One of my readers who commented on my last post asked me a question-who are you? and seriously i dont know and it kind of get to me and iam asking myself that same question and i seem not to know the answer.How do i begin to define myself:Growing up in the family of four girls and two boys wasnt fun due to family interferance but thank God,our daddy is one of those men who dont take any nonsense from anybody when it comes to his immediate family and even we children,if he sense we are behaving somehow to his wife,he will quickly called us to order and that formed part of my stand on how a family should be.My father relations just resent my mother for populating their son/brother house with girls and since then,i made up my mind to be somebody.I remember my undegraduate days when the boys in my class were always taunting me with their words-why are you giving yourself this stress and what are you trying to proof,you are a girl and whether you flogged us in class or not,all those your brain will evaporate when you face the real challenges of life as a woman and they always say the only achievement for a woman is getting a husband and having kids and those days,i used to argued with them but alas they were right-in Africa,the best a woman can become is a wife and mother and any other thing is secondary.By the time i finished service and got a job in a bank,the next sermon i heard was how its better to get settle on time so that you can have your kids early and you can later face your career squarely and if you want to go further in your education,atleast you will be doing that in your husband house and nobody ever made me realise that life is not as easy as that.I entered the institution with a lot of zeal and love,i wanted to be the best woman any man would be proud of and in the process never set a boundary,i became a footmat to everybody.After devoting almost fifteen years of my life to raising kids and making my husband happy,i wanted more from life than just that.So,defining who iam might not be so easy as iam just starting to rediscover myself.

I have been feeling so low for about a week now and the zeal to write anything was not there.I got a good offer from one of this foreign affiliated bank,to manage their Apapa branch but just not getting the right support from my hussy.I have been with my present bank for fourteen years and not getting much challenges again and the promotion is very slow which i discussed with him but he will always say if you leave the place,just know you will come and sit at home and make do with whatever i can provide but i know where the shoes pitches and that option does not go down well with me for many reasons.Iam the first born of my parent and have siblings who are still in higher institution which one way or the other i have to assist though not mandatory and dont forget we women bankers spoil our husband,we do too many things which they are suppose to be responsible for,with the mind that we are one and they have taken it for granted and you can imagine what will happen if you suddenly leave your job without a plan for something else,na stress and shouting.My major problem has to do with kids and how he can make it easier for me to cope with the Apapa traffic and still be at peace with myself that the kids are okay.I currently run a very tight schedule which look cracy to even my family and friends at my own expense but can not just cope with it again if iam to work in Apapa though the man is use to me doing them but iam saying it in a subtle way that i need help and he is just adarmant.I live somewhere in Ikeja and my kids schools are within that vicinity so i dropped the older ones in school and the younger ones in my parent place for them to assist with their movement and drive myself to V/i and picked them from their place in the evening no matter how late as oga does not want his kids sleeping outside his house and he does not want maid around him and i can not get a driver and the stress is so much but bcos i want to keep working,i go through this routine every working day and iam getting older,my body is complaining of the abuse and now that iam begging for his suport,he says its my business how i run the home as he marry for two reasons-for the wife to take care of his kids and run his home-imagine my life,i feel so empty and worthless.My parent send me to school to be able to be somebody of my own and be useful to the society but bcos iam a woman who have to marry and be somebody property,i do not have a say and always put in a situation where i have to make a choice and the choice of which can either make me or mar me.Iam really at crossroad and helpless,should i forgo my career like that or what do i do?

My schedule in the office has been so hectic that by the time i get home,i just want to cook and sleep for awhile before my hussy get back as he is omo oloru and to even put food for mouth na problem.My colleague was in the office on monday and looked better than the last time i saw her.Everbody in the office was so worried about her and gave her all kind of advice,we later contributed money for her to assist her in our little way as all her things were burnt and have to start all over again.She said her husband told her his people will not stay with them again as he intend looking for a place for them and get them a maid and that if she make any attempt to plead with them,he will send her away with them as they have cause too much havoc in his private life!she said her own people reported the case at the police station but could not get them arrested as nobody seem to know where they are and even if she knows,she doesnt think she want them arrested but to warn them not to try that joke with her again.She said her brother was so mad when he saw her that day and she was sure if he had met them at home,the situation would have been worst and he just asked her to follow him to his house since they had indirectly send her out with nothing of her own but she refused as she know the implication in their culture and i just wish her well and hope the man will proctect her as he is suppose to.

