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As an almost-middle child myself, I’m familiar with the popular sentiment that middle children are often ignored and tend to dislike their position in the family. That isn’t the case for Timilehin (26).
He talks about how being a middle child has made his life easier and contributed to his being a well-adjusted adult.
The first time I realised people were supposed to have issues being middle children was at university.
I was in a talking stage with this babe, and when the conversation moved to families and siblings, she began feeling sorry for me after I said I was the middle child. It was like, “Oh no. I can’t imagine how lonely that must’ve felt”. I didn’t want to piss her off or make the conversation awkward, so I just said “Yeah” and moved on. But I was confused as hell. What do being a middle child and loneliness have in common?
I didn’t think about it again until a few months later. I was talking with a couple of my friends in the hostel about how much Nigerian parents can stress your life, and the conversation shifted to siblings. It turned out that some of my friends were also middle children and associated it with being a difficult experience.
I was more than a little surprised. I mean, we all agree that being the first or last born comes with challenges. As the first, you automatically become the third parent. And as the last, you sometimes turn to the chief errand goer.
But I didn’t know that middle children also battled loneliness because they didn’t get as much attention as the other kids and were often left alone to do their own things. I didn’t have that experience. In fact, I had an amazing life growing up. I still do.
I grew up with four other siblings. As the third of five children, that effectively made me the middle child. You know how you have vivid memories as a child of rushing to bring out the soup from the freezer just before your parents came back because you forgot to do that earlier? That was never my problem. That responsibility typically fell to one of my two older siblings. Sure, I had chores and all. But my parents never really put me in “charge” of something.
I also never really felt lonely. I’m just two years older than my immediate younger sibling, and our closeness in age meant we automatically became best friends. My brother was—and still is—my partner in crime. My older siblings could do whatever they wanted. I had my brother, and that was fine by me. If I wasn’t hanging out with him, I was perfectly content to sit in silence or fight imaginary enemies with sticks.
As an adult, I’m grateful I’m not in a position where my family expect so much from me. I’m 26, and our last born is 22. We’re technically in the same age range, so he’s more likely to call our older siblings for money before he even remembers me.
There’s also no black tax from my family because, again, my siblings are there. No one will disturb me to get married for at least seven years or until my siblings get married. Chores? Nope. I don’t live with my parents; only the lastborn does. I’m older than him, so I still get to send him on errands whenever I’m home.
Another thing I absolutely love about being the middle child is the absence of pressure. My oldest sibling just switched to tech after spending several years studying medicine simply because my parents decided they wanted to be called “daddy doctor” and “mummy doctor”.
My second older sibling had to study law. She’s practising now, but I don’t think she ever really decided it was what she wanted. No one batted an eyelid when I chose human resources. However, that could be because they were relieved I finally got uni admission after waiting for two years.
That’s another thing — my parents didn’t stress that I failed JAMB twice. My big sister still says she can’t believe they didn’t fuss too much after I failed. Maybe they just didn’t care, or they’d grown enough to realise that flogging children into submission didn’t do much. Whichever way, I’m just glad I had space to figure out what I wanted to do.
I think space and pressure from home are two factors that can determine just how difficult navigating adulting can be. I have friends who hate their jobs but can’t leave because they have responsibilities at home and need to earn money. I quit two toxic jobs without backup plans just because I could. I know I don’t have to impress anybody, I have space to try things, and there’s no pressure to figure things out immediately. If bad turns to worse, I can always run back to my siblings or parents. My life is the definition of a “well-adjusted adult”.
I won’t lie; it’s a stress-free way to live. I love my life, and I wouldn’t change a thing.
What’s it like navigating a marriage in which you have to endure disapproval from your spouse’s family — especially in a family-centred society like ours? That’s been Ese’s* reality for the last ten years.
She talks about enduring hate from her in-laws, believing her previous miscarriages are linked to spiritual attacks and how she navigates her situation.
There’s a saying popular among Nigerians: “You don’t marry the man, you marry his family”. It means that family approval, specifically from the in-laws, is necessary for a marriage to work.
I didn’t have the approval of my husband, Yinka’s family when we got married in 2014, but I didn’t think it would be a big deal. After all, Yinka* loved me and insisted we didn’t need his family to be happy together.
Funny enough, I’d known Yinka’s family long before we got married. My mum and Yinka’s mum were friends. My mum sold women’s shoes and Yinka’s mum was her good customer. As a teacher, she was always buying shoes.
