‘I will not be with a man who will not marry me along with my children.’
‘It is either he loves me and my children or there is no deal.’
How many times have you heard these statements from a single mum, or even something more threatening? Some single mums, they are daring and then also unwise. How does a man’s love or attraction to you become what you measure by the degree of his love for your children? How? Those are your children. They have a father. He could be dead or a living dead but that does not erase the fact that they bear somebody’s surname, a name you, madam, probably still bear and carry on your oldest bank accounts. Whether the man, your children’s father, is a deadbeat or a good man, he is their father forever. His fate and space in those children’s lives will be determined by time and posterity.
You cannot force the new man in your life to become a father by fire and by force. If that is your mantra, you have issues, deep-seated issues with your self-respect. God blessed you with those children. If your union with their father did not work or death snatched him prematurely, those kids should not become commodities you put on your head to hawk from one man to the other until you find one who will ‘marry you along with your children.’ Don’t be like that. It is smelly, off-putting. You are their mother. They are your gifts. God saw your new boyfriend before he gave those children to you and your departed husband. Take care of them. Focus on your life. Don’t treat those children like liabilities that you need to share with other shareholders. They are yours, the centre and essence of your being. Or have you not met widows and divorcees who do not have biological children? Their marriages ended, years they invested, the emotions they expended, the pain they bore ended with them standing alone, starting afresh. Still, many of them have great testimonies even after the long dark days, the night gave way to bright new days.
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Food For The gods, By Funke Egbemode
So bloody what if you were a sit-at-home wife and mother and now the marriage has broken down or he passed on too soon? It is a painful lonely season. Your children are still not luggage to be shared or advertised. Mourn, cry for as long as you need to and then wipe your eyes. I do not subscribe to the immediate crying spree, though. Widows need to stay clear-eyed, clear-headed in the first few days of bereavement because of the physical and spiritual vultures. It is hard to rein in the tears but widows must reach deep inside their well of strength and summon courage, push down the pain and do the hard stuff, make tough decisions and protect their future and the children’s. The vultures are focused and fiery and ruthless. They are counting on the widow’s pain and weakness. We will deal with this in detail soon, considering certain happenings in Oyo and Imo states.
Back to today’s heart of the matter.
Now that you are alone and have become a breadwinner, go and win bread. Men your age are winning bread. Your classmates and peers who are men have wives and children and in-laws they are fending for. The difference between you and them is your curvy body and the fact that they have living partners. Or don’t you see men on the same salary level with you paying school fees? You can do it. Do not turn yourself into a chattel. Just get up and do something.
Never forget that when that man first saw you, all he saw was a beautiful woman with a ‘banging body’. He rolled his tongue around his lips, summoned courage to speak his mind. Maybe it was on the third date or even later that you finally told him you have two children. He was not discouraged. He kept showing affection, never threw it in your face that you were after two. He introduced you to his friends and even gave you a key to his apartment. What else do you expect him to do to show he truly cares in just three months? But here you are talking nonsense.
‘He has not asked me once how much I’m paying as school fees.’
‘I told him I was going to buy new clothes for my children but he pretended like he didn’t hear me.’
‘He does not even think he should give me a house-keeping allowance, knowing that I have two children to feed.’
‘I bet when my rent expires, he’s going to pretend he does not know he should pay.’
Aunty, you are not okay. You are missing the point because you need to figure out first what you want from a man, now that you have decided to move on.
Let me tell you this for free: many, if not most, men find successful women more attractive than the ones they have to buy sanitary towels for. That is why working women, business women who can pick their own bills can change the men in their lives when they want. They are not stuck. They are not desperate. They are too busy to notice petty stuff. The other day, I had lunch with a successful single mum and asked after ‘her Otunba’ and her reply first stunned me before we both started laughing so hard the people on the other tables turned to look at us.
‘Which Otunba?’
‘Your handsome Otunba now.’
‘That one? He won’t give me his name. He won’t give me his time but he wants to mark territory. I told him I wanted to go for a short vacation and rest before I start that new big project I got in Calabar and he told me I could not go because going on vacation alone meant I was going to meet another man. Okay, come with me. He said he was busy and what would he tell his wife? I just smiled and knew I was on my own.’
That is a single mum with a life, one with a choice.
Get up and go out. Where will the real men see you anyway if you’re not up and about? You think owambe parties every weekend will do it? Every woman with full frontal endowment and rolling backside can dance. If you are picked up at a party or a nightclub, chances are the guy won’t treat you right.
A single mother who sees the man in her life as a crutch or ATM will accept being strung along. She will accept dirty conditions from a ‘paying Otunba.’ She will think without Otunba, she will not be able to make the next school fees or rent. She will give up her remaining youth for a man who will not give her his name (that is, marry her) or give her attention because ‘Chief Mrs’ must not know at home. She will one day wake up and Otunba will be gone, either the way of all mortals or the way of all philanderers, to another woman. That is when we will all now start seeing deep quotes on her status and weepy quotes on her social media page.
*Egbemode ([email protected])
