By Oreva Godwin
This piece might trigger a lot of reactions. But this is what a lot of people face in their marriages and relationships. Writing this piece is likely to take a lot of strength from me. It’s difficult not to be overwhelmed by emotions. When I write, it’s from my heart. I write with passion. I put myself in the midst of people’s stories and feel their pain and grief.
What do we mean by making love to a shadow? Some people enjoy breaking their partners completely. They have that satisfaction that they have completely break you and turned you into a shadow of yourself. And it got me bothered. Why would someone enjoy making love to a shadow?
Imagine, you are no longer making love to that happy man/woman, that cheerful, funny, and charismatic person, but a sad, depressed, low self-esteemed person. And it got me thinking, how do you look at such a person and enjoy making love to that depressed looking person? How do you look at that sad looking man/woman and still get to climax. How does a shadow make you climax?
Danny was a sweet person in nature, full of life, but very religious. He believed sex before marriage was against his religion. He met Esther, a spirit filled sister in the choir, and was drawn to her. After service one afternoon, he approached her, and they exchanged numbers. They started talking, and Danny felt he met his perfect match. He prayed over his choice. He got what seemed like an answer in the form of a dream that would shape his decision.
He Forgot that two voices can’t speak at the same time. Once the heart has made its choice, the voice of God would be silent. The dream made him felt there was a confirmation from God to go ahead. Little did he know that it was his subconscious mind that triggered the dream. Chaos beckoned unknown to him. Dammy and Esther dated for three months and tied the knot.
The first night as a married couple, was quickly consummated. After a few months, Esther changed, and he noticed that his wife had never told him she enjoyed their sex or screamed when he entered her holy paradise.
Soon, he started doubting if she had ever had a real orgasm with him, and this got him worried. He started watching porn and saw how ladies react during sex. He started craving for his wife to squat on his face as he worshipped her or squat on his manhood. He fantasised a lot.
One day, Danny asked Esther if she enjoyed their lovemaking. Her reply was nonchalant: “it’s just there.” He felt it was a slap on his face. He kept mute.
Esther’s response triggered a new phase. He started watching porn more regularly to improve his skill. He learnt how to worship a woman’s body better and even spent more time in foreplay. But his wife kept an unimpressed face. If he came too soon during lovemaking, she would give a big sigh and say: “If you know you will waste my precious time, don’t ever wake me up for this nonsense.”
One day, he called her and asked, “What am I doing wrong?” Teach me how to please you, please. She stood, looked at him, and said: “There is nothing you can do, abi you want to magically increase your manhood? Instead of hitting your woman well, you dey there they whine waist like Shakira. If you like, go disgrace me by going out to sleep with those small girls, let the world see the rubbish I am managing.”
He was in total shame. He stopped being the cheerful man that he was. He totally lost his pride as a man. He got so intimidated making love to his wife, to the extent that while making love to her, he would ask if he was doing it well.
This got her upset. She pushed him off several times to clean up and sleep. Danny became a confused man. He lost his pride as a man. Yet he was scared of cheating on his wife. She made him feel he was not good in bed. He became a shadow of himself.
One day, he picked up courage and tried to make love to his wife, but there was no passion. Only anxiety. He panicked as he tried his best. He was just a shadow making love.
After the sex, Esther cleaned up and bluntly told him; “why am allowing you to touch me is because I want a baby. If not, which normal lady will open her legs to be scratched in the name of lovemaking?”
Danny became a frustrated man. The happy man he was known for was now full of regrets. He was unhappy. He cried to God and asked, “Why? Did I not truly hear from you?” Then flashbacks of that innocent looking sweet girl he fell in love with in the choir with an angelic voice came to his mind. Memories of a girl that’s opposite from the one he was seeing in his house. Even the devil has a sonorous voice.
Maro had always been an ambitious lady. She worked at a big company in Lagos and was earning one million naira monthly. At age 33, she was not married. This bothered and got her desperate for a husband.
She met Chidi, an Owerri based contractor. They met online and got acquainted. He invited her over, and she flew to Owerri. They made love. When she got back to Lagos, she found out that she was pregnant. She told Chidi, and he proposed that they get married.
But he insisted that she must relocate to Owerri. Maro refused and was about showing the stubborn streak in her when she took advice from people to accept the man’s demands. They told her that she was not getting younger and that career could be built anytime. Marriage, they said, comes once in a lifetime. She accepted and her choice would became her deadly shadow.
Maro left her job of one million naira and relocated to Oweri and started up a home with the man. She never knew that Chidi was very stingy. She couldn’t have noticed because she was comfortable and never took notice.
Dear Maro spent all her savings and was left with nothing. She soon took up employment as a class teacher and was earning fifty thousand naira, while Chidi searched for contracts for years. He only got minor contracts that could barely clear the bills.
The little money Chidi made from the small contracts did not get to the home. He spent his little earnings taking care of himself and looking good. The wife had to practically struggle to pay her two children’s school fees and feed them.
Most times, her children would eat cold food as breakfast when she was out of cash to fill up the gas. When she complained, he beat her up and insult her and came back home late.
A tall, fair, chubby looking Maro turned into a dark, dry looking lady. She sold all her expensive hairs and gold to sustain herself and her children. She became a shadow of herself.
She had no close friend in Owerri. No one to talk to. Sometimes when they quarrelled, he chased her out of the house at midnight. She went to the shop opposite her house and slept there. She was so malnourished and stressed that it led to a miscarriage.
One day, she ran into her colleague who used to work with her in Lagos, and the man was in total shock. He was like, how? He could barely recognise her, if not that she called out his name and he recognised her voice.
When he asked for her number, she brought out a phone held together by rubber band. When Maro got home, she stood in front of the mirror, broke down and cried. She reflected on her life, how the man had made her a shadow of herself. She had lost self confidence, lost her pride, and lost her sanity. She was alive but dead on the inside.
These are people’s reality. These are people’s pains. It is rather sad that marriage that was meant to be your sanctuary, your resting place, turned out to be your source of pain and grief. The worst mistake anybody could make is marry an unkind person. Kindness can never be over emphasised.
We look at the wrong things when choosing a partner. We need to ask intellectual and serious questions and learn about who you’re dating and about to marry. Instead of checking your partner’s reasoning and mental health, you’re busy concentrating on showing cooking skills, busy spying to know if he is cheating, busy checking your partner’s phone, busy cleaning, having sex or concentrating only on communication skills.
it’s one thing to know how to communicate, it’s another thing to have the skill to listen and accept it. We concentrate more on looking at the intellect – book brain, business brain, and not the important aspect: kindness, compassion, understanding, watching out for how he/she treats people, because soon that’s how he/she will treat you. We need to look out for forgiveness and how they talk and react when they are angry. Are they generous? Do they share their innate thoughts?
If you don’t look at the important qualities, marriage will teach you a bitter lesson. Never put yourself in a position where you become a shadow of yourself. You are deserving of a good life. You must be valuable and treasured. You deserve that peace and respect. You deserve to be loved and made to feel beautiful. Wake up from the shadows, discover who you were before you met your partner. Find that strength to break that internal chain and walk out from that hold that makes you lose yourself to the shadow.
Leave a Reply