The first thing I noticed was her hair. She had gone almost completely gray. Her skirt suit hung on her, shapeless. She wore no make-up. She had no colour. But I recognised her all the same. Nike, my younger friend, once lovely, shapely and lively, made her way into the airport lounge. I called her name, tentatively and she brightened momentarily and then we hugged and hugged.
“What’s happened to you? You are not ill? Please tell me you are fine. “I asked as bad pictures of AIDS and cancer chased through my frightened mind.
My friend smiled. “I’m fine. girl. Don’t look so woe-be-gone now.”
“Well, I am one clear year older than you and right now you look five clear years older than me.”
“It’s a long story, Funke, a very long story.”
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I grabbed my small briefcase and dragged Nike into the VIP lounge so we could have some privacy. Fortunately we were on the same flight which had just announced a 45-minute delay for the arrival of its aircraft. Holding back tears bravely, Nike told her long story.
Bayo, Nike’s husband of 15 years, had suddenly fallen in love with another woman, an older one at that, and abandoned my friend and their two children. Bayo’s ‘new wife’ is a rich, quite rich 52-year-old businesswoman from Delta state. She lives somewhere in Maitama in Abuja and does her oil and gas business in the South-South states. She is very influential and even more determined to have Bayo for keeps. Like a man under a spell, Bayo moved in with her two years ago and has not looked back.
Nike ran from pillar to post trying to retrieve her husband. She prayed. She fasted. She went from one prayer house to another.
Prophets and prophetesses assured her Bayo would return. They assured her that the bond between Bayo and Helen (that’s her name o) would be broken. But as we waited for that flight, the bond was still there. Helen had her claws firmly in place and Nike’s sorrows were increasing.
On her salary as a nurse, she was paying the rent, school fees for the children who are in secondary school, playing dad and mum and so on. The burden was killing her. Her self-esteem was at the lowest ebb. She was just totally confused.
Very pathetic story. Very familiar? You bet.
Many women are going through Nike’s kind of problem. Husband suddenly relocates abroad or into another woman’s life, under a spell, juju or financial reasons. Wife becomes the breadwinner, pained and confused. She loses weight, loses interest in life and simply starts dissolving like a piece of alum dropped in water. Life becomes unbearable. How does she explain this new arrangement to the children, her siblings, parents, church members, friends and colleagues? Is a woman in Nike’s shoes single. married, separated or a widow?
Plenty of questions but as far as I am concerned, those are not questions anybody needs to answer at once. All a woman whose husband is hibernating in another home needs to do is live, stay alive, stay healthy and make the best of a bad situation. The Yoruba say it is what has not arrived that you cannot make room for. You must accept what you cannot change if you must stay sane. Dwelling on your pains and grieving does not solve the problem. Of course, an abandoned wife has a right to be unhappy. She should cry. She is free to make efforts, plenty of efforts to ‘retrieve’ her man. But she has a duty to stay alive, sane and useful to herself and the children the deceased left behind. Yes, a man who leaves his wife and children to work under another woman is dead all right, even if it’s ‘temporary’ death. Okay, if he is not dead, why is his wife sleeping alone and picking the bills he ought to be paying? If he is not the ‘deceased’, why are you grieving?
That’s hard, ehn? Well only a hard woman can weather the storm my friend found herself in. Until an abandoned wife comes to terms with her loss, sees the runaway husband as out of the picture, until he resurrects, he is dead. He is off the scene. He is, for the time being, not part of that family. All the children have of him is his name and then memories. Thinking that every knock on the door would usher him in would only worsen your pains. For now, he is gone. He will return when he is sated and satiated. He will return when the spell is broken and the hellish claws release him.
A wife who finds herself in these shoes can wait all right, but not with baited breath. Since he is determined to return when he wants, you must also be prepared to receive him. But in-between his departure and (hopeful) arrival, you need to get a life, live it to the fullest. Dust up your certificates, get a couple more degrees, apply for a new and better job. Focus on your happiness and stay strong for those children.
A wardrobe change is a must, why should you be an object of pity when he is living it up in America or Ireland or partying all over the place with his new ‘wife’? Looking good is still good business. You must look in the mirror and give yourself a thumbs-up. And trust me, words will get to him that the abandoned rock is now a cornerstone.
Look on the bright side all the time. For instance, isn’t this the time to get close to your God? There’s now nobody to ask you if you were Mary, mother of Jesus, every time you want to go to Bible study. There is nobody to ask you if you were the one who killed Jesus anytime you decide to fast. There is nobody to ‘sexually harass’ you when you get up at night to pray in your sexy negligee. So go on, get in God’s presence and enjoy receiving daily from Him.
Now, why do I think runaway husbands would return? There is precedence. It is happening all the time Seven out of ten shameless husbands who abandon their wives always return. Who says yours won’t be one of the seven? You see why you cannot dissolve like alum? He is on leave of absence even if he did not transmit any letter. Enjoy the vacation. If you worry yourself sick, he may meet you in a wheelchair and then why should he return to a drooling wife he has to carry into bed and ‘arrange’ on the toilet seat?
Like my sister-in-law counselled Nike later that day in a Chinese restaurant in Ikeja, when he returns, the two of you can apologise to each other. I concur too.
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