As we were about to close yesterday evening,her mother called her that she will have to travel with them to Benin today as the head of the husband clan or something as in the home video invited them for their friday meeting as the family have made a formal complain against their daughter and need to know why she asked her husband to drive away his people.Can you imagine that nonsense in this century?so all the things we watch in all these home video assually happened in real life.Imagine the scenerio of one big chief summoning people to his place and dictating what and what not-i beg our mother try o for staying put despite all the odds bcos their time was even worse than this.

This rivalry between inlaws and wife is getting messier every day and only if we realised that daughter today will become a wife one day and eventually be an inlaw to some people.One of the lady working under me had an urgent call from home yesterday from a neighbour that her house was burning and she quickly left the office to see what she can do.She called me one hour later to say everything in her room was burnt and to crown it all,her inlaws were beating her and she was really crying.I had to leave office for her place with another colleague to sympathise with her and calm her down but the situation i met there was bad.The inlaw had beaten her to the extent that her face was swollen and some part of her hair were pulled off and God,i was mad that some people could come into her house and do that to her.She later explained that the elder sister of her husband(divorcee)and his mother stays with them and that they were even in the house and did not do anything to put off the fire since it only affected her room and her last baby was downstair with the maid and when she got home,she was just asking her maid what happened and why she did not know that fire was burning until neighbour called her,when they just bounce on her and started beating her for damaging their brother/son property and that they ve always know that she is good for nothing and these are people from same Benin o!We did not even know what to say again and asked about her husband,she said the man just left the house and i asked her what he said and she said though he was upstairs when they were beating her but he later came downstairs and asked her to go upstairs and see how she can tidy the whole place and left with the sister and mother.I just advised her to take it easy as its one of those things women take to survive in a man's house and she should just go to hospital and move on as if nothing happened-wetin i for say before,make she fight people wey her hand no fit reach,Can you please explain the logic behind all that nonsense,in her house for that matter and this is a lady that has a good job,what if she is an housewife-what will they do to her?Our people with this my son and brother mentality,forgetting the lady left her own family to marry their brother/son and for christ sake,these people are already joined together as one and whatever they have belong to two of them and they should be left alone to make decisions on their own.

I started this blog with the intention of sharing my frustrations with the institution of marriage in the context of how culture and society makes us inferior to men,making them belief they could just treat us anyhow since the society favour them and how as a woman no matter how much you love your husband,this issues affect you one way or the other as nija men already have a mindset of how their wife should behave,talk,eat and run her life for her without any resistance but along the line,i shifted my focuss to include other women as we are all in the same boat and need to have a common voice to fight this injustice.I get mails from my readers wanting to know if what i write assually happened and i just laughed and wonder if the people asking are women living in Nija as these issues happen on daily basis here and my fellow nijawomen abroad cant understand why we go through all that to remain mrs somebody but they can not understand.

I just read beento.blogspot.com on my post of 21 february and various remarks on it and i dropped this comment based on one of the remark:

Vicki,are you married?if not,you dont know how this thing work in naija-you pack your baggages and see that another woman pack in immediately and your husband wouldnt miss you.Until we women join forces to fight this oppression,we aint achieve nothing.Do you know some girls are so desperate that they will lure your husband with everything including paying to sleep with them-its so bad and men are taking advantage of that.

I remembered an incidence that happened in our neighbourhood some years ago,an irresponsible husband impregnanted his wife half sister and refused to allowed the lady to abort,claiming since his wife womb cant carry pregnancy and her sister was kind enough to do it for her,she must take it in good faith and look for an amicable way to resolve the issue.All the family memeber begged the man except the mother of the girl who supported the man,he insisted on having the baby and the poor woman thought if she blakmailed the man by leaving,he would come begging but alas,it was an easy escape for the man.He never bothered to looked for her and after the lady put to bad,she went back and the man refused to take her,claiming he never sent her packing in the first place and since she decided to go on her own,he has no vacancy in his life for her and the marriage ended that way.

