not to discourage you from doing what is right.

Religion aside, you owe it to this child to plead on behalf of the father who brought about his rejection as well as embarrassment of the mother. Like you, that child is carrying the cross of an incident he knows nothing about. Besides, you and this person are related by the blood of a man, who accepted one but rejected the other.

It behooves you to make peace. Don’t forget this person is crippled and don’t have the freedom of movement you have. That alone is enough to make him or her more bitter against you as very determined to keep the curse alive for not only having the love of your father but the freedom to move around like you. Unlike you, he may not have the opportunity of a good education and the quality of life you have.

These are enough grounds for anybody who has a bitter heart to continue to brew evil. In the first place, you don’t know the story told him about your mother who might have been accused of influencing your father’s decision to abandon the woman he first wanted to marry.

To have gotten her pregnant at that time means they must have done the traditional thing. Moral liberties were not so common then. Again, you don’t know the role your mother played in the whole drama. Granted, she may be innocent but in the eyes of the world proving her innocence in that situation would be most difficult because a man is not supposed to abandon everything he believes in for something else. Yes, he is allowed to take another wife but to completely deny his wife and unborn child is something a sane man isn’t expected to do.

Although their reactions and extent they went in getting justice is another matter entirely, but the fact remains you must make the sacrifices to moderate the consequences.

The reactions of your own aunty and children to you underscore the gravity of the situation, so also is the sudden disappearance of the man you were supposed to marry. The threat of your children also disappearing mysteriously is still hanging over your head. How many more of these strange happenings can you endure?

Life can be very lonely, hence you need wisdom at every point to make it very happy. Nobody except you and God knows where the shoes pinch the most. And He has given you the leading of the spirit as well as propeller through the attitude of your fiancé’s mother to act fast. This is one situation when a second delay might be dangerous.

Once you put God first, have faith that He is in charge and can do all things. If your pastor is unwilling to go with you on this journey, ask that God send His spirit and angels ahead of you to clear the road of all agents of darkness. Going to beg for forgiveness would stop the influence of the devil over your life.

Don’t worry about this person listening to you or not, your concern is obeying God and doing what He says to secure your victory over this dangerous foundation.

God is your strength and armour in this battle.

Good luck.

Fallacy Of Online Romance: Your Take?

Dear Agatha,

I just finished going through your web, www.auntieagatha.blogspot.com. It is really nice.

And it brought about this nagging question. Is it right for men to use the online option to search for a woman?

To be honest, I doubt the workability of such a relationship because ladies hardly take such open request from men serious. From my observations ladies hardly reply, though there are few exceptions.

My conclusions are that the average lady has too many men asking for her hand to be bothered about the mystery man on the lonely heart column or behind the cover of the internet. She lacks both time and patience to pay attention to online 'applications' for relationship from men she doesn't see.

Another thing I observed is that ladies' who summon the courage to write make unrealistic demands.

Even at that she ends up more confused by the responses she gets to her requests.

Added to this is the fact that when a person sees too much of something, there is the tendency to take such thing for granted. The thing is that ladies are used to requests from men to take men who come to the lonely-hearts columns serious.

What therefore in your view, are the factors that can explain this trend?

Ajibola.

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Dear Ajibola,

My views are simple. The man was created to be the hunter and woman the prey. Hunters go in search for their prey even in the most difficult and excruciating conditions. A desired prey can attract the attention of many hunters who want it for keeps. This is the same principle that works in a man and woman relationship.

It is the prerogative of the man to run after a woman, not the woman to run after the man, at least before marriage.

When a girl is in her prime, she is like a beautiful bouquet of exquisite flowers, attractive to all eyes that see her.

It is natural for such attention to get over the head of a woman and live her with little or not time to pay attention to men who for one reason or the other decide to use the lonely hearts columns to find a partner but it doesn’t make the process entirely unworkable.

There are women who still bother to read these columns or go to the Internet to find a partner. There are several women who have been hurt, are tired of the fakeness of the rush hour, too confused to know who to settle for or want something entirely different from others. These categories of women do crave the mystery and company of lonely heart columns as well as the Internet to source for their men.

For people who aren’t bothered about such thing as physical beauty, looking for partners who have that extra special feature which like gold takes plenty of patience and dedication to unravel, the lonely-hearts columns may provide them with all the alternatives and differences needed to be happy.

It must be emphasised here that lonely hearts are not meant for everybody; it is only for those who know its worth that appreciate its essence.

Contrary to expectation, they are not for those who are frustrated or unable to attract the right attention. It takes a woman who is definite about what she wants to give attention to the anonymity lonely-hearts columns or Internet dating offers.

On the issue of women not rushing massively to respond to requests from men, women by nature are conservative and cautious than men when it comes to signifying interest in a relationship. Women think out all their options properly before responding while men respond to women first before thinking. This account for the high mails women get and the low volume men also get.

Good luck.

Any Sense Giving Him Time To Send-off His Ex?

Dear Agatha,

I’m 25-year-old final year student. There is this guy I met last year, also a final year student. We started out as friends until we discovered early last month that our feelings for each other went deeper. When he told me about the change of his feelings for me, I also didn’t pretend about mine for him.

