My father was a big womaniser in our town, even before I could write or spell my name. Everywhere I went, people knew my father as a womaniser. It was not a good feeling. I hated it and felt ashamed because of that name. I was never allowed just to be myself. All I heard growing up was, “That your father. He likes women too much.” That was how people knew him, and how they knew me, too.
If it had only been the things people said, maybe I would have survived it better. But I saw it with my own eyes.
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Our home was almost like a brothel, with women coming in and going out. Some of them would even try to act like mothers to me, even though my own mother was alive and well and living with us. As for my mother and my uncle’s wife, they bonded over their shared trauma. They were always treating infections and fighting for my father’s attention, hoping he would notice them. Even my brothers started following in my father’s footsteps.
Then I met Daudo. I told him exactly what was on my mind. “People claim cheating is their red flag, but when they find themselves in a tight position, they forgive it. I am not like them. I will drop you and leave like it is nobody’s business.”
He thought I was joking, but I meant every word. I caught him cheating on me, he thought he was smart enough to hide it. He thought I would never find out, but I have lived with a womaniser all my life. I knew how they behaved. He cried and begged, but I still left him.
About three years ago, I met Fiifi. He also laughed when I told him I would never forgive cheating. He laughed and told me I should learn to live and move past it.
But it was not about living in fear. I did not want to become like my mother. We have only one life, and I did not want to spend mine treating infections, fighting other women and chasing them away just to keep a man.
Now, I have read two flirtatious messages Fiifi sent to two different girls. If he told Bitha, “You are the only woman I want to spend the rest of my life with,” he sent the exact same line to Irene. Word for word.
He insists that nothing sexual has happened between him and either of the girls. To be fair, the messages did not sound sexual. But I have a theory about cheating. Cheating is not only sexual. It can be emotional, physical or psychosocial. Your mind entertains it first. You nurture it. You become tempted, and sometimes, that temptation alone feels like betrayal.
Fiifi does not see it that way. I do.
I have held those messages against him for a long time, even though I do not have solid proof that he has physically cheated on me. We could be arguing about something as small as who ate last and did not wash the plate, and I would bring up those messages again.
Last week, I did it again. I posted on my status, “I have accepted that I will not find true love.” He saw it and came to complain. He said that if that was what I believed, then there was no need to take our relationship any further. There was no need to continue.
Since then, he has refused to pick up my calls. My messages go unanswered, and he will not see me.
The things I have done just to win him back are making me lose my pride. Maybe my begging is ugly. Maybe I am only pushing him further away. But what am I supposed to do?
How do I heal from my father’s treacherous acts and stop projecting them onto Fiifi? For this man, I would try. I would even go to the moon to fetch water if he asked me to.
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He is right in some ways. I know he is. But if you saw what I saw growing up, if you watched your mother shrink under humiliation while your father entertained women like trophies, you would scream, “Men are wicked!” every day too.
— SHARON
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