My wife studied in Russia. When we were just friends talking through the night and still had things to say in the morning, she told me one of the habits she picked up in Russia was smoking because of the weather and also because of the friends she kept. She did it for a year but when it was about time to return to Ghana, she stopped because she knew no one would tolerate that back home.

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We dated for two years, one year distantly and the other together before we got married. While dating, she didn’t like to visit bars because she was scared someone would smoke and she would inhale it. She said she didn’t want to remember. She wouldn’t go close to where cigarettes were sold. It was her way of running from it.

We got married and soon we started fighting. I’m not talking about physical fights. Usually it was with words. Usually we would talk through it and make amends until one day she got so angry she entered the toilet and locked the door. A few seconds later, I perceived the smell of cigarettes everywhere in the room. I knew it was coming from the toilet.

I shouted, “Samantha, what are you doing in there? What did you get that from and when did you resume this shameful act?” She responded, “You’re rather shameful. When you act shamefully, you get shameful acts in return.”

I knocked on the door. I threatened to break it down. She didn’t come out. By the time she opened the door, inside there felt like a sauna. She had smoked a whole packet of cigarettes and the butts were all over the place. Once she walked out, she went to the bedroom and threw herself on the bed.

All night I tried to talk to her. The fight wasn’t my fault, but I apologized so she wouldn’t do it again. She promised me she wouldn’t. She even held my hands and we prayed and she asked for forgiveness for being so angry to that point. We made love. It was one of the best moments we had shared. In the morning, I cleaned the toilet. I asked her if there were any cigarettes left so I could collect everything and throw them away.

A few weeks later, we had a very small misunderstanding. I was driving, but she wouldn’t leave me alone to drive. Every little move I made, she complained as if I had driven the car into a pole. She was the one telling me how to drive. “Go this way.” “Why are you driving into potholes like you don’t have eyes?”

It turned into a heated argument. When we got home, she quickly ran into the toilet and a few seconds later, the scent started spreading around. “Sam, are you doing this again? You promised.”

She didn’t even mind me. She came out after finishing a whole packet. Once again, she crawled into bed leaving me standing there like a telephone pole. I wouldn’t have that, so we fought about it. She turned physical. She wanted to stand up and fight me physically and even warned me to stay away from her.

She was a different person. Like she had taken something that made her bigger than life. If I had tried, maybe she would have beaten me. So I told her the next time it happened, I would tell her family about it—that the woman they gave me looked as clean as snow, but what I had with me was a chimney.

The greatest mistake I made was getting her parents involved. Yes, they called her to order. Yes, they drilled sense into her head, but did she change? No. She got worse. When I caught her doing it, even when we hadn’t had a fight, she would tell me, “You know my dad’s number. Call him and cry, you crybaby.”

These days, I suspect it’s not only cigarettes. She is taking the devil’s herbs too. The Mary and Juana herbs. Her eyes hardly stay clear at night. She talks slowly like she’s dazed and all night all she wants is sex. She gets violent when you try to deny her.

Her parents didn’t help. She also wouldn’t want to talk to anyone. You talk to her and she tells you she can stop when she wants to stop. “I’m not addicted,” she would say, and yet behave like her life depends on it. Whenever she’s like that, I try to run from her, but I can’t continue like this. So I’ve told her, “The next time it happens, we are divorced.”

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That was just a week ago. I can’t divorce her. Our marriage is too young and fragile to go through that. I wish she would stop. It’s the only thing worrying us. Apart from that, we are fine. We go through the normal things every couple goes through. It’s the smoking that sets us apart. Is there a way to make her stop?

—Emmanuel

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