However, he pleaded with me to give him time to deal with the issue of his ex girlfriend who is back begging him to reconsider their relationship.

Agatha, as it is, she might have the upper hand over him because it appears he’s still very much in love with her. Unfortunately, I’m helplessly in love with this man. As it is now I’m at a difficult crossroad, not knowing if I should quietly quit the relationship or stay around him. I confess leaving him isn’t going to be easy for me at all.

Bukky.

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Dear Bukky,

It isn’t always easy to get out of an existing relationship especially where the other party is unwilling to let go. If you love this man and trust him, you must exercise the needed patience for him to properly clear up the debris from his previous relationship.

If you don’t give him the necessary time and support to properly disengage from this relationship, you may find yourself unable to move this relationship forward as time goes on. This would come primarily from that nagging thought inside of you that he might still hold a strong touch for his ex.

In addition, he has to convince himself too that he is not making any mistake leaving her for you by giving himself the opportunity of x-raying his options properly.

Being in love with you won’t stop him from still harbouring feelings for the other woman. And unless these two feelings are put side by side, it might be difficult for him to decide which of you is the most precious to him. Whatever he is feeling is natural just as his request for time is necessary.

Besides asking for time to end one relationship before beginning something new with you doesn’t automatically mean he is going back to the other girl or signal that he finds his relationship with her more rewarding than yours with him. If for nothing, this man need be praised him for being so honest with you. Some men won’t tell you a thing about their ex especially at this nascent stage; they would find such admission or request too dangerous to make for fear of losing the new girl.

By telling you he is soliciting your trust in him. It won’t be such a bad idea to tell him. You may not be comfortable but love and relationship building is all about sacrifices. Each day brings on with it a new challenge, a new dream, and a new reason to make it work. It also bring with it choices to be made.

Rather than concentrate all your worries on the possibility of the two of them coming back together, use this extra time of practice to really analyse your feelings for him. What do you like most about him in the one year he and you have been friends?

Sincerely, you started from the most important point, friendship. It is the cement that binds two people together. Friendship makes it possible for two people in a relationship to discuss honestly, objectively and constructively. You can only suspect him of insincerity if your friendship was flawed, devoid of the chance of peeping into your characters and identifying your strong points.

As your friend, by now you should be able to tell without hesitation when he is on a mischief mission or a good-intentioned one.

I know love, most times, makes nonsense of our good intentions or beliefs, but discussing your fears with him as well as your decision to quit for the other girl would help you know where you stand as well as his plans concerning your declaration of love.

Don’t make the mistake of ending it without involving him because that would hurt you both immensely. Having told you of his intentions, he demands loyalty and support from you. If you run away before he is ready, you would leave him with no choice but to take his chances with this other woman. You would force him to think you are not serious and unworthy of the risk of investing his life and love on.

You may think he is enjoying all these but if you look deeper you would find a man who is scared because whatever decision he takes now would have an impression on his life. He is almost approaching the final lap of his bachelorhood. The woman he decides on is most likely to be the one he would end up marrying. So, this time, what he is asking is more than the issue of his former ex, rather it more about his future. He has to consider which of you would best suit his dreams in life, the one with the most measure of understanding, care, respect and belief in his person.

He is retreating to make a major decision so if you want to be part of this life, you must not be in a haste to vacate it for another woman or fear of not being woman enough for him. Let him be the one to tell you he has made his decision. It is best you hear it from him than to hurry out of it only to find out that you have made a very big mistake.

For now, pray that God shows you the way to go because unless God gives His support to this desire of yours, it may not work.

Good luck.

My Daughter’s Boyfriend Must Be Arrested Now…

Dear Agatha,

My daughter is 17, pretty and well behaved. So I thought until I began to notice her receiving strange phone calls. Initially I ignored these calls, thinking they were from female friends until I chanced on her declaring her undying love for the person on the other end of the phone.

I was livid with anger so I grabbed her phone, dialed the last number that called to warn the boy or man to stay off her. I threatened to have him arrested if he comes near her again.

My daughter who has just written the Joint Admission and Matriculation Examination had the effrontery of accusing me of being unfair to her. This is new because never has she spoken back to me. I suspect this boy may be responsible. So I’m thinking of having him locked up to drive home my point that he is a negative influence on my daughter.

I desperately need your advice because I don’t want her to make any mistake in life. Her attitude is giving me concern. As far as I am concerned she is still too young to know anything about men and women.

Please help me.

Roseline.

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Dear Roseline,

Be careful else you would lose the love and respect of your daughter. Yes, at 17, she may still be a baby but the changes in her body have made her a young woman, one crying to be given freedom, to be understood and the right to be heard. She is only a year away from Nigeria’s official age of consent. In the developed countries of the world, she is a year above the age.

To continue to be her mother and best friend, you must listen to her, discuss with her and dialogue your options if you don’t want to lose her to friends or people who should not have a say in her life.

The ages of 16 to 18 years are the most troublesome for both the children and parents. These are when the hormonal changes are their most potent and very obvious. This is when the child transforms from the age of complete innocence to the age of awareness. That a child isn’t sexually active to know doesn’t deny the child of the knowledge of the changes going on inside his or her body.

