CHRONICLES OF A MARRIED MAN – 50

Marriage is not a rehabilitation program......





 

 

In an earlier topic, I talked about a junior colleague that wanted to get married but wasn’t ready at that time. Read about it here. By December he had done all the planning and preparation, got a house and furnished it but the lady said she was no longer interested and broke up with him. 

 The lady was his high school sweetheart and they had built the relationship over the years, even throughout their university days. Everyone knew about them, right from our office to his family.

He was heartbroken .

We were all waiting for her to finish her national service while they were planning marriage when the news of the breakup broke out. Friends and family tried talking to her to know what the issues were and what actually happened and to appeal to her about having a change of mind. She just said she was done.


The affair was a “no-sex” relationship and the guy had been taking care of her schooling and upkeep three years prior to that time. She was always coming to his family house to play the role of “our wife”. Looking at them at that time, it was a perfect relationship and they looked meant for each other. 

What went wrong?


While everyone was castigating the lady for the treatment she gave to the guy.  My wife and I saw the issue from a different perspective. Talk about kindred spirit. We felt that the guy had some fundamental flaws which was why the lady left him. I think this happens to lots of young people intending to get married these days. Such people think that just by having a good character and being religious makes you a good marriage material.

This is basically the reason why some so called “good men” marry bitches and the also the well-behaved women are not getting married but the “bad” ones are.


In his own case, he is a very indecisive person and most times a realistic pessimist. He wants to seek all the opinions of everybody before taking a decision thereby wasting lots of time. He also had the need to tell the lady how things actually are in the guise of being realistic. 

She wanted an elaborate wedding and believed it could happen. He, on the other hand, was always complaining about not having enough money. Bottom-line, the lady had to quit because she didn’t want to spend the rest of her life with someone who will always be second-guessing himself. She didn’t feel secure.

It’s been almost one year since that incident happened. Whenever I ask him “how far” concerning his getting married, his response has always been “Oga, I haven’t seen a woman”. But no day passes without him posting a picture of at least one woman on his WhatsApp status, wishing them one thing or the other. But for baba to just pick one is a problem.

Often times, we have seen such people who are too selective of partners, ending up marrying people way below their expectations. They spend so much time and efforts looking for the right person for them when they are not even the right person for such people. 

Secondly when they eventually meet such people, they can’t handle them. It’s an irony.

I once had a young lady for a neighbor who felt she was the next best thing after shawarma. After much “selecting”, she ended up as a baby mama. She had such a huge personality and an over bloated ego that kept scaring men away from her because she was beautiful and had a good paying job.

 No one met her specs, until one sharp married man got under her skin. Before you know it, boom! Baby mama things.

I will not encourage anyone to “marry-down” or end up with someone who doesn’t meet up with their expectations or bring out the best life in them. However, people need to have balanced and realistic expectations when it comes to marriage. When it comes to picking a life partner, you will never get all you need in one particular person. Even if you do, can you handle them?

Lots of randy men today go about believing that they are God’s gift to women. They believe they are too much for one woman. I used to have this mentality when I was much younger. This made it way more difficult when it was time to pick a wife. By then, the cocktail of character I was looking for was found in three women. 

This is the predicament of many young men and women today.

First, rather than looking for the right person or the best partner for you, focus on being a better person or the best version of yourself. Most times in your quest for becoming a better person, the right sets of people will be attracted to you. If you want a rich man, then learn about the ways of the rich, if you need a beautiful woman, know that it takes money to maintain beauty, go and make money.

When certain types of people keep coming to your life. Know that there is something about you that is attracting them to you. A young woman once complained to me “Married men are the ones always asking me out”. I told her to check herself.


Secondly, lots of people have an overestimated sense of self-worth and entitlement. Just because you now have a job that pays you in six figures hasn’t change the fact about your background. Your beauty or virginity is not a ticket to a happy marriage neither does the fact that you have a master degree a substitute for good manners.

No matter how “packaged” you think you are as a person, that will never make you have two husbands at a time. People need to learn to be humble and realistic on how they see themselves. What you may consider is wealth may be coins for another, your beauty at the end of the day won’t cook rice. The same goes for that your much touted oil and gas job, it can’t give a women orgasm. Be humble.


Lastly, one good behavior does not compensate for a bad one. That you can cook and are homely doesn’t mean you have to be dirty, neither will your virginity be an excuse to be frigid or a timid wife, being beautiful and sociable doesn’t mean you have to be uncouth. It’s a given that you will never be a prefect person but working to become a better person and acknowledging your weakness will always endear people to you.

Always be open to your partners about your flaws and seek help when required. I often see people try to guilt-trip their partners into maintaining unhealthy relationships and marriages because of how “good” they think they are.

Marriage is not a rehabilitation program; it never was and will never be


Till next time!

Ciao!

*Hmmmmm....