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(A married couple who have been childless for years seek unorthodox means of getting a child with dire consequences)
***
I would have picked the other alternative if I had known that my mother’s suggestion would bring calamity to my marriage. But as the saying goes, ‘had I known always comes last.’ My marriage was the type every man dreams to have, a union built on love, trust, but it was destroyed because our union was fruitless.
My mother brought up the idea of my wife seeing a native doctor who lived in a village close to ours. My wife and I rejected the idea, but we gave in due to her endless pressure from my mother. I could remember that day vividly, the day I accepted the option.
"Rufus,” my mother called me that evening during the family meeting. “It is over thirteen years since you got married and no child to show for it. At first you said you were trying your best, this changed to God knows and from that to God’s time is the best. Don’t you know that heaven helps those who help themselves?
All my friends are holding their grandchildren in their arms except me. Do you want me to die without seeing my grandchildren?” Nana, as she was fondly called by all, asked with her hands spread towards heaven as if she was addressing someone there.
“Mother, what do you want us to do? Is it not God that gives children and he will give us children at his own time,” I replied.
“My son, you’re playing with fire and I hope it doesn’t consume you because you’re not getting any younger and the earlier you start looking for your black goat before nightfall, the better for you,” she warned, pulling her left ear.
“I don’t have any problem going to the place,”my wife put in, “but you know your son.”
“My dear, you can follow me to the place when I’m leaving. Men at times don’t face reality until it's too late. Anyway, the place is not as bad as you people think it is. I’m doing this for the sake of the two of you,” she asserted.
“There is no way I will let my wife see that fetish man just because we want children,” I stressed almost shouting at them. The issue was never discussed again until my mother took her leave.
Naomi continued from where mother stopped and mounted more pressure on me to let her see the herbalist. My home became a living hell for me; I would have said my mother bewitched my wife if not that I knew my mother too well.
“Honey,” she called me during dinner on a Sunday evening, while holding my hands across the table, “Why can’t we trymother's suggestion
“What do you mean?” he asked
“Don’t you want to have children?” she asked in reply.
“Am I complaining, and what has come over you? We will surely have children; we will wait as long as it takes.”
“It’s easy for you to say that because you are not the one receiving all the insults I receive regularly due to my inability to conceive,” she complained almost to the point of crying. “Besides, women have limited time for giving birth,” she continued nagging.
“Please woman, don’t start with your emotional blackmail and let me eat in peace,” I said without taking my face away from the food in front of me.
Her disturbance became more persistent; in fact, it got to a stage where I did not have peace in my home, which made me allow her travel to the village. My wife took a leave of absence from her office and went to the village. She spent three months and it was not easy for me to cope without her presence in the house because we had never stayed away from each other for that long...
To be continued...
Note: a native doctor is like a shaman who is often consulted on spiritual and physical matters.
***
I would have picked the other alternative if I had known that my mother’s suggestion would bring calamity to my marriage. But as the saying goes, ‘had I known always comes last.’ My marriage was the type every man dreams to have, a union built on love, trust, but it was destroyed because our union was fruitless.
My mother brought up the idea of my wife seeing a native doctor who lived in a village close to ours. My wife and I rejected the idea, but we gave in due to her endless pressure from my mother. I could remember that day vividly, the day I accepted the option.
"Rufus,” my mother called me that evening during the family meeting. “It is over thirteen years since you got married and no child to show for it. At first you said you were trying your best, this changed to God knows and from that to God’s time is the best. Don’t you know that heaven helps those who help themselves?
All my friends are holding their grandchildren in their arms except me. Do you want me to die without seeing my grandchildren?” Nana, as she was fondly called by all, asked with her hands spread towards heaven as if she was addressing someone there.
“Mother, what do you want us to do? Is it not God that gives children and he will give us children at his own time,” I replied.
“My son, you’re playing with fire and I hope it doesn’t consume you because you’re not getting any younger and the earlier you start looking for your black goat before nightfall, the better for you,” she warned, pulling her left ear.
“I don’t have any problem going to the place,”my wife put in, “but you know your son.”
“My dear, you can follow me to the place when I’m leaving. Men at times don’t face reality until it's too late. Anyway, the place is not as bad as you people think it is. I’m doing this for the sake of the two of you,” she asserted.
“There is no way I will let my wife see that fetish man just because we want children,” I stressed almost shouting at them. The issue was never discussed again until my mother took her leave.
Naomi continued from where mother stopped and mounted more pressure on me to let her see the herbalist. My home became a living hell for me; I would have said my mother bewitched my wife if not that I knew my mother too well.
“Honey,” she called me during dinner on a Sunday evening, while holding my hands across the table, “Why can’t we try
“What do you mean?” he asked
“Don’t you want to have children?” she asked in reply.
“Am I complaining, and what has come over you? We will surely have children; we will wait as long as it takes.”
“It’s easy for you to say that because you are not the one receiving all the insults I receive regularly due to my inability to conceive,” she complained almost to the point of crying. “Besides, women have limited time for giving birth,” she continued nagging.
“Please woman, don’t start with your emotional blackmail and let me eat in peace,” I said without taking my face away from the food in front of me.
Her disturbance became more persistent; in fact, it got to a stage where I did not have peace in my home, which made me allow her travel to the village. My wife took a leave of absence from her office and went to the village. She spent three months and it was not easy for me to cope without her presence in the house because we had never stayed away from each other for that long...
To be continued...
Note: a native doctor is like a shaman who is often consulted on spiritual and physical matters.
Names have been changed to protect the identity of the narrator and other individuals in the story.
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Photo Lifted From ArtistPortfolio.net
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