I grew up inside a box my parents built for me. I was the “good child,” the example they used to threaten my siblings into obedience. I did nothing wrong on purpose. When they said sleep, I slept. When they said I should marry my books and give birth to success, I obeyed. When they warned me to stay away from men until I was of age, I took it like scripture and lived by it.

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Whenever my siblings misbehaved, my parents would beat them and shout, “Why can’t you be like Ophelia? Do you want to end up on the street?” I became the standard, the measuring stick, the child who never questioned anything.

Now I am grown, and I am paying for it.

I am twenty-eight years old and in my first serious relationship. My life, by all standards, is painfully boring. I start dozing off after 9 p.m. When I go out at night, I keep checking the time and asking, “When are we going home?” My boyfriend looks at me like I grew up on another planet.

He once asked me, “Which side of life did you grow up on that even basic things sound strange to you?”

That question hurt because it is true.

I love him, and I want this relationship to work. He is patient. He has accepted that there will be no intimacy until marriage. We have dated for seven months, and he has never tried to force anything. He shows up when I need him. He gives his friends excuses just to spend time with me. In return, I want to make him happy, but I do not know how.

He loves football, so I am trying to love football too. One day I asked why a goalkeeper was wearing jersey number 39 instead of number one. He got angry. He said I asked too many questions when all he wanted was to enjoy the game.

I am even planning my first kiss. Imagine that. At twenty-eight. I am scared I will mess it up, so I am reading books and watching films like I am preparing for an exam. I know I am beautiful. He tells me often. But beauty is not my problem. I am scared of being boring.

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He’s not putting pressure on me to be anything but I’m scared I will lose him if I don’t up my game. I’m worried and have started questioning my upbringing. My sisters and my brother, the stubborn ones don’t have problem with their social lives. My younger sister is married and having fan but I’m here asking her questions when she posts something I think it’s fan on her status. Is it all lost for me or I can make my life better than what is it now?

—Lindy

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