These changes give them the same feelings, urges, desires and awareness the more matured adults have. Theirs, being completely novel come with all the excitements and promises of new beginnings. You must understand from your own experiences at their age that these feelings cannot be caged neither can the children whose bodies are being ravaged by the hormones control the effects of these natural but necessary invaders.

The hormones prepare them for the only assignment natural to man and woman, procreation. It is primeval, something no amount of scolding, imprisonment, threats, beating, denials can change. From the day we were born, it has been wired into our subconscious. Our main purpose on mother earth is to have sex and children. This is an indisputable fact. Every other thing we do in between like getting education, acquiring extra knowledge to develop and improve our environments is in between assignments. That is why sex remains the most consistent topic through the ages right from the Garden of Eden. It is the only thing that has resisted change just like the sun, moon and star.

And this is why our responsibilities as parents must be pegged on love and understanding to ensure that our children have the confidence to face the changes going on both inside and outside them.

The first thing is for you to accept that there is nothing you can do about those feelings going on inside of her or prevent her from falling in love. It is a natural process, and Mother Nature is preparing her body for the ultimate assignment of a woman in life.

Your duty as her mother is not to oppose Mother Nature but to help her minimise the negative side of the process. I totally agree with you that she needs monitoring but not the excessive force you are considering. Locking that man up would only make your daughter more determined to follow her heart. The stubbornness and resilience of the teenager, especially the female, is legendary. If she thinks you are too strict, she might decide to do that thing all females do to tell their parents they are of age. She may decide to get pregnant simply to show you that she is her own person. When that happens, you stand compromised. At least until she finds her feet again, you will bear the most shame of her act of rebellion.

Technological advancement has made motherhood these days to be the most difficult assignment on earth. While our mothers and their own mothers got away with attitude like yours, it would be difficult for you to because all the information today’s teenagers need about their sexuality is at their finger tips. Mothers before us managed well because so many things in those days were shrouded in secrecy.

Contemporary technology has made our children more advanced than their physical ages. They have so much information more than you and I could possibly have when we were their ages. So don’t deceive yourself into thinking that this man is a negative influence over your daughter or responsible for her actions. Such information she can get at the press of a button in or outside your home.

Rather than fight her, deploy dialogue. One of the worst things that can happen to a female child is to get pregnant before her time. Not only does it derail the child, it equally calls to question the moral values of her mother. More often than not the mistake actually comes from the attitude of the mothers who forget that those heady years need wisdom and not threat to navigate safely.

The first step is to realise that she is no more a child but a young woman. Learn to listen to her voice and pleas just as you want to be listened to by her. We are given our experiences in life to help others succeed where we have failed and provide it when necessary to teach life’s important lessons. If you recall your own growing years and how much you despised your mother for being too hard, for not understanding you, you would know how to handle this delicate stage of your daughter’s life.

All you have to do to make this task easy is for you to go back in time a little bit. It would help you put things in their proper perspectives, it would give you wonderful clues to make this period enjoyable for both of you.

Destroying the phone or seizing it would not solve the problem, like I earlier said, would only complicate the situation between the two of you.

Whatever your own mistakes and high moments were as a teenager, learn to share them with her. Doing so would help her to understand you as a person, bring about a bond between the two of you. It would, more than anything else, help you two talk about the disparity between your worlds. The talk would help refresh your memories on the changes going on inside of her. It would also remove whatever suspicions she has of you. By discussing the subject of your past with her, you invite her to be your friend and for you to be her confidant.

As her friend, the gains are tremendous in that it helps both of you know your limits as well as your liberties.

In discussing your own teenage years, don’t leave out the mistakes of your own past, the wrong decisions you took which are still affecting you till date and how your mother tried to prevent the mistakes from happening. These are subtle ways of reminding her of the vulnerability of her own current situation and how disappointed her decision could turn out to be if she isn’t careful.

Tell her that you are not against her falling in love but would appreciate if she allows you to be part of the process by bringing the man home to meet you. This may worry her a bit but assure her of your good intentions as well as promise not to do anything that would compromise her image.

Meeting the boy would help you access him and monitor the development between the two of them. The fear of what you would do to him should he do anything to hurt or compromise your daughter would put some fears into him to behave. There is some security for her too if the boy is known to you.

Demanding to see him would produce two results, terminate the relationship if the intention of the boy is simply to sleep with her or change his intentions for good. The forbidden and secret fruits are usually the sweetest. Legitimacy gives a measure of sanity to an act formerly thought forbidden. Insisting on meeting and discussing with the man involved would kill some of the excitements in the relationship because at the end of the day, you would have succeeded in making it appear as non-issue, even though it is, deep down.

This doesn’t mean you would stop praying or showing interest in what she does. It only means changing your line of discipline through enlisting her help and involving her in the control of her affairs.

It is called joint responsibility. It takes a whole load from you while conferring on her certain level of responsibility. The fear of not disappointing you is enough to make any young and thoughtful girl stay out of trouble until she is ready for the responsibility of sleeping with a man.

