I think the first question I asked on the date was, “Where is her baby daddy?” I liked her, and the idea of dating her even though she was a single mother was wide open to me. She explained, “He promised he would marry me after we had the child, but even after two years, he showed no intention of fulfilling that promise. He was stalling, so I left him.”

We started dating in 2017. In 2019, she got pregnant, and that also pushed our marriage process forward. I was a happy man and I was present every step of the way for her and my baby. In 2021, early first quarter of the year, we got married. Later that same year, we welcomed our child.

Due to the nature of my work, I was often away from home. But each time I came back, just the sight of my wife nurturing my baby was enough. I felt like the richest man alive by every standard. A few months after she gave birth, I noticed she was forgetting things, zoning out, drifting somewhere far from the room we were both standing in.

I was paying close attention. Almost every day, the question slipped from my mouth, “What is wrong with you? Have I done something wrong?” She would murmur, “Nothing is wrong,” and carry that stone face around the house.

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One morning, after four days away at work, I came home to an unsettling silence. I walked into the bedroom and her wardrobe was empty. Her side of the bedside cabinet was cleared out. I was dialing her number while searching every corner of the house. It was unreachable. My children were nowhere to be found. I immediately reported the situation to her parents. To my shock, her father snapped at me, “Mister man, make sure you find my daughter or else, we will wear one pant.” I stood there thinking, “Ei, I have met some.”

Sweat ran down my face. My thoughts were all over the place. Within a few hours, I gathered my family and we began searching. The next day, we reported the case to the police. They encouraged us to make announcements on radio stations, and I did. My wife was a new breastfeeding mother. The image of that alone tore at me. Most days, I was walking around like a dead man. Her parents did not make things easier, but I understood their pain so I did not fight them. I searched everywhere I could. I could not find her or my children, but I kept sending money to her parents just in case they heard something.

Four months later, I got a call from her younger sister. She was whispering, “Don’t tell anyone I told you, but my sister has gone back to Bra Yaw.” I knew Bra Yaw. He was the ex-boyfriend who never did right by her. The same man who left her heartbroken. She continued, “My parents also know where she is. That is why they are not bothering to look for her. My sister has been seeing him throughout your relationship and your marriage too. So if I were you, I would do a DNA test for the second child, because hmm.” I asked her, “You think your family believes the child I have may not be mine?” She said yes and hung up.

I was dumbfounded. I was shaking. I reported the matter to the police again, and her father was arrested to help locate her. After a long and painful process, a DNA test was conducted. It confirmed the child was mine, not the other man’s. I should have felt relieved, and part of me was, but that result did not erase the betrayal I had just lived through. I kept asking myself what I never gave her that sent her running back to someone who had already hurt her.

Sadly, it has now been six years. I have neither seen my child nor heard from my ex-wife. The police have found no trace of her. No leads. No hints. Nothing. It is as if she vanished from the surface of the earth and never existed. I am currently not in Ghana, and that distance has made everything even harder to carry.

What Nobody Tells You About Divorce

Since 2020, I’ve struggled with fear in relationships. I am now approaching my early 40s with no wife and no child I can say I am actively raising, even though I know one of mine is out there somewhere. I have healed in some ways, but the trauma still lives in the background, quiet but present.

I genuinely want to start a new family. I want to build something real and stable with a good woman. But the fear of going through that kind of pain again is real, and some days, it feels bigger than the desire itself.

—Benabi

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