I used to help my mum at her shop whenever I was home from school, and it sometimes meant following her to drop shoes at her customers’ houses. That was how I first met Yinka. I was 12 years old, he was 14, and he was my first crush. I remember drawing his name on my hand with a biro and scrubbing it off immediately after so my dad wouldn’t catch me.
But Yinka and I didn’t become friends until four years later when I resumed at the same university he attended. My mum had told his mum about my uni admission and both mums decided he should help me secure off-campus accommodation since he knew the area better.
I still liked him, and it looked like he liked me too. We hung out regularly. By my third year in school, we officially started dating. He graduated some months after we started our relationship, and it was at his graduation party that his mum figured out we were dating.
His mum had brought coolers of party rice — normal for university graduation ceremonies — and I was running up and down helping to share the rice and take pictures. She knew me, of course. But she realised my running up and down was more than friendship. She called Yinka that night to ask if we were dating, and he said yes. Her response was, “Omo Igbo? Why?” I’m not even Igbo, but I guess it means we’re all the same to her.
Yinka thought she was joking and laughed it off. She also didn’t pursue the issue. I guess she thought it was just a fling. But she realised he was serious when he took me to visit her “officially” a year later in 2011. That’s when the problem started.
The thing is, Yinka is the last born of five children. Plus, he’s the only boy and his dad died when he was a baby. His mum had it tough raising them, and for some reason, she thought his marrying from another tribe — specifically Igbo — meant she wouldn’t “eat the fruits of her labours”. According to her, Igbo women only know how to eat their husband’s money, lack respect and also won’t let the man’s family come close.
Of course, I didn’t know these were her reasons then. I know now because I’ve heard it repeated to me several times.
She had a bold frown on her face all through that first visit. This was the same person who used to dash me money as a teenager. After Yinka and I left, she called him on the phone and told him to end the relationship. He told me about it, and I innocently thought I just needed to show her how hardworking I was.
I decided I’d start visiting her every weekend to help her out with chores. The second time I visited, she asked me if I didn’t have anything to do for my mother at my own house. No one had to tell me to stop going.
His sisters also snubbed all my attempts to be close to them. I’d call, send birthday text messages and even visit to help out during major events, but it was obvious they didn’t like me. Even then, I didn’t think the disapproval was serious. My parents liked Yinka and our mums still talked.
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In 2013, Yinka proposed.
The night of the proposal, his mum called mine and told her there was no way the marriage would happen. It turned into a shouting match, and my mum called me that same night to return the ring. That night was so dramatic. How many women have you heard say they cried all through on the day of their proposal?
Yinka had to take the issue to his mum’s pastor. The man spoke to her and told us to go ahead with the wedding planning. Yinka’s mum respected her pastor and kept quiet. My parents were another matter. They didn’t understand why I wanted to die there when the man’s family didn’t want me.
In the end, the wedding happened because I got pregnant. Me, my mum and husband, kept it from my dad because he would’ve never allowed the wedding to happen.
My husband’s immediate family didn’t attend the traditional wedding in my village. It was his uncle and some people from church who attended. On the white wedding day, my mother-in-law brought her own live band and divided the reception hall into two. Our DJ was playing music on one side, and her live band was playing on the other side. The DJ had to just take the cue and stop the music. Yinka’s sisters and mum also refused to dance with us when it was time for the husband’s family to dance with the couple. Instead, they went to dance in front of the live band as their friends sprayed them with money.
Yinka just kept telling me to “calm down. They’ve done their worst.”
I should thank my in-laws for drawing me closer to God because these people started attacking me two days after the wedding. I had a dream where one of Yinka’s sisters hit me with a cane. I woke up with a stomach ache and had a miscarriage three days later.
I thought it was a coincidence, but I had three more miscarriages over the next three years, and they always happened after a dream where I’d see someone in Yinka’s family. When I noticed the pattern after the third miscarriage, I told my mum and we started visiting pastors and attending prayers. I prayed o. Almost every weekend, I was at one church or the other for a vigil or deliverance session.
I have two children now, and both times, I fasted almost all through the first three months of pregnancy. I also didn’t tell Yinka until the third month because I didn’t want him to tell his family. He didn’t even know the spiritual battle I was facing. I only told him about the first dream. His response was, “Are you saying my sister is a witch?” So, I just focused on winning the battle in prayers.
I still see his family members in my dreams sometimes, but I always give it to them hot hot. I don’t joke with my prayers.
We moved to a different state in 2019 and now only see them during family occasions where they give me weird looks and taunting words. Me, I just mind myself.
