There are two types of fights that happen in marriage. Because we are not perfect, one will do or say something wrong and can result in a fight. When our marriage was barely three months old, I went to work and later went out to chill with my friends. I didn’t call home to tell my wife that I would be late. I didn’t even know I had to call her and tell her I would be home late. I was my own man for so long before marriage. I didn’t ask permission to be out. I didn’t ask permission to chill with friends. I thought asking permissions was so class one and I wasn’t in class one to walk up to my madam and say, “Please madam, may I go out?” It could be inexperience. Around 9pm, my wife called, “Joe where are you?” 

I played it casual. I said, “I’m out with paddies. Is anything the problem?” Thirty minutes later I was still on the phone receiving lectures on why a man has to ask permission from his wife before he steps out with his friends. I said, “Dear, sorry. I will be home soon.” She screamed, “Don’t sorry me? How can you stay out till this late without saying anything to me? Is that how to behave as a husband? Were you not at counseling when the pastor said we are two in one body? How can you be out there and leave me here when we are supposed to be one?” I said, “It’s not that late? It’s only 9pm.” 

When you marry, late is no longer 12am. It can be late at 11am. It can be late at 12pm. It can even be late at 6am. It’s late when your wife says it’s late and you can’t say anything. That day when I got back home, she gave me a cold shoulder. My apology fell on the land with gravels so it didn’t germinate. (I hope you know your bible enough to understand this.) All night she scolded me while giving me lessons on marriage etiquette. That’s one of the fights that happen in marriage. This fight has a basis. You did something wrong and it resulted in a fight. You understand it’s your fault. You know where the anger is coming from and you know why the anger. This type of fight is easy to resolve. Even if it’s not easy, at least you know why the fight started in the first place.

The second type of fight is very dicey. You think you know why you’re fighting but you don’t actually know it. You’ll call your wife, “Darling…” and she’ll ask with an angry tone, “Why are you calling me darling?” You may answer, “I’m calling you darling because I always call you darling.” She’ll retort, “Don’t ever call me darling. Is Darling what’s on my birth certificate? When you came to my house to marry me, were my parents calling me darling? You better don’t. Next time you call me with that silly name, both of us won’t fit in this house.” You’ll ask, “Are you angry because I called you darling?” She will answer, “Why shouldn’t I be angry? Is my name darling? You go about calling all your concubines darling and you have the audacity to call me too darling. I’m not your darling so never call me darling.”

You know her anger isn’t coming from the darling you called her. You know there’s more to it than that so you approach her, “Dear, is everything alright?”

“He’s calling me Dear. Is that my name? Don’t you know my name? Stop that. You’re making me angry.”

This fight can go on for so long yet you wouldn’t know the actual reason why you’re fighting. You know for sure that there’s more to it but if you ask, she will tell you, “I’m  fine.” Even the ‘fine’ doesn’t look fine but she still won’t tell you what the problem is. It’s like fighting your own shadow or trying to run from it. You won’t win until she tells you, “I saw you talking to the usher who wore short skirts to church today. I don’t like it when you talk to women in short skirts. It looks like you don’t like me anymore because I wear long skirts. Stop it!” 

Then it hits you right in the face! 

I started having the second type of fight with my wife when our marriage was barely a year old. I fell sick. I thought I was going to die. For several months I moved from hospital to hospital trying to find out why my stomach hurts so bad every day. Doctors will touch my stomach and prescribe drugs. I will go home and take the drugs but nothing will change. I started losing weight. I could sweat all night and cry even in my sleep. I later found a good doctor who had time to look for what was really happening in my stomach. He said, “It’s appendicitis. You need surgery as soon as possible.”

The surgery was done and later got discharged. Healing started happening to me but it came at a cost. I lost weight. I mean a lot of weight. My mom saw me and said, “Your body is finished. The only thing you have left is your head attached to your neck. The rest is gone.” All the time I was going through the pains and sweating and crying at night, my wife was with me and she got scared too. She didn’t sleep as far as I was awake and crying. She was more worried than I was. She didn’t want to be a widow just around the morning glow of her marriage and it was understandable. When I started getting well, her smiles came back to her. 

