My Life In a Bit (Part 2)

Ours was a peaceful marriage for a few years as I tried all my possible best to make it work. Olufemi was caring during the first three months of our union and changed drastically all of a sudden. It turned out that he was jobless and only lied that he worked with a popular company in Lagos. So the home responsibility fell on my shoulder, I had to cater for the home upkeep since I was gainfully employed in one of the biggest banks in the country and doing quite well for myself.

I fend for the house with no complaint and there were times I would have to buy things to give to my inlaws and mother in Femi’s name because I wanted my husband to be seen as caring and generous.

Six months into my marriage, I discovered that Olufemi was a cheat and have received threat messages from neighbours warning that my husband either leave them or their relatives alone.

Despite all these, I would still lie to my friends about how loving my husband was and how I was lucky to have married him. I wondered how many of them would have challenged their husband to also buy them a car after I lied that the car I bought for myself was a gift from my husband.

I kept lying and lying not intentionally but most times I find myself spilling lies with bitterness gripping my heart. The reason for these, I am yet to know. Could it be that I wanted to prove a point to my friends that I was lucky to have married him just to feel among and contribute to the good tales and gists we shared among ourselves? Or could it be my wishes playing at me because I have always wished to be with a man whom I would be proud of.

Anyways, God blessed me with a bouncing baby girl after a year and half of being married to Olufemi and I consoled myself in this by paying less attention to Olufemi and his promiscuous ways to derive the the joy from motherhood.

“Rather than kill myself over a man who cared less about me, I’ll rather focus on my child.” I said to myself and that I did. I paid more attention to my beautiful baby girl and resolved to ignore all of Olufemi’s cheating. It was painful though, really painful as this was not the marital bliss I dreamt and wished for.

I remembered times I would cry myself to sleep. I remembered times I would pray and fast wishing that Olufemi would change for the better but it looked like the more I prayed, the worse he became. Nevertheless I never gave up on prayers.

That is not to say that there were no times Olufemi would come home and showered me with love and we would have the magical intimacy but the bad times most times outweighed the good. There were times I wished God would just hold on to the good days and never let it end.

The chance for career development came at work and I travelled out of the state for a training program sponsored by my organisation and was away for three weeks. I wished those three weeks would never end, because I was far away from the headaches, heartaches, shame and verbal assaults Olufemi would throw at me on a weekly basis.

The training program ended and I came home on this fateful day to one of the worst days of my life. I saw my lawfully wedded husband in bed with Ada!

“Ada? Why? Why Ada?”

Ada was a confidant and a colleague at work, one of those people I opened up to when the frustrations at home were unbearable. So how could it be that the same Ada I confided in would end up with my husband? I was shattered and heartbroken. But how did they meet? Who spoke to whom first?

I didn’t know when I started shaking Ada who was stark naked. “How dare you betray my trust!”

Just then, a heavy hand landed on my cheek and another pushed me away from Ada whom I was shaking vigorously and before I knew it, Olufemi pounced on me and gave me the beating of my life.

It was as if the Devil was released from his cage and found a new abode in Olufemi.

I was helpless! Thank God my baby girl was with my mother. He pushed me out of the house (by then, Ada had left the house for fear of what I might do to her again). I silently entered my car in tears and drove myself to the hospital to get myself treated after which I branched to my mother’s place and narrated all that happened to her.

I stayed in my mother’s place for three days and Olufemi never showed up. My mother called him and he kept promising to show up but he didn’t.

I complained about the cheating and beating to my pastor and his wife and I was told to keep praying for him as only prayers would make him change. I was advised to move in back with him and I did as I was told. I also took the advice of praying for him as only prayers would make a man like him turn a new leaf.

I kept praying with the bitterness of heart for a man who would beat me and disgrace me by constantly cheating on me with my friends and neighbours.

We moved to a new apartment due to the change and he graduated to my close associates yet I kept praying, thinking it could be the work of the devil and I wasn’t going to allow the Devil have a say in my union.

I kept enduring the pain and kept wishing and praying that things will work out well even as I go in and out of hospital as a result of the beating. After each beating I received, he ended up apologising citing that my nagging attitude pushed him to it. So I stopped complaining about his bad ways and endured it all.

Not to mention the sexual diseases I got treated for,  yet I didn’t want to opt for a divorce. I had promised myself that once I get married, it would be for better, for worse.

I gave Olufemi a million naira to start business, perhaps this would get him busy and keep him away from drinking and bad company but he squandered it.

In addition to this, he collected five hundred thousand naira from me for a business he said would yield profit. I gave it out to him with the hope that if it turned out well, I wouldn’t have to be the only one fending for the house but all was a lie as the money and business were nowhere to be seen. Nevertheless, I kept giving to him just to make him feel like a man.

I kept my role as a virtuous woman and kept fasting and praying hoping that he would turn a new leaf one day.

Then this faithful day came, I almost died but for the intervention of neighbors. Olufemi got someone’s else pregnant and when I questioned him about it, he agreed that he was responsible for it. 

I was livid and started throwing all I could lay my hands on at him. He held my neck and almost strangled me.

His words “You should be happy I saved you from being unmarried. You are not happy that I was your saviour yet you have the audacity to come at me and question my activities. Who are you? Leave my house and get lost. So because you feel you earn more than I do, you feel you can talk to me anyhow? If you are not interested and feel heartbroken, Leave!”.

I was in tears and constantly kept shouting that he would regret it. He threw me out of his house that night and I went back to the only choice I had – my mother’s place.

My mother saw me and burst in tears. She knew something had happened again, the bruises on my face and neck proved her right.

“What happened again Kemi?” My mother asked.

“The man you gave me threw me out. I finally experienced the peace you wanted for me. If only you had given me that peace of mind and give me time to choose my own, perhaps I wouldn’t have fallen into his hand and would have waited patiently for my own God-given husband. This one I got married to is a beast…….” I cried uncontrollably.

Maybe I should have left my mother’s place and rented my own apartment, away from some relatives and probing aunts who does nothing but to remind me of my unmarried status?,  Maybe I would have found my man and not be with someone who felt he did me a favour by getting married to me. It’s hard. It’s really so hard writing this. So hard moving on. So hard nurturing my baby girl alone without any support from her father. Really so hard being in this shoe.

This isn’t how I planned or wished my life would turned out but this is how I found myself.