Wonder shall never seize to happen in this our men and women affair.My best friend called me yesterday evening that she is about to lose her marriage to a fellow married woman,what she told me somehow sounded unbelievable.She said her husband have been behaving strangely of late and she just assumed its one of his usual behaviour when he meet a new girlfriend and she knows that until the affairs fizzle out,he will just be misbehaving at home but it doesnt really bothered her again as she has made up her might that she is not going to give herself unnecessary stress and end up in Yaba but somehow the freedom got to his head this time around and he really misbehave full time.She got information that a certain married woman comes to Lagos every other weekend to meet her husband and she investigated and confimed that all those days her husband always claimed he had residential training were mearnt for her and infact they have been on it for two years before she got the hint and last friday,her husband came up with a story on how he and his M.D had to go to Ibadan for a major consultation with some people and he might not come back till following day and she just accepted his explanation as usual but the man didnt come home till Monday morning and without even calling to give one of his excuse.She thought over everything and decided to take action by calling the lady in her office that friday to warned her to stay clear of her husband and threatened to call her husband if she refused to leave her husband but the stupid lady was bold enough to tell her to do her worst and that if she satisfy her husband well,he would not be running after her(na calabar babe) and that she has no business with her and banged the phone.She said she was just getting over the insult when her phone rang and it was her husband and was just saying rubbish to her and query her audacity to have called the lady and he asked her to call her and beg her within 48 hours or pack her bag and baggages from his house.I do not know what to tell her till now than just to take it easy and lets wait till the expiration of 48hrs and see whether he meant business.My friends out there,what can she do or how do we resolve this issue without her husband sending her packing and this man is so strict with his wife that we wonder why is so possessive and jealous after twelve years of marriage but now i know he is afraid of law of karma

I got a comment on my last post and it got me thinking on why men always think they are doing us favours at all time.Our culture have made them belief its their world and we must accept whatever they do to us as our lord and master without complain,afterall they are our crown.How can men think because we have offloaded,our thing is not so tight again and we cant perform that magic in our department and will always prefer a fresher blood,are they saying that makes us less of a woman?somebody once told me that after four kids why iam i still thinking i can get my hussy undivided attention and of what use will i be to him than to concentrate on taking care of my kids-imagine that.They have concluded in their mind that we can not give maximum pleasure again and must look for fresh blood who can be useful for their ego trip and who says men too are that good again after certain age and not with the rat race they are doing now which has reduce their prowess as a man.Whether i be mother of four or ten,the fact remain that am a full flegde woman and can still perform wonders and its not only through that means one can give pleasure,if you guys decided to abandon us-na una go regret.Its really a funny world-when a man is caught with another woman,heaven will not fall but when a woman is just suspected,they begin to call on their god of whatever to strike her dead but if you abadoned your major,they pursue minor-na u sabi but no say one man abadoned property,na hin be chasis elsewhere and my bible did not say man can look at other women and women dare not but both of us must not commit adultery.

I have been hearing stories on how GSM has cause a lot of havoc to marriages,i thought they were all cock and bull story until saturday morning when it happened to me.I dont know how a junior colleague of mine was so daft to send a message mearnt for his client to my phone and quite unfortunately,my phone was on my hubby table when it came in and he read it and that started the katakata.The previous day i had told my hussy that i had a course to attend in my headoffice and he was still lamenting on how banking takes too much time and the only time i could stay at home,we were being called for useless meeting or course as if he is ever at home and i know better than to say anything but kept quite.That stupid message-lets meet as schedule for ten so that we can have enough time to ourselves spoilt my day as my oga was all out for a show down.Despite all the trust,he still think i could be so stupid to leave my home and kids to go and meet somebody somewhere.Initially,i find the whole thing amusing that i could still bring out jealousy in him-i thought he always joke that iam expired drugs after four and he will gladly dash me out without collecting kobo from anybody willing to take me but his behaviour on saturday was something else.He was just going up and down as if he is in a maternity ward about to deliver,i heard him saying ewoo emi ni ma se oko iyawo mi,i mean nobody can represent me,when iam still alive and he will hissed and shake him head.When i saw that it wasnt a joke and he was working himself up unnecessarily,i had to forgo my course and called in sick and my boss believed me.You cant belief that my hussy didnt step out throughout the whole day because of that and my kids were like is daddy sick.