Where marriage is a competitive sport

A young woman GoFunded her hospital bills (by way of posting her account number on Twitter so that folks who were so inclined could send her money) because her husband had allegedly spent their (her?) money on buying a dog and a new phone while she was busy almost-dying to delivering their first baby. If he were this foolish/heartless/evil, he wouldn’t be the first husband to be so.

I once heard of a woman who had twins and the husband forgot to pick them up the day they were discharged. She had to call an Uber to get home.  So, the man’s folly, heartlessness, or evilness isn’t what is remarkable about this latest case, but rather the tweets his wife previously posted during her pregnancy, praising her “supportive” partner and alluding to the kind of model wife she wanted to be: one who woke up at 4a.m. while pregnant to cook for her husband so that he wouldn’t be tempted by other women’s food.

Great.

A man who’d spend funds meant for his wife’s hospitalisation on a new dog (and a phone) isn’t really the kind of husband any woman should want to keep, let alone want to needlessly inconvenience themselves for. Neither is a man who’d watch you do that without calling out its silliness. And a man who is so easily led astray by his stomach, whose love and devotion and etc are so easily transferable depending on who is feeding him isn’t really adulting material, never mind husband material. That’s the message we should be hearing to our daughters and sisters.

Why should anyone want to marry a fickle-minded man-child whose affections are bought with a plate of jollof? Personally, I have never understood the mentality that a husband shows his love by eating his wife’s food. I have heard of husbands not eating at home or not eating meals prepared by their wives to signal their anger.

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In this day and age, the criteria for marriage and commitment shouldn’t revolve around food—who makes it, or whether or not it is eaten—so much so that a heavily pregnant woman is lauded for putting her own self-care aside to cater to the stomach of a grown man. Why isn’t the man making sure his heavily pregnant wife, the woman he’s sworn to love isn’t being spoilt? Because he’s been raised to think that he’s the prize.

Connected to this is the idea that any marriage is better than no marriage. Judging by social media posts, it’s almost a competitive sport. What is really sad to see is young women appear more concerned with the appearance of a relationship rather than the quality and substance of it. The pressure to maintain the façade of a perfect marriage was what led this woman, suffering at the hands of an unworthy man, to post tweet after tweet about how loving and supportive he was.

I may not be privy to the details of their relationship, but a man who would allegedly prioritise a dog and a phone over his wife didn’t just start misbehaving. Worse: this is a man that not only doesn’t care for his wife but knows that he would get away with it. Because he has been set up as The Prize.

Marriage isn’t an achievement – anybody can marry. That is not to say that marriage isn’t a good thing. I am married. My son has recently got engaged (and I wish him a solid, beautiful marriage with his beautiful, solid wife-to-be), but a bad marriage is a stealer of peace of mind. Do not tether yourself to an underserving man so that you can flaunt marriage on social media and elsewhere.

Having a husband, any husband at all shouldn’t be the ultimate goal for your life because when you are not discerning, you give access to the kind of man who’d abandon you in hospital to come home with an Uber after having your children, or the one who’d spend your hospital bill on a pet and a phone.

As a woman of a certain age, as one who’s been married for years now, it behoves me to tell our youth that the true value of a relationship lies in the mutual respect, love and real support shared between partners, not in how willing you, as a woman, are to cook and clean for your man. The aim shouldn’t be any marriage, but a healthy, respectful and genuinely supportive partnership.

We – as a collective – need to teach our daughters and sisters that their worth is not defined by their marital status or the public perception of their relationship but by their own happiness, self-respect and well-being. It is also worth reminding them that when they invite men to treat them like foot mats, they will invariably find men unscrupulous enough to do exactly that.