My Friend Is Going Through A Lot In Her Marriage, Unfortunately, I Cannot Help

By Cami Ezenwa

Of a truth, my friend is going through a lot in her marriage, but worse still is that I cannot be of help.

How painful can that really be? How harrowing is it that such an angel of a belle would be the one in such a nightmare, and I am unable to help

I am left again, wondering why life, with all its quantum of grace and men of goodwill, could permit one of its angels, unholy entanglement with evil..

An angel, in mold and character, that is what Chinyere is. How then did she land on the laps of a monster?

Or how do you describe such a belligerent fellow, who didn’t waste time, upon the coercive union in the name of marriage, began dealing with Chinyere, such that she now looks like a lactating dog.

You needed to have seen the blossoming ebony skin beauty before this time, to appreciate what it means to be pretty, and endowed with feminine grace. Chinyere’s level of enterprise all to supporting to her family knew no comparism.

Despite being relatively young, Chinyere was an ultimate marriage material, to wit a virgin as at the time.

What on earth blinded reasonable men from sighting her, that now gave leverage for her to be turned into a domestic horse and sex toy, the proof of which was two child births in two a half years.

What, with her luxuriating hair that usually got gathered behind and knotted by beads at the tips.

And some other times, parted in two from back, each part flowing from either side of her to the front.

I have also severally wondered whether I am not in the position to save the day for her, despite already being married myself.

My Friend Is Going Through A Lot In Her Marriage, Unfortunately, I Cannot Help

Chinyere’s only sin, as far as I can see, is that life had not dealt very generously with the family.

That had ensured limited exposure to life for the chocolatey gazelle.

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Her routine revolves around her home, an upcoming kindergarten school where her mother worked as cleaner, their modest church of very modest worshippers, and a hospital in Ajuwon, an Ogun State outskirt, where she was auxiliary nurse.

That was where she met Andrew. He had come there seeking urgent treatment for the injuries he sustained from a bike accident one evening, and Chinyere had been the nurse on duty.

By the time the injury was gone, another thing had developed, foisted in a most deceptive manner.

Naive Chinyere, who had never been in a relationship before, never seen genuine love ever, had been deceived by Andrew’s fables. He feigned he loved her, owned an electronics shop on Alagbole road, and was working seriously to travelling for Dubai.

It was Chinyere’s mum herself who updated me with these, unfortunately after the whole damage had been done.

File photo: used for illustration purpose only

Whole damage, because as I write, she is third-child pregnant, living in squalor, home, self and children unkempt, and yet faced with domestic violence.

But she has been putting up with all, saying there was nothing else to do, than to try and bring up their children.

She had been tricked by the fake love lines from Andrew, his occasional parcel of snacks from Alagbole-Akute eateries delivered straight to Chinyere at work, and a few other worthless things but which got magnified in the girl’s impressionable heart.

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My Friend Is Going Through A Lot In Her Marriage, Unfortunately, I Cannot Help

Before the family knew it, 20 year Chinyere, was pregnant. The mother was in distress, so was everyone in the family. She ran from pillar to post, angry at herself that she didn’t supervise enough and upset with for letting down her guard. She was utterly confused how to handle the faith side of the dilemma being member of a deliverance ministry, and undertook fast after fast, embarked on chain prayer after chain prayer, wishing for the pregnancy to turn a hoax, or just disappear by itself; it never happened.

She had lost a major fight of faith and real proof of motherhood.

I could not but break down too, the day she cried to me, seeing that I had failed in my duties to her first, to the family, and even to society.

The Chinyere was technically handed to me to nurture, not the kind of nurturing that would require her coming to stay with me.

The family, moreso the mother, had always been impressed by the perspective to life associated with exposure to higher education, and did all her power to get Chinyere to imbibe them closing relating with me. She thus technically “handed over” Chinyere for the right kind of nurturing that she felt would possibly see her sojourn in the ivory tower.

The only slack, was when the father, pressured by financial needs, felt she should go get some kind of paid employment “in the interim”.

That changed everything. Aside that Chinyere lost track of occasional tutorials, and sensitisations propping her for university education, she met new set of acquaintances, for whom further education was not a priority. Added to this was a N15, 000 per month salary that the hospital, once she got employed there, began to pay. And it was in the course of the hospital duties that Andrew happened by.

It was a very emotional setting recently sitting with her in a restaurant.

My Friend Is Going Through A Lot In Her Marriage, Unfortunately, I Cannot Help

It was difficult to believe she was the one: almost flesh-bare, lacking in skin nurture, hairs unkempt despite outward effort to make it see okay. I tried to see the charming smile; it was gone, and instead, both sides of her chin had receded, and even her palms seemed to have been subjected to laundry bleach.

She could barely look at my face, but this time, it was more out of shame in what she had become.

“What is the matter?”, I asked for want of what else to say.

“Brother, I am going through a lot, and unfortunately, it is not something you can help me”, she declared, face still cast down

At that point, my heart broke. Tears quickly formed in my eyes, and as much as I tried to keep it in place, it began to glide down.

Then she burst out, sobbing, keeping her head down on the table separating us.

For a long time, we provided good spectacle for the eatery attendants, although they may have misunderstood the reason for our collective breakdown.

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Truly, my friend was going through a lot in her marriage, but unfortunately, I cannot be of help.

Aside the sanctity of the union, what do we want to do with three children. How possible is it to get children start life afresh; how?

As much as I had made up my mind to provide financial and emotional support to the best of my ability, to what extent can that heal the wounds and reverse the excesses that this life has already experienced? Who can really proffer a sound advice of how to handle a young woman in this kind of situation?