I also don’t report them to my husband because what use is it if he starts fighting with his family? Won’t that prove their reason for hating me in the first place?
I wonder about the reason for all the attacks and hate. It’s not like Yinka is one millionaire. He’s just a civil servant, and I contribute equally to the home’s expenses. Sometimes, I even convince him to send them money so it wouldn’t be like I’m the only one “eating his money”. But I guess you can do no good in the eyes of people who are already determined to hate you.
*Names have been changed for the sake of anonymity.
Every week, Zikoko seeks to understand how people move the Naira in and out of their lives. Some stories will be struggle-ish, others will be bougie. All the time, it’ll be revealing.
“Do crypto with Quidax and win from a $60K QDX prize pool!” Bayo, a 28-year-old Lagosian tells Jide, his Ibadan friend seeking the most secure way to trade crypto in Nigeria after a major exchange he trades with announced its plans to leave the country. Find out more here.
What’s your earliest memory of money?
I don’t have a specific money memory apart from spending my pocket money on books and two-for-₦5 sweets. I grew up privileged, so I didn’t have to think about money. It was just there.
Tell me more about your privilege.
My dad owned a law firm, and my mum didn’t have to work, so that should give you an idea. My pocket money in secondary school was ₦1,500/week, and my school provided lunch, so I was just spending on books, snacks and whatever else I liked.
My dad was pretty strict with money, though. I have five siblings, and we used to spend every summer vacation in England. During those six-week trips, my dad would give me a £500 allowance I had to use to shop for outing clothes for the rest of the year. He’d occasionally give the extra £50 for cinema outings or to go on the bus, but I had to run him through everything I planned to do so he’d approve. He had a particular way of doing things, and my siblings and I had to do exactly like he said to remain in his good books.
Fast forward to 2007, I finished secondary school and went on to do two years of college in the UK — a prerequisite to study medicine at university. After college, my dad said I had to study law like him or return to Nigeria.
What did you choose?
Law in the UK. I didn’t want to lose the freedom I had in England. Even if he’d said I should do animal dentistry, I’d have done it.
My monthly allowance was £500 in my first year in 2009, which was enough to cover my phone bills, food and transportation. But there was hardly anything left at month’s end because I also liked spending on things that made my life easier — I still do. Small rain would fall, and I’d pick taxis instead of waiting for the bus.
Then, I’d manage whatever I had left till the month’s end because I couldn’t call home for more money.
Why not?
I’d have to explain to my dad where the money went, and I’m uncomfortable asking people for money. Maybe it’s pride, but I’d rather not do it.
By the time I left uni in 2012, my allowance had increased to £900, but I still had money problems. I’d also developed a taste for retail therapy, so that didn’t help. I returned to Nigeria with zero savings. Then I went to law school and started working for my dad at his law firm during NYSC in 2014.
Were you paid a salary at your dad’s firm?
Oh, yes. My dad treated me like a regular employee. I was paid ₦150k/month — the same amount he paid every entry-level lawyer. He got me a car so I could drive myself to the firm though.
The funny thing was that he didn’t show me any favouritism at work but expected so much from me. Other lawyers would go home after regular work hours, and I’d have to stay until 10 p.m. if he was still in the office. When we’d eventually leave, he’d drive with his police escort and leave me to drive alone at night. I didn’t have any free time; I was almost always working.
Then, I had to leave the firm in 2016.
What happened?
I got pregnant, and my dad wanted me to get an abortion. It wasn’t a teenage pregnancy o — I was 24, and he knew my boyfriend. He just wanted me to do things the way he wanted. He even promised to upgrade my car to an SUV and fully sponsor my wedding if I did as he said.
But I didn’t want to live like that for the rest of my life; always doing whatever he said. So, I refused, and he disowned me. I lost my job and car and had to leave the house. My dad and I haven’t spoken since. My siblings are also not allowed to contact me.
Damn. What did that mean for you?
I moved in with my boyfriend. He worked in construction — still does — but his contracts didn’t come every month. He could get a ₦5m job today and then nothing else for a while. We went through a rough patch because of that. We were also saving every income that came in for me to have the baby in America. I didn’t think the America thing was necessary, but I went with it.
Also, I was suddenly very aware that I didn’t have money. Money was always there, but now it wasn’t. I was almost always ill during pregnancy, and the electricity supply in his area was terrible. We had to sleep without light multiple times because there was no money to fuel the generator. I wasn’t used to that, and it was tough adapting. It was a depressing period.
Sorry you went through that.
Thank you. My boyfriend and I had a registry wedding, and I travelled to America to have my baby. We had family there, so it worked out.