Meet her halfway. It won’t hurt you to let her see your fears, know why you are having those fears and how disappointed you would be if she fails to make it in life. Facts of life is not an abstract lesson but one every adult has walked through before. This is not the time for you to play the superhuman mother. You lack the strength of your own to paddle her across this ocean of life without her help and the help of God. She is also very confused but just don’t know how to ask for your help. Being the more matured one, show her you care by holding out your helping hand to her. That stubbornness is a camouflage for a cry for help. Don’t drive her away by being so uncompromising. It won’t help either of you.

Remember life is in seasons. This is her season, help her make the best of it so that when she moves from this stage, she would always have you to thank for being such a supportive and understanding mother.

Good luck

She Pesters My Life With Love I Don’t Need

Dear Agatha,

There's this lady who has been showering me with lots of love and care. But deep down me, I know I don’t love her but enduring her attention because, I don't want to hurt her emotions. I don't know what to do.

Bright.

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Dear Bright,

You would hurt her more if at the end of the day she finds out that you never loved her and lack any plans for her. No matter how she would feel by your revelation, tell her the truth about your precise feelings for her.

Granted, she may not like it now but overtime, especially when she meets the man who really cares for her, would come to appreciate your sincerity. In time, she would come to not only appreciate you but also come to respect you for not taking undue advantage of the situation. Being frank can be very cruel but it should never stop anyone from telling the truth.

However the way you make your presentation is very important. You don’t have to be mean simply because you don’t reciprocate her feelings towards you. It could be your turn to fall in love with someone who doesn’t love you tomorrow, so be mindful of her pains and sense of emotional bereavement at not having your love for keeps. Take her to somewhere special and private. Soften her by telling all the good points she has and how much you wish you could produce the type of feelings that would make her happy being with you. Be honest but deploy wisdom. To be rejected by the one you love is very difficult so be very gentle and humane because she didn’t choose to fall in love with you, rather her feelings made the decision for her just like yours refused to hook on to her signal.

Let her know your decision isn’t something personal but a situation you have no control over. The way you treat this issue would go far in determining how fast she heals from the wounds of rejection as well as the type of relationship that would exist between both of you thereafter. You may not love her but you two could remain meaningful friends, a development which at the end of the day could be more beneficial to both of you.

Good luck.

Return Of Her Ex From Abroad Alters Our Dream

Dear Agatha,

I am an avid reader of your column and have benefited from your responses to people's questions.

For two years, my girlfriend and I were happy together, and our relationship was the envy of others around. But all that changed when her ex-boyfriend who has been out of the country came back and her attitude towards the relationship changed.

Before now, we were at liberty to call or receive each other’s call as often as possible. But not anymore, these days I would call her and she would refuse to pick my calls.

Early last month I went to visit her but she wasn’t comfortable with my presence so I left. After an hour, I tried calling her but her phone wasn’t going through so I went back there but she was not at home. I decided to wait for her. But I ended up waiting till the morning of the next day.

Just last week, I saw the name and number of her ex-boyfriend on her phone. When I called to enquire if he knows anybody by my girlfriend’s name, he responded by referring to her as his girlfriend. Severally, I have called my girlfriend to clarify the actual nature of her relationship with her ex but she keeps telling me they don’t have anything together again and that she has only seen him twice since he came back to the country.

Please what do you think I should do about this?

Felix.

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Dear Felix,

When things get this messy, it is best one step aside. This is to enable the other person who is having doubts get clearer signals concerning his or her feelings for the current person in his or her life.

Only one relationship of the many we enter into in life is expected to have a happy ending. Many things add up to make what appears to be so perfect not so perfect any more. You simply didn’t realise it, this other man has always been between you and your girl except that he has never manifested as a major threat to you until now.

Obviously your girlfriend hasn’t gotten over her feelings for her ex. Chances are that she and her former boyfriend were never apart even while he was out of the country. Loneliness and trepidation over the uncertainty of the future with the other man may have driven her into your arms.

With the man back, she realises that their dream can come true after all and that whatever she may have had with you is nothing compared to what promise this other man have always held, and still holds for her. It’s unfortunate that you are the one at the receiving end of all these, the one whose heart and happiness have to be sacrificed for her own happiness.

Life is about gambles, choices and decisions. Since she has started avoiding your calls, exhibiting unease at your presence in her house, refusing to explain her whereabouts to you, don’t linger too much around her if you ever loved her. This is one painful sacrifice you have to make for her. Give her the chance to be happy with her man. I appreciate that she lacks the right to treat you so shabbily or without offering you any explanations but forcing her to choose between you and her former boyfriend would not endear you to her now, rather it would only make things worse between the two of you. Her problem is the lack of honesty and transparency from the beginning. She should have told you from the beginning her arrangement with the other man as well as why she is going into the relationship. That would have prepared you for this moment instead of giving the impression that she and you had a future together.

The issue has gone beyond her, to protecting your person from both hurt and ridicule. You can either decide to drop out completely from her life by refusing to call her or visit her anymore. The only draw back is that she may come around later to accuse you of being unfair to her, leaving her for another woman.

Besides, it is a cowardly way to end something that gave you so much joy in the beginning.

If she is refusing to take your call, send her a text message insisting on discussing something very important with her. If she still refuses to give you an appointment, inform her of your decision to give her a chance to be with the man she loves better than you. In the text, let her know that even though you are hurt by the development but you love her enough to let go if it would make her happy.

