MOTHER AND CHILD

Sunday was mothering Sunday, and a whole lot of people were sending out messages to their mothers and updating their status on facebook telling everyone how they love their mom and all that. There was this particular tweet someone tweeted on twitter that made me laugh so hard.  It said, “Mothers are so fond of their children because they are very sure they are their own, unlike the fathers who are not so very sure”…..lol.  However that’s a story for another day.  Also, I saw lots of women who not only put up their mother’s pictures on facebook, but also that of the mother  in law as well. I was very impressed with this. I know lots of women these days do not get along with their mother in law . Sometimes there is this rivalry between women and their mother in law which if not properly handled may lead to serious problem within the family. I did experience this in the early years of my marriage.

I happen to be the only child of my mother (Dad had a child from another woman) and I lost dad when I just left secondary school so it was just my mum and I and we were so close. My wife and I started dating in my second year in the university and funny as it may seem, the first time I took my wife home and introduced her to my mother as my girlfriend my mum developed instant likeness for her so much so that they became so close then.  She was like the daughter she never had. They became so close that they were virtually doing everything together….. going to the market together, doing stuffs together and all that. So you can imagine how confused I was, when years later after we got married, my wife and my mom started having issues.  I immediately understood that these issues spun from the fact that my mom felt that I was no longer giving her the attention I use to give her, so she was doing everything to crave that attention. My wife on the other hand was of the opinion that my mum was been too worrisome and she should cut me some slacks, and understand that things are a bit different now.  So I had to call both women separately and explain to them that if they really want my happiness then they need to stop acting up. I was able to arrest the situation and put each woman in her right place. My mum is my mum, while my wife is my wife. They both have different roles they play in my life and the earlier they understand that, the better it would be for all of us.  Right now things have gone back the way it used to be and I’m happy about this. I laugh these days when they both gang up against me, most especially when one of them needs me to do something, they form alliance against me and I grudgingly give in. They now have this mother and child relationship once again, and we are one big happy family again.

The relationship between mothers and their son cannot be over emphasized . There is this close bond between them, most especially when the son happen to be the first child or the last child or the only son or only child. The mothers always fail to realize that her little boy would one day grow up to be a man and would go on and have his own family.

There is this story a colleague  told me about a friend of his whose closeness to his mother has prevented him from getting married. He said that every girlfriend he has had, refused to marry him because of his affinity to his mother. He always made them understand that he cannot live separately from his mother and his mother will live with them under the same roof when they eventually get married. It is not as if he cannot afford to set his mother up somewhere else as he is well loaded and have houses in different places in both Lagos and his hometown, but he is insisting that his mother would live with him. In most cases the girls get scared and refuse to go into the marriage. However, the mother has realized that she seem to be the problem of her son and that their closeness together is what is affecting him and preventing him from getting married and has since relocated abroad. Now it’s not as if the mother cannot live with him as the case may be, but it’s obvious in this case that the kind of bond that mother and son share is so tight that it would definitely put a stress on the marriage when eventually he gets married. The good thing here, however is that the mother has been able to realize this and try to create the enabling environment for her son to move forward. Not all mothers can do this. Please send me your comments and let me know what you think about the relationship between wives and mother in law.

 

 

 

 

BEDROOM WAHALA

Hello people, it’s been quite some time since I came in here. Work has been pressing so I barely have time . However, a lot has been happening around. Today’s post is going be a very long one, hope you take your time to read through it.

About two weeks ago I noticed that my friend Eke was not looking his usual self. He seem to have lost weight considerably Eke was what you would call a jolly good fellow, always fun to be with and there’s never a dull moment with him, so you can imagine my concern when he came into the bar we usually hung out and sat quietly nursing a bottle of beer and lost in his thoughts. He was not contributing to what we were discussing and seem to be in a world of his own. The Eke that I knew would always want to dominate the discussion and would not even allow others to talk, but on this particular day, things were different which made me believe something must have gone wrong. I quickly concluded that it must have been the close down of Ladipo market . Eke imports auto spare parts and sells wholesale to traders at ladipo so I felt the close down must have been affecting him.