We made the best decision choosing America because my child was born with genetic defects that required surgery. Obamacare was still effective in the state where I had my child, so we got the surgeries and other healthcare benefits for free. We only paid for the birth, and that saved us about $250,000 in medical bills. I stayed in America for about a year before returning to Nigeria in 2017.
Did you try returning to the workforce?
Yes. I started job-hunting immediately. But I ran into a couple of issues. Law was my only experience, so I inevitably applied to law firms. But my dad is quite known in legal circles because of some high-profile cases he’d worked on.
Once prospective employers connected the dots and realised I was related to him, they were no longer interested. One even said I was coming to spy for my dad. Of course, I couldn’t go around telling everyone he disowned me so they’d trust me. They just couldn’t understand why I’d leave my dad’s firm to work elsewhere. After a while, I told myself that pursuing a law career wasn’t possible. It’s a good thing it wasn’t even my passion.
That’s wild. What did you do?
I started looking for “any work”. Anything to put on my CV. In 2018, I got a ₦25k/month business development role at an insurance company. I was promoted within two months to business development manager, and my salary increased to ₦40k. I also had a 7.5% commission on sales, so sometimes I made up to ₦100k in salary and commissions. I left the job after nine months because I didn’t like sales. It’s like walking up to people to beg them to give you money.
I feel you.
In my next job, I worked as a user researcher at a bank for ₦100k/month. My goal was to cross the ₦150k salary I earned while at my dad’s law firm to prove I could earn it on my own. He’d said I wouldn’t survive without him, and I wanted to prove him wrong.
I figured the quickest way to earn more was by upskilling, so I began to invest in online courses around user experience. I spent almost two years at the bank before I moved to another job in 2021. This one paid ₦189k after taxes, and I used my first two salaries to pay for a ₦200k Udacity course. To me, investing in my career was a better decision than trying to save.
Why did you think so?
I wasn’t earning enough to save. If I saved ₦50k/month, for instance, I’d only have ₦600k at the end of the year. It still wouldn’t make sense even if I got a 15% interest. But I can take that same ₦50k to invest in a course and work on getting a new role that pays five times what I was earning.
I got that advice from someone on Twitter and ran with it. I got another UX research job in 2022; my salary was ₦350k/month. By the time I left the job in 2023, I’d been promoted a couple of times, and my salary was ₦500k. Between 2022 and 2023, I spent about ₦2m on an education program with an international business school.
That’s a long way beyond your ₦150k goal
I’d have been excited to earn ₦350k in 2012. I mean, that money could take you to Dubai. I should’ve felt like I could finally relax, but the fluctuating exchange rate meant I couldn’t even enjoy the fact that I was earning more. It’s even worse now.
It’s the reason I decided to work towards earning in dollars. Towards the end of 2023, I started writing and sharing what I’d learned from my multiple courses on LinkedIn. A content manager reached out, and I got a gig — $350 for every technical article I write for their blog.
I’ve written at least one article a month since then. I did two articles in March and hope to keep that up. But I started another full-time job in January, and I’m a mum of two now, so it’s a lot to juggle.
How much does the new job pay?
₦1.5m/month, which is great because I’ve finally started saving. Since January, I’ve saved my dollar earnings in a domiciliary account and one-third of my naira earnings in a fintech savings account. I’ve also considered saving my dollars in a fintech platform to earn interest, but my challenge is having to buy the dollars on their platform. Why can’t I just transfer from my domiciliary account? I might just open a dollar-denominated mutual fund account and leave my savings there. I’m open to suggestions from whoever reads this sha. What should I do with my dollars?
I’ll be sure to ask them. How much have you saved right now?
$1,500. I recently took $500 out of it to treat my husband on his birthday. I’m looking to start saving half of my salary monthly, but I’m currently running a part-time Master’s program and eyeing a ₦750k course, so the saving plan is still just a plan.
Do you have a saving goal?
I’m saving because spending the whole money wouldn’t make sense. My husband handles most of the bills. If I ever have to save for something big, it’ll probably be buying a house or my kids’ education.
Japa might be an option, but my husband’s business is here, so we’ll need to put a lot of thought into it before deciding to leave.
How would you describe your relationship with money?
I’m still learning. I want to say I have it all figured out, but I really don’t. I’m not frivolous, but I definitely need better money management skills. For instance, every time I get a salary bump, apart from thinking about courses, I’m also considering what I can do to appreciate the people around me. Like, how do I appreciate my husband? Or make my kids’ lives better? I even increased the salaries of my housekeepers and security guard.
