I turned 31 last year and I am not married. I’ve never been in a serious relationship. Love has eluded me. If you’re wondering why, I don’t know either. I fit the description of most women’s ideal man. I know I’m a fine brother, with a good job, and I am God-fearing too. It seems these qualities are not enough to make a woman happy anymore. I have never been in a serious relationship. You know the one where you plan the future and pick names for your unborn children. I never had a relationship where we wear clothes made of the same cloth so everyone will know how serious we are. My longest official relationship lasted five months. My longest unofficial relationship lasted a year (wink wink). I don’t know how exactly I ended up the kind of man who cannot commit to a relationship. But I think it had something to do with Adzo.

She was much older than me. I don’t know exactly how old she was because I was only six years at the time. Adzo could have been 15, or 16, or 17, or 18, or even 30. My memory is foggy. The only thing my mind recalls is a bathroom scene. She took me to the bathroom to bathe me. In the process, she went down on me. I didn’t understand what was happening. Then she asked that I reciprocate but I wouldn’t. She dipped her fingers down there and told me to lick it. I don’t know if I did it. I can’t even remember who Adzo was. Except that she introduced me to shuperu at an age I had no business knowing what shuperu is.

We lived in a compound house at the time this happened. Adzo lived with one of our co-tenants. She was probably a maid or a family relation. I really don’t remember. My mother doesn’t even remember her. How could she not remember someone whose care she entrusted me to? This person wasn’t significant enough for my mother to keep in her memories, but I am still reeling from the consequences of her actions. My parents were workaholics. Everyone had their own thing going on for them and school was on break. They couldn’t leave me unattended, so Adzo was my assigned babysitter. But she wasn’t really right in the head, was she? She enjoyed instructing us (me and the other kids in the house) to do each other so she could watch. Sometimes she participated. We were too young to understand what we did. We snuck around to indulge when our parents were home.

One day we woke up and realized Adzo was gone. Nobody knew where she went or how. Like the wind, we’d never seen her again. And like the strong wind, she left a lot of ruins after she had gone. It was hard to fight the urges Adzo stirred in me. I wanted shuperu with everyone I saw, regardless of their gender or age. It got so bad that when I was left with my neighbor, I’d wake up at dawn to sneak into their daughter’s bed, with the intention to have some rounds. I tried it with my own cousins. This is how damaged I was.

Because of this, I never took women seriously. I never took the time to try and get to know them. I only wanted to satisfy my perverted urges. I never got caught doing the things I did. My dad actually thought I was a virgin until last year. It didn’t help matters that we used to sleep in my parent’s room. We were privy to their dawn activities. Almost all my siblings saw what my parents were busy doing at dawn, thinking we were sleeping. How could we sleep when they were so loud?

It’s interesting how my life turned out this way…because my parents did their best to instill the fear of God in us. We never missed Sunday church services. If anything, we were popular in the church. I currently hold many leadership roles at church. So, imagine my guilt when I indulge in lust and womanizing. It has corroded my soul, and I am constantly depressed. At some point in my life, I decided, “No, I won’t do it again. I won’t look at a woman with lust in my heart. I won’t go out there looking for an opportunity to be promiscuous. I surrender. I surrender all to Christ. I want to be the man he wants me to be—the Christlike man.” I tried. I held down my urges and had constant battles with my thoughts. I could only hold out for six months. I fell on the edge of the sword again and became who I fought not to be.

I am not proud of how little control I have over my body. It breaks my heart that my two younger brothers also suffer the same affliction I’ve been suffering. They didn’t tell me about it. I found the evidence on their phones and laptops. The kind of videos they’ve stored there and the number of times they watch them. At this point, I’m very certain that my family is cursed.

I thought falling deeply in love would hold me grounded and cage me out of my carnal desires so when I was in the university, I fell in love with Efua. She was stunning. Everything I wanted in a woman, she had it. I said to myself, “I would marry this girl someday when the stars align in my life.” But there was a problem. She had a boyfriend. She liked me but she couldn’t get out of her relationship. We spent a lot of time together. We did everything lovers do except shuperu. She was good for me. But she was not ready to settle down with me. She stabilized me but she couldn’t say yes to a relationship so I walked away.

We met again after school. She was no longer in love with the guy who stopped us from falling in love. She was alone. A solo band who sang songs of love to her own self at night. We spent a lot of time together, talking about the past and the future. I was planning to make a move on her again. While I was thinking of the perfect way to hit on her, she was busy jumping into the arms of another man.  I said, “I thought we were headed towards something? I thought we were going deeper so why would just jump out at this moment when…when…when…” It didn’t matter. She was gone.

That was 2015. Boy, I was broken. I couldn’t eat for days and couldn’t rest my mind. I was running to love for salvation but it was love that broke me into pieces. I hated her but it didn’t change a thing. I sunk very low into depression but it didn’t change her mind. I went back to my old ways—flirting and sleeping around. Love was no longer on the board.

But when I met Aku, everything changed. Love came back into my heart and I started beaming with smiles again. She was a girl I met in church. Church girls make things better, I thought. So, I started the process of loving again. This time, it was Aku I was thinking of. The girl I met in church. We started as friends who go to places together. We were so close people thought we were lovers. I met her parents and she met mine too. They were happy to see me and my parents thought I’d found a good partner in her even when I hadn’t proposed to her. She kept me grounded. She kept me away from the curse that followed me from my childhood days. It looks like when the heart is in love, the mind thinks of only good things. I thought of possibilities and I dreamt dreams of a better future with her.

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The only reason I didn’t propose was that she was about to write exams. I didn’t want to be a distraction. I didn’t want to be the guy who took her mind off her studies. I waited until she completed her exams and proposed.  She sat quietly and listened to me. After I was done with my proposal, she burst out laughing. She laughed so loud I thought something was wrong somewhere. She said, “I am not ready to date anyone.” She was still laughing. What I said wasn’t funny at all but I guess she laughed because the thought of a relationship with me sounded ridiculous in her mind. I said all there’s to say. I painted a beautiful picture for our future. She said, “No. That’s not what I want. Let’s stay friends.”

We are friends yet we kiss. We kiss often.

She still has a thing for her ex and it’s the reason she’s keeping me as a friend. She doesn’t know I know that she’s still with her ex. She even introduced her ex to me as her childhood friend. It makes me confused. I don’t know what she wants from me. but I’ve seen a lot of red flags to walk away so mentally I’m out.

I thought falling in love deeply would keep me grounded but it didn’t. It rather worsened my situation. I kept me out and it brought me back in and when I’m back in, things get worse. My addiction to the sins of my childhood becomes so severe. I’m embarrassed to say this but I’ve thought of suicide once. I felt it was the right way to end things.

Currently, I’m 31 and I haven’t had any serious relationships. I’ve spent the best part of my life trying to uproot the seed Adzo sown in me when I was only a child.  I try my best but nothing good comes out of it. I’m here today asking a simple question. How can I win? How would I finally break out of this chain I’ve been in? Is there any easier way to do it that I don’t know? Please help.

—Davies

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