My husband doesn’t wear his ring. The ring isn’t missing, and there’s nothing wrong with it, but he doesn’t wear it. We’ve been married for over three years, and he hasn’t worn this ring for more than three months in total.

We talked about it one time. It was even in connection with a story he was telling me. He said the police stopped him on the road, searched his car, and even searched his pockets. He felt disrespected by the way they did it because it felt like they had already judged him as a criminal. I told him, “If you were wearing your ring, they would have been more lenient. I’ve learned they respect the ring because criminals are hardly married people.”

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He snapped and gave it to me properly. He said he was telling me something important, and all I could talk about was a ring. “What is it about this ring that you won’t let me have peace? Am I less of a man because I don’t wear it?”

I responded, “You’re not less of a man, but you’re less of a husband if you don’t wear it.”

I was teasing him because I realized he was getting angry. When I had talked to him innocently about it before, he ignored me, so this time I was happy my words were drawing a reaction from him. He still didn’t wear it, so I decided not to bring the issue up again.

I thought of removing mine too, but later decided against it because I knew the kind of questions that would come my way if my friends saw me without it.

I travelled out of town on a project for a week. It was a sales activation, so we had to engage with a lot of people, and in the end, we had to meet our targets too. Guys would queue in front of my other female colleagues, while I had only a few people in front of me.

On the third day, I complained to one of my colleagues and asked if she had gone for juju to attract customers, and she laughed. She said something jokingly, but it made sense. She said, “You’re wearing your ring, goyiii, and you think the men will come to you? They want single ladies they can vibe with.”

I took it as advice, so the next day I removed my ring. It worked. I engaged freely with those guys, and they happily spoke their minds to me without any inhibition. It wasn’t anything sexual, nor were they making advances toward me, but I think the fact that they thought I wasn’t married lifted a weight off their shoulders and made it easier for them to engage with me.

I didn’t wear my ring again and, unfortunately, forgot to put it back on until I got home and my husband saw my empty finger. He asked calmly, “Where is your ring?”

I looked at my finger and laughed because I remembered the reason I had taken it off. Before I could explain, he said, “Are you sure it was a business trip you went on?”

That question threw me off balance. I asked, “What are you trying to say? What has the ring got to do with where I went?”

Something about my question infuriated him even more. “Can you swear you didn’t go to see a man? Who in your office doesn’t know you’re married that you had to remove your ring? How many men did you sleep with?”

It’s very difficult to remain calm when you’re being accused falsely. I fought back. Anytime I tried to explain, he cut me off midway through my sentences. He grabbed my hand, dragged me to the bedroom, and pushed me onto the bed. “Let me see if no one has been there.”

I wasn’t wearing any panties because all the ones I had packed had gotten dirty. Once he pulled down my trousers and realized I wasn’t wearing any, that became another accusation. “You even made it easy for him. It’s only a woman whose vag!na is always busy who doesn’t see the need to wear panties.”

Honestly, I thought my husband was losing his mind or that someone had upset him and he was taking it out on me. We fought over this issue for days. He even tried to trick me into confessing to something I hadn’t done. When that didn’t work, he threatened me with divorce and later brought my parents into the matter.

In front of my parents, he asked me to give him my phone so he could go through it. When he didn’t find anything, he accused me of deleting messages. I told him, “Do your worst. You think everyone is like you? You know what you did without your ring, so you think I’m doing the same just because I’m not wearing mine.”

I’m currently living with my parents because of this small issue. He asked me to leave with my parents because, according to him, I was disrespectful. Every move I made was given a negative interpretation. I was tired, so I followed them home.

When he called, he said he would take me to a shrine to swear that I was innocent. I answered, “I’m not about that village life. If you don’t believe what I’m telling you, live your life and let me live mine.”

When he called again, he said he would take me for laboratory tests and all that. I told him I was ready, but he never mentioned it again. Weeks later, he said people had spoken to him and he had learned to forgive me, so I should come home.

I told him I had no home to return to if a man I had been married to for three years after dating him for four years couldn’t trust me.

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So instead of apologizing, he’s using the back door to get to me. He has used his parents, my parents, and, most recently, our pastor to persuade me to come home. Until he comes here, apologizes, and tells me he has realized his mistake, I’m not going back. I don’t want him to think he forgave me for something I never did. I want him to accept that he made a mistake and went too far. Without that apology, he can continue living there while I continue living here.

He has started wearing his ring, but that doesn’t change anything. A ring is not an apology. It’s simply what married men wear.

—Janet

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