Uru Eke: Love… Despite All the Scary Stories You Hear About Marriage

I was inspired to write this piece after reading a few horror stories from a certain page on Instagram. Some of the stories beggar belief, and I don’t know if they are fact or fiction, nevertheless they are all very intriguing and entertaining.

Majority of the stories revolve around marriages and relationships and I couldn’t help but notice a lot of women writing in to complain about their husbands or boyfriends. One story that tugged at me particularly was a girl who wrote in to say she would never get married, but would simply find a man to have her children with and be done, because of what she sees her dad put her mother through.
She went further to say her mother is only 45 years old and both parents haven’t had sex in 7 years, but her father has slept with 5 of her sister’s friends at university.

On bad days I share her sentiments, as I have felt this way myself. This is because I really don’t know if there are any decent, wholesome honourable men left. Having said that, I remember a story my mom told me about a woman in our village who had two husbands in different villages and children for both men but neither man knew about the other. After many years of keeping this secret the bubble eventually burst and both men found out. I argued with my mom for quite a while about this because I found it difficult to understand how she was able to have children for each partner. My mom’s response was “ you think men can keep secrets, wait till a woman has one to keep”

In 2013 Ben Affleck got a lot of flack after his infamous acceptance speech, in which he thanked Jennifer Garner (his then wife) for the “work” that they put into their marriage. This of course brought on a lot of backlash and has been revisited due to their divorce as we all know now that Ben was cheating with the nanny. I saw pictures of the nanny, she’s a pretty little thing and I wonder why they didn’t just go for someone plain and ordinary. Scientists say that relationships are important for our well being, as their initiation is often associated with happiness, elation, love and joy. The benefits of being in a relationship, such as those mentioned may explain why people experience strong negative emotions when they feel as if their relationships may be compromised.

One day I went to a popular Nigerian tailor’s store in London and I over heard her telling a friend of hers a story that left me depressed for the rest of my day. A friend of hers had met someone they all believed to be a nice gentleman; they dated for a while then got engaged to be married. She had a fifteen-year-old daughter in boarding school in Nigeria whom she had introduced to this chap and as she was based in London and he in Nigeria, she asked him to visit the child now and again. He assured her he would, as the child had now become his since they were getting married. This is where it gets interesting, ofcourse this man visited the girl at school; he didn’t just visit but took presents and befriended the child. Soon he began to take her on weekends away from boarding school and began an illicit relationship with her and got her pregnant. Unfortunately for him, the young girl didn’t know she was pregnant, maybe if she did she would have told him and he would have had her terminate it. Her mother made a trip to Nigeria and visited her daughter and noticed the change, she almost beat the truth out of the young girl before she opened up and told her mother who was responsible. Well I hear the poor woman wound up in a psychiatric ward at the end of it all.

I also know of someone who is going through a serious ordeal with his now estranged wife because while he was with her he had three children with his side-piece. Based on the betrayal, the wife is bent on putting him through hell on earth by almost having him deported and so far she’s doing a good job from what I can see. There are several more stories to tell and I could go on but I really don’t want to bore you all.

Despite the doom and gloom in some of these marriages/relationships, I’m a glass half full kind of girl and a hopeless romantic at heart and I still believe that true, faithful, fulfilling coupling still exists. Having said that I still harbor the fear of opening my heart up incase I let someone in who isn’t deserving. Bob Marley said “The biggest coward is a man who awakens a woman’s love with no intention of loving her” and very apt this statement is. But how about the women who go into relationships/marriages with an agenda, game plan or a certain level of insincerity because let’s be honest the women cannot be left out of the equation when it comes to the demise of relationships too?

Is getting married worth it these days anymore? Because I don’t have enough fingers and toes to count how many couples I know who have separated, divorced or living as strangers in the same house. Some I know and saw the beautiful pre-wedding photos and talk of the town weddings and now cant stand each other. I see this and I’m thinking, “what happened and how did they get there?”

Without a shadow of a doubt love is an absolutely beautiful thing and it is every girls desire to have their dream wedding with all the bells and whistles. Some people go out of their way to borrow money to make the day live up to all their expectations and more. But how about when all of this is done and the reality of the union sets in. Life happens and hits you for six, is the memory of the lavish ceremony enough to keep the two people together. I want to see more positive stories about people in love and relationships that have tested time and overcome obstacles. Old fashioned romance and stories of gentleman who have gone out of their comfort zones to woo the loves of their lives and continue on that path to keep her.

Recently I watched the video of the couple that got married and as the bride walked down the isle the groom was crying his eyes out and could barely stand straight. One of his groomsmen had to hold him up and kept encouraging him with words such as “stand up, look at her”, “ this is your moment”. It was a very moving and emotional clip and it reassured me that true love still does very much exist and I hope the love I saw in that video will help them through whatever life throws at them.

After hearing and reading a lot of these stories I’m scared out of my head about the institution of marriage and I really don’t know what to make of it anymore. But being the Positive Polly that I am, I don’t want to let the negatives turn me away from believing that there are still blissful, healthy, loving and long lasting marriages out there.

Photo Credit: bibyonce