Later that evening, he called me aside, and started complaining about his wife to me. They have been married for nine years and they have an eight year old boy. He said for some months now, his wife has been refusing him sex for no reasons, and that right now, they are no longer on speaking terms with each other at home and his home has become so unbearable for him so much so that he detests going home. I advised him to sit his wife down and talk to her and try to find out what the problem is. He told me that he has tried severally to do this, but its not working for him. He asked me to come talk to his wife. I wondered why he wanted me to talk to his wife and how I was going to start such a discussion. I however, agreed when he reminded me that his wife respects me a lot and looks up to me as an elder brother. (I was the one that introduced both of them together, the wife was my cousin’s best friend and they had both lived with me during their youth service year)

That weekend I went to their house to see them. His wife was so happy to see me. She didn’t seem like a woman who was unhappy and they appeared to have mended fences. When she went to get us drinks, I quickly asked Eke if all was well now, and to which he answered negative. He said that he was quite surprised that she was gisting with him now as if everything was fine. He asked me to still go ahead and talk to her and find out what the problem is. When I called her aside later to ask what the problem is, she told me that there was no problem and that she was surprised that Eke told me that they had issues. She called Eke and asked him in my presence if it was true that he told me that they had issues, Eke could not reply, he simply kept quiet. So I concluded that Eke was the problem but I couldn’t really pinpoint what the real issue was, so I allowed the matter to die because I didn’t know how I was going to proceed from there since I knew the crux of the matter has to do with the bedroom. I simply advised them to sort out themselves.

However, two nights ago, my phone rang late at night ,and when I looked at it, I found out that it was Eke’s wife that was calling me. I reluctantly picked up the call, only to hear the voice of their little boy saying , 'Uncle please come to our house quickly, my mummy and daddy are fighting. I tried to call back, to find out what was really happening, but the phone was not connecting anymore as it had been switched off. I called Mike, a mutual friend of ours and told him what was happening and he said we should meet at Eke’s place. I got there 30minutes later and met Mike who was already there. When I entered the house, the whole place was in disarray. I saw Eke sitting at the dining table looking so lost and frustrated. As I was about to approach him to find out what the problem was I saw his wife coming out from one of the rooms dragging a big box and their little boy crying behind her. I went up to her and tried to find out from her what the problem was. Justthen, she started crying and saying she can’t take this anymore. I allowed her to cry and she calmed down after a while and sat down. She asked her son to go his room that she will soon be with him and She asked Mike and I to sit down and then she started talking.

She said that for the past 2years Eke has been having issues with his manhood. He is barely able to get it up and that most times she would need to work on it for close to two hours before he will get partial erection and even at that, he’s barely able to sustain it leaving her frustrated and in need. She said she had advised him severally to seek help, but he keep saying he’s okay. She said it got to a point she decided there was no need getting intimate, because of what use will it be when she cannot get any satisfaction from it. However, every now and then Eke keeps pestering her for sex knowing how difficult it is for him to get erection and how most times he ends up ejaculating even before penetration. She said she decided to bear all these believing that one day things would get back to normal. She said she has been suffering in silence and has not told anyone about this not even her friends, and was quite surprised when I asked her two weeks ago if they had issues. She had decided not to say anything not wanting hurt his ego believing that he had decided to get help since he told me, but she later realized that I did not know what was really going on. Ever since then she has been pressurizing him on the need to get help but he has bluntly refused yet he wants to get intimate and when she refuses he gets angry and violent.

I looked at Eke, and wondered why he has kept this to himself all these while and has refused to get help. As far as I know there's nothing to be ashamed of here. 60 to 70 percent of men between the ages of 40-70 years experience erectile dysfunction at one point in their lives and this may be due to anxiety, depression, or psychological problems, however seeking help in the right direction often goes a long way in sorting this out. I pointed this out to Eke and told him that he should even be happy that he has a good and faithful wife. I often wonder why most men are ashamed to come to terms with erectile dysfunction. Having erectile dysfunction is not the end of the world and its something that happens in 1 out of every 10 men. The good thing is that it can be handled and treated so I see no reason why it should be hidden. Overall treatment for ED have improved significantly in recent years. These days most people are eventually able to get back to successful intercourse. So for those men out there experiencing this problem, do take a bold step and seek help. And for the wives that are affected, do not relent in your effort in helping your man.

Do send me your comments and let me know what you think about this. Cheers