The Story Of My Wife....and Marital Life...

Some 24 odd years ago, I accepted a pregnancy as a miserable house officer visibly lacking in means to sustain a family.... No house.... Scant personal effects....

My family backgrounds were such that nine months into housemanship, I was "still" squatting in the medical students' hostel. It was under these harrowing circumstances that my girlfriend announced her pregnancy!

I was not ensnared by "her" beauty, higher education, money, family name, fame, placcid temperament or kindness....as she possessed none! I only saw the need to live up to my responsibility... accepted an unplanned pregnancy...and married her!

When my wife was schooling, I nursed my daughter as a toddler....nappies and feaces et al....as I refused to ignore wify's soaked underwear when washing up soiled nappies....as she grappled with ATS. I shopped for groceries, cooked and warmed meals, sterilized baby cutlery....burning stews as I tried to attend to patients all at once!...my employers accusing me of divided attention as a resident doctor!

The smell of burning stews and soups....and the attendant monetary losses compelled my nurses to offer to look after my meals on fire whenever I was summoned to see patients while cooking.

This state of affairs continued for about two decades long into the days when the kids had started schooling and when I became self-employed!

You would think a responsible woman would have made arrangements for say, a househelp to tide over her domestic duties before embarking on full time studies....and that the timing and the very essence of such studies would be discussed with her husband....

No! Not Ronke Afolabi!
She had a weird way of taking solo decisions in ways even most men wouldn't! She brought a dummy of a cousin to "help out" when she was just about finishing her degree!

So, my nurses also assisted in shopping for my groceries, cooked and warmed my meals, did my dishes, washed my dresses plus those of the kids, bathed the kids in the mornings, dressed them up for school, took them to the road to await their school bus, went to fetch them from the bus as they returned from school, helped them with their homework, played with them, carried plates to purchase meals from food vendors whenever we ran short of supplies, attended their PTA meetings, their prize-giving days!

All these in addition to the nurses' extended duties of cleaning, fetching water for the hospital, doing hospital laundry, making hospital purchases... Remember I was a young resident doctor in solo practice....called out for duty at the shortest notice...even at odd hours!

Then, she moved on to law...soon after the second kid came....as I again grappled with toddler-care and house chores! She habitually invaded my clinic to make a scene and slap nurses around.

Even after her call to the bar, she was never there for us...ever restating that I "spoilt her life" by her first pregnancy.

I suppose we all suffered a burn-out because of her absence....as I was always on edge....and the hospital had a high turn-over of staff....especially nurses!

She enrolled the kids in expensive schools to emasculate me financially....and promised to soil my professional reputation....as she vowed to ruin my life!

She later said I had no money...ignoring whatever input she might have had in my penury....

She left....later kidnapped the kids. Despite maintaining contact, I only learnt of my daughter's call to the Nigerian bar on AIT!

I thought I had forgotten about all her mess and finally moved on with my life until the AIT incident!

How much shock can a man bear!
Just chancing upon such ceremony on national TV after all the needless disruption this cursed woman had brought to bear on my life?

So, that would be my gain after all this?!
I am further perplexed by my belated realisation that the pregnancy I accepted on sentiment then was unlikely to be a honest mistake by the woman I married!

Every evidence points to the fact that that woman planned to get pregnant to "trap" me in the hope that I possessed some lofty prospects she could tap into!

Even the house she rented at Itamaga was most likely gotten long before she stormed out on the night she did. It was in this house she was going to spend weekends and weeks on the pretext that she had functions to attend or had week-long programmes in church! She even led the kids to tell similar lies to me, their father!

In summary, she was ever so eager to share in my fortunes (even bracing up to key into presumed future fortunes!).

She was unwilling to share in my misfortunes.
She was however too ready to share her misfortunes with me (e.g. concern for her parents' health and commisseration with her at their death!) while scheming me out of her fortunes!

I am surely adjusting to all this....in the most unexpected manner!

My mindset is that of a man who either was unable to father any kid in his lifetime....or whose entire family was wiped out by a natural disaster....sparing only him!

As for the monetary losses, I put that down to comparable losses to accidents, robbers and fraudsters...

And the time losses, that cannot be recovered....
The feeling of foolishness for so easily succumbing to sentiments rather than a cold assessment of the situation....to marry her!

I just hope I can feel less foolish again....
And that is why I smiled when the agony of her parents' illnesses and death compelled her to call for my help and support....5 good years after she had left! The parents that would rather encourage her to persist in her odd ways rather than check her excesses? She expected me to tread the path of sentiment again! She must have such a low opinion of me.....thinking I am forever a "maga" for her antics!

I hold her parents responsible for destroying my marriage....for I believe that however bad a woman may be, the respect and fear of righteous and corrective parents should dampen and rein in her excesses!

My pastor and his wife were no better....always urging her on in these weird ways....rather than correct her!

With her, reconciliation is out of the question!
This is avoidance unto death!
And beyond!
If she relies on future pressures from friends and family in using the pleas, grovellings, and blackmail of one day to undo the sustained wrong of decades, she is dealing with the wrong person.....