Don’t bother if she still refuses to take your calls or reply to your messages. Your conscience would at least be at peace within you that you tried your best.

If it is any consolation, every relationship we go into in life, including the ones that end up on the altar are all gambles because even in death some of us still regret the choice of the person we spent our lives with.

God may be saving you a lot of stress in the future because of the many things He knows about us, which we don’t know. Whichever way it ends, learn to trust and support the will of God for you since some of the things we regard as disappointments in the beginning of our journey in life turns to be blessings at the end.

Good luck.

His Love For Me Glows Dimmer…

Dear Agatha,
Thanks a lot for your succour to many lives. I will be 21 in May this year. I’m currently in a six-month old relationship with a man, who is now exhibiting lack of interest in me.

If I call him on phone he sometimes refuses to pick the call. The only time he does is when he wants to have sex with me. It is so painful because we did not start that way. I love him so much.

Worried Girlfriend.

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Dear Worried Girlfriend,

Isn’t it obvious to you that he has had his fill of your body and that from the beginning you both never had the same ideas about your relationship?

He wanted sex, you wanted something else, perhaps a more permanent arrangement. From the beginning, your relationship was flawed and jaundiced by your different dreams and desires.

Because of what you wanted, you failed to look the mask. You took on face value everything he told you, ignoring obvious signs of his true intentions until he adopted his present style of coldness.

An astute woman would always know if she were honest with herself, when a man’s interest in her doesn’t go beyond the bedroom. If in six months he has seen all he has to see about you, done everything a man does with a woman, what other excitement would keep him interested in you that he has not experienced in the less than six months he has been with you?

Much as the current gospel of men centres on premarital sex, a lot of them still appreciate a woman who still knows the mystery of holding on to her moral values.

Sexual liberty or not, a lot of men still prefer a woman they can teach, whose experience isn’t as wide in scale. If at 21, you have the experience of an old woman, no young man would want to have you for keeps.

Most often, the same men who plunder a woman turn around to run away from her after having their fill for another woman. Calling you or answering your phone calls only when he desires your body only underscores this point. To him, you are nothing but a good pleasure object. It may sound cruel and very unfair to you but that is the message this man is communicating in clear signs.

You would only get hurt the more if you insist on hanging-on because of the love you have for him. Your love is not enough to sustain this relationship or get it back on track. So many moral questions have come up between the two of you to make him especially change his mind about you. This man will neither love you the way you want to be loved nor demonstrate any respect for your person.

Sincerely, you need to put a lot of distance between the two of you, a measure that will give you the opportunity to reappraise yourself as well as the values that you projected in the relationship.

Men don’t get to the point of making it obvious to a woman that their only interest in her is her body unless she herself has projected the image to them. Even when that is their objective, a lot of men still have the decency to conceal it in fine words. To make it so apparent to you means you must have thrown caution to the winds.

This is one area you must watch and work on in your next relationship. Re-branding means, acknowledging one’s areas of fault, weakness as well as strength hence must apply honesty to get to the right point. Accept first that his attitude has something to do with your own presentation of yourself and that whatever mistakes this relationship has become is your own fault. Men take their cue from the image a woman presents of herself hence a woman must be very careful about what she says of herself.

Life is generally about new opportunities as well as gaining back lost ones for those who are smart enough to know what they have lost. Your joy would come from genuine acknowledgment as well as acceptance of your mistakes, excesses and all the other things you did wrong.

With such acceptance comes a determination to do things differently as well as nurture new dreams. You may have done everything wrong in the past, but your current experience offer you a new opportunity to do something worthwhile, to give yourself a new and positive image as well as another chance to be happy.

If you have learnt nothing from this whole experience, at least, you know that sleeping with a man regularly would never make a man who isn’t interested in you stay glued to your side. There are so many other factors involved in the growth of a relationship. No matter how generous a woman is with her body to her boyfriend, if she lacks the moral values, attitude and character to make him a good wife, the man would still leave her for another woman. It is an important lesson you must never forget in your next relationship. Don’t do things that you would at the end impute on your reputation as a woman else the very man you seek to please may abandon you for the same reason. Being principled is part of growing a viable relationship.

The best way to recover from the pains of this relationship is to accept the fact that there was no relationship in the first place. Don’t bother to call him again and when his urge pushes him to crave for your company, tell him you are no longer available to him or any other man for that purpose until you marry.

It might hurt for a short time but being principled would make you happier as well as better focused in life. To do otherwise is to continue to sell yourself cheap or worthless to a man who rates you at the bottom of his scale.

Granted, it might not be easy at first to drop some old habits, but if those habits you are dropping are ones that cause you pains and disappointments, it is best you do. It is a small price to pay for happiness and huge sacrifice to earn your respect at the end of it all.

If you tell God about it, He would give you the strength to do what is right.

Good luck.

I’m In A Fix, My Love Happily Married!

Dear Agatha,

I am 31 years old in love with a businessman who is 34. He is the type of man I want to spend the rest of my life with. However four months into our relationship, I discovered that he had lied to me about himself. He gave me the impression that he was single only for me to discover recently that he has a wife and three children. He is the first man in my life. I don’t know what I will do without him or survive this period because this is really my first time of falling in love. Without him, I am not complete. Please help me point at the right way to go because I realise now that I have made a very terrible mistake in my life.

