As a girl, I saw my mum cry every day in her marriage. I don’t know exactly what my dad did to make her sad. All that I knew was that he was an amazing father to both my brother and me. So while I loved him as his daughter, I did not find any admirable traits in him as my mother’s husband. Because of this, I never desired marriage. Instead of viewing marriage as an institution of love, I started to view it as a place of torture for women. It didn’t help matters that on my dad’s sick bed, he admitted to being a bad husband. He even asked me to help him apologize to my mother for all the years he didn’t treat her well.
We both apologized to my mother but the harm had already been done. Two years after his death, my mother died of a heart attack. My younger brother and I were orphaned in a span of two years, and it was a horrible experience. Somehow, we sailed through life and made something out of ourselves. However, the trauma of my dad’s ill-treatment of my mother stayed with me. It was so bad that whenever a man proposed to marry me, I would get scared. I remember when I first met Joojo after tertiary school. Right in the early stages of our friendship, he told me, “I am not interested in being your boyfriend. I want to be your husband. Please say yes.”
Under normal circumstances, the proposal should have excited me because of how much I liked him, but it rather made me afraid. I kept wondering what I would do if things went bad in the marriage. However, Joojo did not get put off by my fears. He patiently goaded me toward marriage plans. Just within six months of meeting him, we were traditionally married. Before that, we had undergone our premarital lab investigations and so we had shuperu about three times before the marriage ceremony was held. After the marriage, our counsellor told us, “I know that you are traditionally married, but in the eyes of God you are still not married. So abstain from any acts of intimacy until the church wedding comes off the next two months.”
It was a disappointing thing to hear but we listened, and we abstained. Now after marriage, my husband wouldn’t touch me unless I initiate things. In 2019 for instance, we had shuperu only three times and then I got pregnant in June. After I told him about the pregnancy, he didn’t touch me at all. I was always horny, so I did everything possible to get this man to touch me but he always said, “No, I don’t want to hurt the baby.” I couldn’t have forced him so I endured the lack of intimacy until I had the baby in March 2020. After my body recovered from childbirth, I tried to initiate shuperu with this man but he pushed me away and said, “The baby is too young for us to be doing this.” I was hurt by his rejection but I didn’t give up. I tried to initiate something another time, but he still pushed me away. This behaviour of his continued throughout 2020.
In 2021, on the first baby’s one-year birthday, Joojo got drunk and we had sex. Later, I found out that I was pregnant again. Honestly speaking, I wanted to get rid of the pregnancy. This was because I had already started thinking of leaving the marriage. I didn’t want to be like my mother and endure a marriage that lacked intimacy, love, and friendship. My sister-in-law and I are very close, so I told her about the problems in our marriage and my intention to undo the pregnancy. She talked me out of that intention and encouraged me to hang in there. She also constantly counselled Joojo to stop neglecting me, but he didn’t listen to her advice. During this pregnancy too, he didn’t touch me until I gave birth in November last year. From that time till now, he still hasn’t changed. It’s not that I’m not beautiful or that I am dirty. I have even been referred to as a clean freak, on a few occasions. I am also thick, and curvy. I have all that a woman needs to physically entice a man, in the right proportions. So I don’t understand why this man is starving me.
I am tired of complaining about it. The only quarrel we have in our marriage is about this same issue. I really want to leave this marriage because, at this point, I don’t know what else to do. I have confided in our mutual counsellor and he also counselled him but he still hasn’t changed. I mean, it’s not as if we live apart. We live under the same roof, yet he lives his life as though our marriage is all about our kids. I’ve changed my wardrobe. I’ve even cut my hair so I would look edgy and sexy but he turns a blind eye to all of it. All I want from him is a little affection and intimacy but he is acting as if I am asking for the impossible.
I don’t want to cheat on him. I also don’t want to waste my life here waiting for when he’ll come around and make me feel like a woman. In our three years of marriage, we have had shuperu only four times. I had all my kids through C.S. so nothing has changed down there. At this point, I’m almost like a virgin. So what’s his problem? My mental health is deteriorating because I feel unwanted. I don’t want to be unhappy, for the sake of my kids. I don’t want them to grow up and be afraid of marriage just like I did. It seems Joojo needs a maid, a nanny, and a surrogate, instead of a wife.
