Sometimes you meet someone and you know that you have found all you need in life. The only thing to do is to stick with them and make them yours as soon as possible. I’m talking about the kind of connection that makes you say to yourself “I’m going to marry this person.” That’s exactly how I feel about her, the woman who has me dreaming of a happily ever after. You know what they say “No one is perfect.” And it is true, isn’t it? My woman is everything I want in my ideal partner but there is one thing about her I wish I could change. One thing that blurs my picture of a happily ever after with her.

I met her in 2020 when I was transferred by the company I work for to another branch. I was her superior but we became friends. I was drawn to her wonderful personality. The more we got to know each other the more I liked her. We learned that we had a lot in common and our friendship grew closer. We were best friends. We did almost everything together and went everywhere together.

After ten months of working together and being best friends, we decided to take our relationship to the next level. We grew from best friends to lovers. It has often been said that best friends make the best lovers, and it is true in our case. We were so in love. We still are. About three months into the relationship, she resigned from the company and got another job that would give her space and time to take some distance education courses. This didn’t affect our relationship and I’m always glad to know that distance can’t change what we’ve built together.

During Christmas break in 2021, we traveled to spend Christmas with my family so that my family would get to know her. When they met her, they loved her instantly. My family, my friends, and even my pastor wholeheartedly embraced her. It was a good sign that we were meant to be. We were very happy about the reception my people gave her. Our love grew deeper from there. I turn 30 and she turns 25 this year. We have talked about getting married and we’ve made plans for next year. After all this effort from my side, she doesn’t seem confident enough to introduce me to her family. She even blocks her pastor when she wants to post me on her status. I should be concerned but I’m not, because she has assured me she will do the introduction when she feels the time is right. I trust her judgment.

My problem with her has to do with the way she keeps her surroundings. Putting it mildly, she is a messy person. The actual word I should be using is dirty. She doesn’t seem to care about keeping a clean and tidy environment. This is a big problem for me. I like orderliness but she’s the opposite. I like things arranged properly and I like my bed made and room swept. I can’t function in an otherwise surrounding. My woman on the other hand can litter her room and leave dirty dishes all around her and she would be comfortable. When she visits me on weekends, she comes to meet my place organized but by the time she leaves, it’s a whole mess.

I understand that we are from different backgrounds and we’ve received different upbringings so we can’t act and do things the same way. So, I talked to her about it but she ended up arguing with me.  Later, she went ahead to do the same thing I complained about. No matter how tidy my room is, if she visits me on weekends and leaves, my room will be in a mess. She will not sweep the dirt she had created. She wouldn’t do my laundry. She will not lay the bed she had slept on. The bathroom would be left with stains all over. Everything would be in a mess by the time she leaves. I have even lost count of the number of times I spoke to her about how uncomfortable it makes me. I tell her “I don’t say this to judge you or make you feel bad. The goal of this relationship is marriage so we have to learn how to live with each other so we don’t create an uncomfortable environment for ourselves.”

One day she will listen. You’ll see a change in her attitude. For the next few weeks, she will do my laundry and clean things up. Just when I’m about to pat my back and congratulate myself for causing a change in her, she will go back to her old ways of doing things. She will sit and watch TV while I do my own washing. She will stay on her phone and laugh every now and then while I do my scrub the bathroom.  I will mop to where she sits and she would raise her legs for me to mop under them. When I ask her to help she would say, “I do it for you all the time. Do it this once.” The truth is, I can count the number of times she had helped since we became lovers two years ago.  I don’t even mind doing the chores myself, I do them all the time while she waits for me to finish so we can look at memes on her phone and laugh together.

It bothers me that I cannot spend time at her place the way she spends time at mine. I have tried but her room is infested with mosquitoes, due to her uncleanliness. When I tried to explain things to her she misunderstood me and said “You are saying I live on a rubbish dump.”

I hoped by telling her about her mosquito-infested place, she would take the cue and clean up a little and spray the room or even light some mosquito coils. Instead, it became a problem between us. “I sleep at your place willingly but you want me to force you to sleep at my place before you do.” She complained.

READ ALSO: I Sent A Harmless Message To My Husband’s Girlfriend And Now He’s Threatening Divorce

In order to put her mind at rest, I decided to sleep at her place. The moment I got to the Veranda, I was attacked by a gathering of mosquitoes and a heap of rubbish. I couldn’t contain myself. I screamed “Eii mosquitoes. Tomorrow I will go to my place.” She just looked at me and said “Go erh”. It disturbed me that she didn’t see anything wrong with her way of living.  I dressed up that night and left without waiting for the tomorrow I said I would leave.

I really love this lady. She’s beautiful and kind.  We’ve sat down several times to discuss our likes and dislikes. I’ve told her on many occasions how I detest filth and not putting things in their right places but she simply doesn’t care. Am I demanding too much? One day she managed to do some cleaning and tidied up her room. I praised her a lot and encouraged her to keep it up. Before I could blink, she had messed it all up.

We have plans to get married next year, 2023. We love each other and we want to spend our lives together but this is one thing I am finding very difficult to cope with. I always want to spend my weekends and holidays with her but her messy behavior turns me off. As for her place, I’m waiting for her rent to expire in August so that I get her another place.

I don’t want to break up with her. I’m looking for a way to make her change for the better. Is there a way? Is it possible to make her move away from her old way of doing things? I’ve tried in my own way and it’s not working. I really love her. She has her shortcomings but she’s a one-in-a-million kind of woman. I just want to know how to deal with her behavior—how to make her see the need to clean after her own self.

–Kwesi

Do you have any relationship experience to share? Email it to [email protected]

NOTE: NO PART OF THIS CONTENT CAN BE REPUBLISHED OR REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM WITHOUT THE EXPLICIT CONSENT OF THE EDITORS OF THIS BLOG