Confused Woman.

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Dear Confused Woman,

You just have to let go because he belongs to another woman. I can imagine your pains at his deceit as well as the sense of loss you must be feeling now but be grateful that it hasn’t got out of hands before you discovered his lies.

Just imagine the embarrassment as well as emotional torture if you had got pregnant by your Mr. Right only to discover that he wasn’t free to marry you or acknowledge the baby? What would you have done?

In every situation, we must learn to give thanks to God. You have learnt a very important lesson that some investigations and caution are important during the first few months of meeting a man or woman.

Had you applied just the most a little caution and observations, you definitely would have noticed one or two things that pointed him out as a liar. For instance, his eagerness to get away from you after a particular time, his refusal to allow you know his house, the excuses for his failure to meet your time, the busy schedules he suddenly manufacture when you have planned something special. Although you may not give so much consideration to them, these are sure signs that the man in your life is either having an affair outside you or not telling you the truth about his status.

Marriage is too important an institution, so don’t be involved in this one more than you have been. Granted there was no way you would have known that he was lying to you the first time, but now that you know, keep your distance from him. A man, who could lie so generously to cover the fact that he has a wife and three children, is one man to avoid with a passion.

Even though it was unintentional, you have already robbed another woman of four months of her joy, time and pleasures. You have also inadvertently caused those children quality moments with their father; holding on to him or whatever dreams you thought you had with him is to cause everybody involved in this drama more pains.

Whether you know it or not, his marriage will be affected one way or the other by your involvement with him. Don’t even linger around for him to plead with you to forgive him.

It is unfortunate you chose the wrong man to fall in love with but this experience is sure to leave you a better woman if you give yourself the opportunity of looking at the positive side of this whole development.

For instance, it would make you more cautious the next time a man comes your way. Now you know the mistakes you made with this man, never again would another man get away using the same tricks on you. God knows why He sent this man first to help you mature.

To continue to hold to him therefore is to do yourself a greater injustice than he has already done to you.

On how you would get over him, once you have the determination, the rest is easy. First make the move to forget ever meeting a man like him; granted it might not be as easy as it sounds given the menu of various degrees of pains going on inside of you, but you must make the effort to.

Having waited this long to fall in love and only to be so betrayed in the worst kind of ways a man can betray a woman, this is the time you need God the most as well as meaningful friends. Which of your friends is genuine? The one who has the magic to put a smile back on your face? Don’t be shy to call that friend up for help.

Except for the lessons you are supposed to learn from the episode, don’t allow this to affect your attitude towards men. To do that is to give this man an open visa into your life to continue to hurt you long after he has left.

If there is no friend to call on, take a break from familiar places you both visited or stayed. This is a sure way to help the memory of the time you had together fade faster. Also changing the position of things in the house would help reduce the time spent on imagining him in a particular position or the things you did in that position.

To help you get over it completely, you have to take pride in your judgment as well as your person. Don’t do yourself the injustice of questioning your own judgment on account of what happened between you and this man because there are so many decent men out there, ones who would appreciate the uniqueness that is you. This man happens to be one of those who make the human race full of pains and disappointments. Just like we have them in men, we also have women like him, so it is not a gender thing.

Besides, mistake is a part of growing up and life. We win some, we lose some. Mistakes are meant to strengthen us, to point out at the right way to go and to showcase our own limitations. Mistake itself is not a tragedy of human life; it only becomes one when we consistently refuse to learn from the experiences of past follies.

You never had the experience of a man like him but having met this kind of man, you now have the training to know what to look for and how to be wise in dealing with this kind of man.

As for you not being able to cope without him, trust me, you will become better than you ever imagined. It is the anxiety the heart generates when first love comes crashing down.

Cheer up and trust God to do what you now think is impossible.

Good luck.

My Husband-to-be Is Stingy

Dear Agatha,

I am 24 and in a relationship that is heading for marriage. But there is this problem I have with the man in question. He is very miserly; he doesn’t spend money on me. I don’t know if it has anything to do with the nature of his job but even when he has, he gives me so little.

I don’t know why he keeps telling me that he refuses to give me enough money because I am extravagant. He doesn’t trust me despite my telling him everything about my past from the beginning. At least my story didn’t stop him from bringing drinks to see and request of my parents for my hand in marriage. So, why doesn’t he trust me?

Although he recently told me his confidence in me is building up but I don’t think it is fair. He is a lot older than I am. His sister is of the opinion that he is scared of responsibility.

Honestly, I have nothing against him and I am really okay with him because meeting him really helped me in stopping most of the things I used to do while still in school.

A lot of my friends say he is madly in love with me but I sometimes doubt it. He is of the opinion that I lie a lot but I know I have chosen never to lie again to help the relationship work. It hurts because even when I am telling the truth he still thinks I am lying. Something tells me he knows I have changed but simply chooses not to advertise it in my presence.

Worried Fiancée.

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Dear Worried Fiancée,

It is obvious both of you still have a lot of things to iron out before you tie the knot.

Being the woman, you must learn to live within the means he provides for you else you risk drowning the thin line of trust that exists between you two.

