I have been in three different relationships. My first relationship happened when I was in high school. We were all young so I didn’t take it seriously. The second one also happened when I was still in high school. I didn’t take that one seriously either. It was when I got to the university that I began to understand the concept of love and relationships. One of my coursemates, Maxwell, was a very good friend to me. I didn’t see him as anything beyond friendship. When we got closer, we became best friends. That was what I thought of him.

That’s why I was surprised when he confessed that he was in love with me. He asked that I give him a chance to be my boyfriend. I thought about the friendship we shared. What if I say yes, and the whole thing blows up in our faces? Will our friendship survive the explosion? These were the things I pondered over before I finally decided to give him a chance.

I thought I was older and more mature, and that the fact that I understood relationships better meant I would get it right this time around. That was why I threw caution to the wind and bet on our good friendship that the relationship would work. Initially, I was happy I made that decision. That’s because we were best friends before we became lovers. So we were always in sync. We did almost everything together.

I believed I knew him as well as I knew myself until he started changing. He would get angry at me unprovoked. When I asked what the problem was, he would shrug and say, “Nothing.” One day he called me and said, “My pastor wants to see you.” When I asked him why, he answered, “When you get there you will know.” His behavior filled me with so much anxiety that I almost declined the invitation. However, I showed up to meet his pastor out of respect for him.

It was when I got there that I realized Maxwell summoned me before his pastor to complain about me. He brought up things I did in the past that he found offensive. They were very petty things too. There was a time I suggested we go out to a place, but he refused to go. I didn’t make an issue out of it but he brought it up before the pastor. There was another time I was expecting him in church. He didn’t show up so I complained. That one too, he brought it up.

I was completely ambushed. These were things he never mentioned to me. How can you call me your girlfriend, your best friend, yet you won’t point it out to me when I offend you? Throughout our three-year relationship, this guy never complained that I had done something wrong. He was always acting as if we were in a happy relationship. The first time he finally decided to complain, he chose to do it in front of his pastor. That was the saddest part about the whole thing for me.

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I couldn’t hold back my tears. I sat there and cried my eyes out. I felt so betrayed. His pastor then told me, “You are disrespectful and proud. Your relationship is spoilt.” That was how I walked out of my three-year relationship with just a cooking pot. The cooking pot belonged to him. It was the one I used to prepare our meals on campus. I kept it as a souvenir of our good times, and a reminder of everything that could have been.

A week after our break up, Maxwell started posting pictures of himself and Mavis. They are in the same church, yet the kind of photos he posted indicated they were more than brother and sister in Christ. It was obvious that they were together. Only one week after our break up and he had moved on so fast. In one of their photos, their pastor was in it. Everything pointed to the fact that they were a match made in heaven. I was so broken-hearted. I cried for days unending.

I Discovered He Had Another Woman But I Couldn’t Leave Him

It took a while before I finally healed and got over it. We were in the same circle so I got to see their relationship unfold beautifully and then collapse tragically. After their breakup, he tried to get back together with me but I had seen too much shege to accept him back. Besides, I had gotten over him.

He is married to someone else now. They have a beautiful daughter together. He gave his daughter a name that sounds exactly like mine but has a different spelling. We are not friends, but neither are we enemies. The last time I spoke to him, I prayed for him and his family and wished him all the best in life.

It’s been seven years now since that relationship ended. But I still don’t have a man in my life. I have had a few talking stages but things didn’t work out. I’ll be turning thirty in a few months. Sometimes I feel it’s okay not to have a man at my age. After all, they say God’s time is the best, and He makes all things beautiful in His time. Other times I feel sad that I am still single and it makes me cry. I cry when the thought of getting married and having a family comes to mind. How much longer do I need to wait to be found by a good man?

—Estelle

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