I want to save more because I might not have a choice with how inflation is going. I can’t confidently say earning ₦1.5m will still be considered a good salary in the next three years. So, I need to improve my savings and investment portfolio even as I try to earn more. Again, I’m open to financial advice.
Apart from saving, what other lifestyle changes have come with earning more?
Not much. My kids are still my biggest expense. My husband handles most of the bills; I just pay for food and the random things my kids need. I also have two housekeepers — over 18 — who go to school and some other vocational training, so I give them pocket money and handle expenses like their clothes and hospital bills. My husband pays them salaries, but they save it.
Can we break down these expenses into a typical month?
Most of my black tax expenses are spent on my kids’ teachers, house staff, and in-laws. My husband and I also contribute about ₦30k – ₦50k each to purchase monthly welfare packages (mostly foodstuff) and share with underprivileged people in my neighbourhood. The economy is terrible, and it’s our way of easing other people’s burdens.
Talking about the economy, I’m always shocked by my food expenses. When I was earning ₦100k, grocery shopping was like ₦50k in a month. Why am I spending more than triple that for almost the same things now?
Omo. I can’t answer that. What’s an unplanned expense you made recently?
I renewed my car’s comprehensive insurance and passport in February. The renewal wasn’t unexpected; it was the increased fee, especially for the car insurance. When my husband bought the car two years ago, insurance was around ₦180k.
It moved to ₦350k in January 2023, and now it’s ₦430k. Usually, my husband pays, but I offered to do it because I’d just gotten my new salary. The passport renewal was for a 10-year validity period, and I paid to fast-track it. It cost ₦140k.
What’s an ideal salary you think you should be earning now?
$5k/month. I see it as something I need to work towards rather than something I’m owed. I’ll be set for life if I can earn a minimum of $5k/month for the next 10 – 20 years. I don’t need to become a billionaire or make it so my kids don’t have to work a day in their lives before I’ll be fulfilled.
In fact, I want my kids to work and know the value of money. I want them to enjoy, but they should also know what it takes to get what they enjoy and be responsible contributors to society.
Is there anything you want right now but can’t afford?
A number of things, actually. I want to own my own home someday and have enough money to take a family vacation every two years. I’d also like to be able to afford to put my house keepers through school till university comfortably. Same for my kids as well, preferably outside the country.
How would you rate your financial happiness on a scale of 1-10?
6. I can afford my basic needs, but I don’t think there’s enough structure in place yet to give my children and family the life I want for them. There’s promise, though. I just need to keep going the way I am.
The funny thing is, if you’d asked me how happy I’d be earning ₦1.5m last year when I was still on ₦500k, I’d have said a 10. It’s good to have something else to look forward to, though.
I’m curious. Do you think you’ll ever reconcile with your dad?
A part of me wants us to, but I know he can be quite problematic and controlling, and I don’t want issues. I miss my siblings, but the only way I can have a relationship with them is if I get back on my dad’s good side. Maybe it’s better like this.
If you’re interested in talking about your Naira Life story, this is a good place to start.
My life changed forever on the night of March 11, 2012. That was the night my dad died while trying to cross the road, unaware that he was walking directly into the path of an okada with no headlights. My housemistress told me the news the next day at school. I was 13, and I was shattered.
I was a proper daddy’s girl. Of my parents’ two girls, I was the one who looked most like him. I was also the only child for the first ten years of my life. There are stories of how, as a toddler, I’d follow my dad everywhere, even to the toilet. I rarely let my mum pick me up. It was always “my daddy”.
I think my mum started to resent how close I was to him. As I grew older, I began to call my dad “my love” because that’s what he called me too. My mum would make offhand remarks about how I was ganging up with her husband against her or how I came to steal her husband, and my dad would laugh over it.
Most times, the remarks had a tense undertone. Especially when she tried to flog me whenever I was naughty, and I’d run to my dad for help. He preferred to punish by taking away my toys and talking things over. To my mum, he was just spoiling me, and they clashed over it regularly.
Maybe he did spoil me, but I preferred hanging out with him. I even used to run away from the sitting room once I heard my mum returning home from her shop because she always seemed angry. When she gave birth to my sister, it was like they divided the children among themselves. I was daddy’s girl, and my sister was mummy’s girl. So, it all worked out.
Then my dad died, and it felt like my person had left. I didn’t really have a relationship with my mother, so I couldn’t process my grief with her. I’m not even sure how she processed hers. She just cried for a few days and kept to herself. When the relatives and mourners finally left our house after the burial, all that was left was empty silence. My sister was three years old and didn’t really understand what was happening.