Despite telling him you have changed, depending on the extent you went before meeting him, it would take more efforts on your part to completely clear the image he has of you or people around him have. Don’t forget, it is not just about him but about all those other people who have had one or two things to do with you in the past.

That he appears distrustful of you doesn’t mean he doesn’t love you or trust you. It could simply be a case of being cautious primarily instigated by fear that you might hurt him.

It is the inordinate survival instinct in everyone of us. It makes us struggle relentlessly against the evidences of our eyes. For now, his attitude is heavily under the influence of what his heart wants to accept and the voice of caution from his past knowledge of you.

It would take time for the war of his heart to win hence you must be willing to exercise patience, tolerance and understanding else if you fail to help him understand the new you, you risk losing his complete trust.

Bear in mind that some certain lifestyles are believed to be difficult to change from. Having lived a lifestyle of carelessness or given him some false starts in the beginning, you would have to excuse his behaviour for now.

It takes a man who cares to do the impossible. He must really love you so much to have taken the risk of going to your parents with the type of image you claim to have had. Give him time to build his trust as well as for you to earn it.

Nagging him over money won’t help at all. Learn to accept whatever he gives you; it could be his way of accessing the change really going on in your life. Also, it could be his way of instilling some financial discipline in your life. Having made up his mind to spend the rest of his life with you, he feels an obligation to impact some of his values into you.

To him, you are no just any woman anymore but for both of you to have a life together, he feels it is his responsibility to give you some lessons in life, which could be not getting everything you request from life. Before you met him, you got what you wanted without caring what you gave in return. There is a world of difference between being a girlfriend and a wife. Men most times don’t care the character a girlfriend they have no interest in marrying put up. All they are interested in from such women is fun but it is a different ball game when it comes to the woman they want to spend the rest of their lives with.

More often than not, men are more meticulous than women when it comes to details about the woman they want to share their space with. Money isn’t everything. If you are unable to manage the little he gives you now, how do you propose to convince him you would be able to manage difficult times with him when you get married? How do you seek to tell him that you have the qualities to be a good wife?

Marriage is full of uncertainties. It is a wild field where anything, both good and bad could happen. It pays to adopt the motto of the boy’s scout to be prepared always. Marriage strives on sacrifices and unconditional support. Even if you suspect his playing pranks with you by refusing to give you enough money, give him your support if you truly love him.

By so doing, you earn his trust, friendship as well as loyalty. Once you both are able to work this into your relationship at this nascent stage, it helps solve a lot of confusions as well as complications later in life.

Sincerely, it is in your interest you earn his absolute trust now because some people from your past you may have hurt emotionally may want to foment trouble for you once the knowledge of your marriage plans become public. The major target would be your man. They would tell him things just to discredit and make him change his mind about marrying you. While you have acted wisely by exposing your entire past to him, it isn’t enough. You must follow such honesty with both transparency as well as determination to make this relationship work against the expectation of all those who are expecting you to derail.

Truthfully, he is the one that has taken the most risk in this relationship so don’t discourage him by making demands you know are out of place.

Don’t forget that apart from the love he is investing in this relationship, he is also investing his pride as well as the friendship of some close friends who may have warned him against the wisdom of dating you. If you fail him, it would go beyond you; it would affect the way he treats all the other women who come after you.

Your role as his would-be wife is to help him manage his life, including his finances. It is not to encourage him to spend unwisely. If your friends are of the opinion that he is really in love with you, why not help yourself making your dream come true with this man by deploying wisdom into anything you do with him. There is nothing that comes easy in life without preparation.

Refusing to praise the changes in you is not out of recognition of your efforts but an attempt not to make you rest on your oars.

With plenty of prayers, you can make this work so be very prayerful.

Good luck.

After Taking My Flower… Now Finds Solace In His Ex

Dear Agatha,

I’m a final year student of Ambrose Ali University, Ekpoma. I was 23 years of age when I agreed to a relationship with my current boyfriend.

Before I agreed to his request, he had through a picture I saw in his photo album introduced his ex-girlfriend to me.

But few months after we started dating, he informed me about the visit of his supposed ex-girlfriend. It was at that point he admitted that he told a lie about the lady being his ex. He told me that he was once very much in love with the lady.

However, she came as he had warned. Not did her visits become frequent, having secured admission into 200 Level in our school, they now live together.

Immediately she came, she placed everything in the room prompting my boyfriend to give away his former things. The lady is responsible also for his financial needs since he doesn’t have a good job for now.

The most painful thing is that she uses everything that belongs to my boyfriend, including wearing his boxers. Whenever I ask him the precise situation between them, he says nothing.

Everybody in the compound tells me he is cheating on me. When I confronted him on who is responsible for the pregnancy he took her to the hospital to terminate, he told me it was the girl’s boyfriend.

I’m told they go to the bath together when they think nobody is at home.

I once trusted him and I have never cheated on him and I don’t want to be cheated on either. They both speak Igbo whenever we are together, knowing full well I don’t understand a word of the language, as an Ishan lady.

I’m beginning to change my mind toward him despite him being the one who deflowered me, a year and six months into our relationship.

Please I need your advice before it is too late. I’m 25 years old and time is not exactly my friend.

Rosy.