After the surgery, I had no pain. I was stronger and had started going to work fully but my weight never came back to me. Weight is a tricky thing. When you gain it, it’s hard to lose it. When you lose it, it’s hard to gain it. I tried all I could to gain what I lost but it wasn’t coming back to me. My wife had seen me at my best so she was finding it hard to adjust to the new me who only had a big head on his tiny neck. She started avoiding me. At night, I will put my leg on her trying to draw her attention to my need—my Godly duty. She’ll open her eyes and tell me softly, “Please, remove those chopsticks off my body. It’s hurting me.” I will tell her, “But you know what I want. We haven’t done it for months.” She’ll say, “Get well first.” 

“But dear, I’m not sick!”

“Look into the mirror and tell me if you look like someone who is well.”

It continued for months. Each night when we slept, we fought about sex. She always found a way to deny me. The absence of sex makes a good man goes angry easily. I started getting mad about little things. I picked fights with her when there was no reason to fight. I felt empty and I felt she was the reason for my emptiness so I fought her over little things. Her phone beeped for an incoming text message one evening. I said, “The beep is so loud could you turn it off?” She looked at me like I was crazy. She said, “A beep? Just kpiin and you’re calling it loud?” We fought about it all night but deep down, it wasn’t about the kpiin. It was because she was denying me sex. Everything about her got me angry.

I brought the pastor in. She talked to her about it. She said, ”I’m not denying him sex. I’m rather helping him. He’s not well.” I said, “Pastor, please ask her for me. Maybe she thinks I’m having HIV. We can go to the hospital and do the test together.” She promised the pastor that she’ll change. In her own words; “I will do my best…” That statement hurt me like hell. My own wife had to do her best before she could get intimate with me. It’s hard to suspect that your wife finds you horrible but if she says things to confirm your suspicion, it makes things harder. 

After bathing, she’ll walk out of the bath naked and catwalk right in front of me. She’ll bend and smear pomade on her legs, displaying everything right before my eyes. Yet she won’t let me hit. How could a woman be this wicked? Five months and we still haven’t had any intimacy. I threatened to cheat. She laughed. She didn’t say a word but I heard this from her laughter, “Which woman in her right senses will lay with a man like you?” 

One night while watching TV with her I poured my heart out to her, “You’re frustrating this marriage with your attitude. You will drive me away and later call me names because a man can never be right. I will walk out of this marriage. Maybe that’s what you want but can’t say.” She said, “It’s not my fault that you’re sick. Instead of you concentrating on your health, you’re there thinking about what can kill you. Do you have the strength to even get on top?” 

One Saturday morning, I stood in the mirror naked and watched my body and compared it to the way I looked in my wedding picture on the wall. I looked nothing like I used to be. I was even shy to look into my own eyes in the mirror. I left the mirror and put some clothes on. I put on my sneakers and picked a bottle of water. I ran till it felt like my heart was giving up on me. When I got home and she saw me she smiled. She asked, “When did you add jogging to it?” I answered, “Today. I need to be in shape.”

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I woke up every morning and did some light training. I ate very well and slept very too. I stopped bothering about sex and stopped picking up an unnecessary fight. I took the fight to myself and decided to get better. I joined a keep fit club and did aerobics every Sunday. I worked with weights on Saturdays and jogged for the rest of the week.  I started filling the holes with muscles and started feeling confident in my own self. One dawn I felt something heavy on me so I opened my eyes to see what it was. My wife’s leg was on me. I look at her face and she was awake. She asked, “What?” I said, “I should ask you that question,” She said, “You can go back to sleep,” then turned her back on me, with her butt right on my face. I got the message. 

A few minutes later, we were both panting and looking for the right words to say. She asked me, “Are you happy now?” I chuckled. We did it again in the morning and did it again when we returned from work. We couldn’t get enough of each other and it’s been like this until now.

Marriage is hard we all agree. That’s why people leave at the first sight of trouble. It’s also the reason why some people doubt if they can ever marry. They don’t know the kind of hardship that awaits them in the future when they marry. I believe people perceive marriage as difficult because those who stay and fight until they win don’t usually share their stories. It’s always those who leave who are quicker to share the reasons why they left. Trust me, if you conquer the difficult part of marriage, the rest is all joy. It’s like iron coming out of the fire after it had been molded into a machete. What can’t it cut? 

–Joe 

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