LAMENTATION OF AN ESTRANGED WIFE
This is a real-life story of a couple based in B.C. Canada and became separated for three years over an undisclosed disagreement. Amid this feud, the husband fell sick and died. At the end of the story is a PostScript and personal analysis of their tragedy.
Modified and edited by Gabriel Onajite David-Okoro
I received a sudden summon to the hospital after almost three years of separation from the husband of my youth. He was on the sick bed. Seeing each other again, reminded me of the many dreams I’ve had about him and how I was the one telling him I don’t have anything against him again.
I acted out the dream before him. He was calm and responded positively to everything I said to him, I apologized for the wrongs I did, which was to call the cops. I told him the devil did us great evil and we can start all over again.
I asked if I should go home and make food for him, and he said ‘yes’. Oh, what a joy! I miss cooking for him. I told him, our kids are fine. All this while our thirteen-year-old was standing by his bedside. Despite what transpired, I never fought you back, I’ve been waiting and hoping that all this war will end one day.
The Social Worker said it was okay that I came.
Meanwhile, there’s a part of me that is feeling hopeful that he’s going to come back home and all shall be well again.
I was hoping that we will be one happy family again only for me to be called again late at night that he had died. Waves of confusion swept over me. In that state of mental dishevelment, I ran to the hospital. My sight had become blurry for many tears. I couldn’t imagine me seeing him dead. I was hoping we would talk about everything and how much I had learned and suffered alone with the kids.
I was hoping I would get the opportunity to tell him, he hurt me so much and made me suffer like a criminal that I wasn’t.
My head went blank. I had my bladder loose because of the shocking news. I couldn’t comprehend anything. I was numb.
I was summoned to pick up his body. Where do I go from here, “koyemi”?They handed over to me all his house keys, car keys, credit cards, everything that belongs to him!!!
Still in shock, I visited his residence to move his stuff back home, and my heart kept breaking as many things were being revealed at that time.
He had been taking different types of concoctions sent to him from Nigeria by his family members, and this was responsible for the damage to his kidneys.
I realized that I’m the one who often scrutinized his intakes. Throughout our thirteen (13) years of marriage, he never visited the hospital or had any medical issue that necessitated his admission into the hospital. I began to hear many tales.
I have questions I couldn’t answer. It looked like the enemy planned it all out. During his burial, I thought I saw his eyelids move. Oh, I was going to say, “Prince, oya get up, let’s go home.” But then, it was a fatal reality that he has departed.
I discovered that despite all that happened, at the end of it all, he was my responsibility to care for after he died. I asked myself, where are all the people who encouraged him to wage war against his only family? They are nowhere to be found. We are all by ourselves now! Himself, his kids, and myself- this is family Never allow anyone in your marriage. When all is done and dusted, it’s gonna be you and him and your kids. There’s no one else again who’s as important as your wife/husband. Only my signature was accepted. I was told you’re his next of kin, and he didn’t change anything despite his rage.
My heart kept aching and racing to and fro unknown destinations.
Nobody else matters at this moment, but his family. Please don’t let love and forgiveness diminish from your home, no matter how bad the situation looks. We only know the beginning of the war, but we never know the end of it.
I thank God that I was able to speak to him. I told him, I never fought you, despite all that you did to me. He was quiet. I reminded him of how I had often called him, and how he failed to answer the calls or returned them.
“I do call you, but you don’t answer my call. But, it’s fine, let’s forget all that happened and move on”. But he chose to go and REST from it all.
Adieu and REST in peace Adewale.
~~~PostScript and Onlooker’s Analysis ~~~
This narrative can best be described as the lamentation of an estranged wife. In hindsight, she realized when it was fatally too late that there was a better way in which she could have managed the family feud. There is a sociological, spiritual, and ideological perspective to this story.
In the literary field, this could pass for a short play of four characters in which she is the main actor. Each of these characters can be used as metaphor or imageries that epitomize a sociocultural belief, ideology, or virtue. The other characters included the Social Worker, the sick man, and their thirteen-year-old whose gender was not disclosed who played the role of a silent observer by the father’s bedside. (Sometimes, silence is golden).
Why was the child silent? The child’s silence echoes the significance of silence in grave moments or times of emotional aggravation. It may also indicate that the child has been used to being silenced at home. Or, perhaps it’s his way of expressing his disapproval of the father’s unwholesome role in the whole saga.
On the other hand, the sick man spoke only once throughout the entire episode, and this speaks volumes. He may be a man of few words, one who speaks only as occasion demands. Someone might say, it’s the sickness that made it difficult for him to vocalize his impressions.
But I beg to differ on the latter submission. I take it that he’s a man of few words by the decision he made despite the feud. He still made his wife his next of kin. In his rage, he still retained a modicum of sense of judgment intact. None of his relatives who might have fueled the feud between him and his wife weren’t aware that none of them were named as his next of kin.
The man (husband/father) only spoke once, monosyllabically, and that was in response to the question that his wife asked him. Would you like me to make some food for you? ” Yes”, was the response.