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Dear Rosy,

What sort of advice do you want? That you should continue to stay with a man who obviously has little regard for you? Isn’t it obvious this man and his girlfriend are playing you for a fool and that you don’t reckon in his life?

What more evidence do you need than the ones they are presenting to you? Are your fears of being left on the shelf so profound that you would continue to tolerate this humiliation from this man who has no grain of respect for your person or feelings? What do you call this, love or outright stupidity? He lives with a woman in the same room who wears his cloths, uses his things and he tells you there is nothing between them? And you believe him? Why are you finding it so difficult to let go of something that never was?

Deep down, do you think this man has anything to offer you? Do you think you can trust him? From the very beginning he has never been straight with you. The woman he told you was his ex, turns out to be very much alive in his life. Not only was she ever out of the picture, but also has come in full force to take her rightful place beside him.

At 25, there is no hurry for you to get married. Even if you are well advanced in age, it still doesn’t mean a woman should marry any man simply to please the society. This man would never treat you with respect. He would always find an excuse to hurt you. Is this the type of man you want or a marriage where there would always be other people?

One thing is to desire marriage another is to have it with the right type of person. Trust me, it is one of the most wonderful institutions on earth but the wrong choice of a spouse could make it the worst nightmare in life. Often, it is best to remain single than to go into a marriage laden with pains of disappointments, lies, infidelity, and outright lack of respect.

Wake up to the hard fact, this man doesn’t feel a thing for you or this other lady. He wants you for the free sex he gets when this other lady isn’t around. While the other lady, he wants for the money she provides him.

Men like him are nothing but opportunists, always on the look out for his self-interest. This is one man who would never make you happy. Not having a job is not an excuse for him to be cruel or deceitful.

But beyond the issue of this man is that in all these, you seem to be your own worst enemy. There is the need for you to build your self-esteem else you would become an easy prey for any man out for quick fun and mischief. The moment men perceive you as desperate to marry, they would tell you all the things they know you want to hear for the purpose of sleeping with you.

If you are not careful, you would end up more broken hearted than you already are now, because out there are more men like this current boyfriend of yours.

You need to help yourself adjust to the fact that age adds value to life if you know how. You must shake off the mentality that says you are aging fast on the shelf to prevent you short-changing yourself from the good promises that go with marriage.

Earn your respect from a man by refocusing your priorities from desperation to acceptance of the will of God. Unless you key into his plans for you, you are liable to making the worst kinds of mistakes in life. Our God is neither late nor early but always on time. When His time is ripe, age becomes secondary; it assumes the posture of a huge advantage not the disadvantage you seem to think it is now.

The important thing in life is to be happy with the choices you have made, not weep over them later in life.

The more time you spend with this man would only add depreciation to your worth and self-esteem. If you don’t end the relationship before it is too late, you would never be able to recover from the psychological trauma of all that is happening to you. Yes, you took a gamble on him by loving and trusting him. That he deflowered you doesn’t mean you have to tolerate humiliation. It is time for you to move on with your life. Painful, yes, but there is nothing more for you in this relationship. This is life, sometimes it is so unfair and painful, other times, it is just and fair to all those who learn from each bitter experience as well as trust God.

At this early stage, he should be the one sweating to have you in his life, not you. If you begin from the beginning to fight the battle to have him remain in your life, what will you do when you marry and you have to fight to make the marriage work as well as protect it from the claws of other women? You can drag an unwilling horse to the river but can never force it to drink.

You are forcing this man to retain his interest in you when he has made it obvious that he no longer wants you around.

Leaving him to focus on your strengths, qualities, values as well as work on your self-esteem would help you know what to look out for in another man who comes your way. You must first have a focus of your own to be happy in a relationship. You remain in this relationship despite the pains it is causing you due to your lack of focus beyond getting married at all cost. It isn’t his problem but yours. Make the decision to be happy and God will provide you with everything you need to make it work wonderfully well for you.

Good luck

Can Girl Declare Her Virginity Status To New Man?

Dear Agatha,

I really enjoyed your response to my problem. It seems God specifically created you for only me. May the good Lord reward you immensely in Jesus name. Amen.

Like Oliver Twist, I’ve come again ‘to ask for more.’ This time, there is this disturbing question I want you to answer for me. Is it right for a girl to tell a man just coming to her that she is till a virgin?
Blessing.

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Dear Blessing,

It is neither here nor there. Telling him would depend on the questions being asked or the topics being discussed.

If the question bothers on the woman’s virginity, nothing stops her from giving him an honest answer. This is simply because it pays to tell the truth from the beginning otherwise such information should not be given on a first date. A couple’s first meeting should be devoid of such private issues or things that could stampede the relationship into hasty or ill-conceived conclusion.

It is always best for a woman to keep her lips sealed on such very personal matters until the occasion calls for it. Flaunting the fact of her virginity on every opportunity to the face of a guy could result into her falling into the wrong hands. Some mischievous men excited at the thought of being a woman’s first, could capitalise and manipulate such intimate information to their advantage.

Besides, a man who truly loves a woman would not bother about such information. Some men actually discover that fact about their girls, years later.

A woman should give herself and the man the opportunity to build something very tangible first before divulging this vital information.

Good luck.