The woman made her audience understand that her husband responded positively to everything that she said. This does not necessarily indicate a vocalization action. It could be a gesture, body language of mere acquiescence to all that she was saying.
A school of thought presupposes that his positive response could be that he had no choice because his life was now at the mercy of his warring partner (once estranged wife). Again, I beg to differ. A woman once asked me to pray for her husband who was dying of cancer of the prostate. She flew from Abuja to the hospital in Lagos where the husband was receiving treatment.
She had intimated to me the situation before boarding the flight. We agree that she should pull a call across to me and place the phone on speaker mode so that the husband could hear and respond with an Amen, as I pray. As agreed, she called me. Just as I was making the first sentence, the sick man shouted at his wife. I wondered where he got the strength from.
“Who is that?” He shouted.
“He’s a man of God. He wants to pray for you”. The woman replied. “What man of God?” At that point, I became irritated. “Hello, Mr. Man. Please, know that I am not a prayer contractor or whatever you may think neither do I beg to pray for people. Your wife requested me to pray for you. But if you are not predisposed to it, let me know and I will not hesitate to hang up”.
I heard him making some incoherent sounds underneath. The wife later said; “Daddy, please I’m sorry for the embarrassment I might have caused you. You may hang up sir”. I did, but he died a few days later. According to the woman, he was angry with her because he felt she was responsible for his ailment.
The sick man could also have shouted at his wife during his dying moment just as the man earlier mentioned. But, he didn’t, and this just indicated that it wasn’t his nature to do so. A man’s true nature will likely manifest when he is at his lowest ebb. The two men were at their lowest ebb. The kind of reaction that was exhibited by each of them only indicated their true nature.
At this juncture, it is needful to cross-examine the various perspectives showcased in this drama.
One is the sociological perspective. The presence of the social worker epitomized the sociocultural norms and beliefs of the clime where the couple found themselves. The estranged wife was summoned by the Social Worker whose responsibility it is to undertake such tasks. English law and customs have high regard for the woman in marriage. Even if the man should die intestate, the woman can inherit up to 75 percent of his possessions unlike what is obtainable in most African settings.
The attitude of the estranged wife reflects her sociocultural background or natural upbringing. According to her narrative, she said that the social worker said it was okay for her to come. It means that she was not duty-bound to come by the existing strained relationship she had with her husband. Nonetheless, she came. This tells us something.
She is still in love.
The love factor could have influenced her immediate response. It also showed in her willingness to cook the man’s meal. She made a brief reflection on how she missed preparing his meals. It was an art that she had developed and grown to enjoy over time, unlike some women who shudder at the thought of preparing their husband’s meals.
The love factor also showed in how she was the first to make reconciliatory moves which were rebuffed by the husband, an action which we later got to know did not reflect the state of the man’s heart towards his wife.
On the man’s part, he was still in love. That’s why he never thought or planned to remarry. That was why he didn’t change her status as his next of kin. Nothing noteworthy changed about him toward her except that he wasn’t on talking terms with her. This is a dangerous attitude that gives the enemy loophole to destroy families.
Satan was able to tear the first family apart because they were already apart from each other; otherwise, where was Adam when Lucifer was busy interacting with his wife? The reality of their “apartness” was seen in the excuse that Adam gave to God when he was queried for his disobedience. Apartness is established where either or both parties in a relationship attempt to shift or trade blame for their misadventures.
This brings me to a spiritual ideology that satan is behind every evil. At the root of every evil is Satan. Most often, we are so limited to the natural realm of life to forget or fail to realize that it is the spiritual that controls the physical realm. In other words, nothing happens in physical life until it has been established in the spiritual realm. The woman later realized this truth, but a little too late. Hear her: “I told him the devil did us great evil and we can start all over again”. From this woman’s tone, if given another chance, she wouldn’t have called the cops on her husband. This means that she knew that the issue between herself and her husband was resolvable. It didn’t need a second or third party depending on your perspective that husband and wife are one party or separate parties.
Sometimes, one partner has to play the fool for the devil to be stopped in his tracks. Usually, for this to happen, the person that is logically expected to play that role is the aggrieved party.
The third perspective is ideological. Some of us still retain some warped ideologies which are responsible for most strained and ruined relationships. There is this warped mentality that is common with African men, which is that the man can never be wrong. It is taboo for the man to say sorry to his wife or else he’s no longer the head of the house but the woman. This is nothing but a mere display of egotistical ignorance.
For peace to reign, and thereby prevent satanic invasion into homes and relationships, we must embrace ideologies that are founded on the principles of godliness, justice, fairness, and equity. Every ideology has a particular spiritual origin that is associated with it. Any ideological belief that doesn’t line up with the demands of heaven will surely put us in trouble. This is why there is schism and chaos among nations.
The human family unit is a microcosm of a nation. The kind of ideologies that we allow or tolerate in individual family units have an overall telling effect on the entire nation, and hence determine whether we will be plunged into the realm of tragedy or peacefulness.