Thankfully, I didn’t have to navigate the silence for long because I returned to boarding school. But whenever I was home, the silence was there. When we weren’t silent, she was scolding me for one thing or the other. I either didn’t sweep well enough or didn’t mop the way she would have.
I finished secondary school in 2014 and returned home to pursue a university admission. 2014 was also the year my mum remarried. Two months before the wedding, she called me and my little sister to the sitting room and told us we’d have a new daddy soon. I’m not sure I felt anything about it.
We met the man that week, and he seemed nice enough. The only thing on my mind was gaining admission and leaving them to it.
But admission didn’t come easy. I failed JAMB and had to wait an extra year at home. While I waited, I attended tutorial classes from morning to evening, and by the time I returned home at 6 p.m., it was usually just me and my mum’s husband. That was when he’d return from work, too, while my mum stayed at her shop till around 9 p.m. My sister’s school bus would drop her at the shop, so they always came home together.
The arrangement worked at first. I’d return home, cook dinner and serve her husband before going to my room for the rest of the night. But he started dropping comments like, “Why are you running to your room? Come and spend time with me.” Other times, he’d encourage me to greet him with hugs since “I’m like your dad.” I found the whole thing weird and just kept my distance.
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I finally gained admission in 2015. A week before I had to resume at the university, this man tried to rape me. That day, when he returned home from work, he tried to get me to hug him as usual, but I politely laughed it off and returned to my room.
A few minutes later, he called out to me to pick something from his room. I actually thought he was outside, but I entered the room, and he suddenly appeared from behind the door. It’s still a bit triggering to think about how he tried to pin me down and cover my screams with his lips and whispers of “Don’t be a baby, now.”
I’m not sure how I managed to escape. I must’ve kicked him because, one minute, he was on top of me, and the next, he was on the ground. I ran out of the house to our street junction to wait for my mum.
When I eventually saw her, I ran to her and narrated the whole thing. She was visibly shocked and even started crying. She led me back home and confronted her husband. The man denied the whole thing and claimed I ran out of the house because he caught me with a boy. He swore up and down that he’d never try such and I was just making things up.
My mum believed him. There was nothing she didn’t say to me that night. How I didn’t want her to enjoy her home. How I’d never been in support of her marriage. How I’d grown to be a liar and prostitute.
To this day, I don’t know if she truly believed I was capable of such a lie, or was simply choosing to make herself believe what she desperately wanted to be true.
I decided to avoid her husband as best as I could while I counted the days before I could leave for uni. The plan was to stay out all evening till my mum returned at night. But the first day I did that, he reported me to my mum, saying I didn’t cook his dinner. She warned me to never let that repeat itself, and that’s when I knew I had to find a way out.
Behold our Valentine Special. We brought back three couples we interviewed in 2019 to share how their relationships have evolved in the last five years. This is the first episode.
The next day, after they’d gone out, I took some clothes, my school documents and the ₦68k my mum hid somewhere and travelled to the state my university was located. It was about three days to resumption, and I didn’t have a plan or anywhere to stay.
But I got to the university in the evening and met some fellowship people on campus who were trying to mobilise fresh students. I told them I didn’t have anywhere to stay. They let me sleep in the fellowship hall for two days before their other members resumed, and I went to stay with one of them at their hostel.
My mum called me the day I left, screaming and calling me a thief. That went on for about two minutes before I ended the call. She didn’t even bother to ask where I was, and she never called back. Maybe she thinks I followed my imaginary boyfriend.
I haven’t seen or spoken to her since 2015. I survived the years at school with the fellowship’s help and the little money I made from making people’s hair, a skill I learnt in boarding school.
I found my sister by chance on Facebook in 2023, and reached out. Our first call was so awkward because we had almost nothing to say. I wasn’t surprised to hear that my mum had fed her with stories of how I stole her money and ran away to destroy my life. We chat occasionally.
At least, I know my mum is still alive and married to that man. But she’s dead to me. I’m not sure if we’ll ever unpack everything that went wrong between us or if I’ll ever be willing to do so.
I don’t even know how to ask my sister if he ever tried to abuse her too. I feel like I abandoned her, but I also know there wasn’t much I could do but save myself. I consciously try to push the whole experience to the back of my mind. I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready to work through it.
Funke Akindele’s latest production, A Tribe Called Judah (ATCJ), is Nollywood’s highest-grossing film of all time, but it’s also earned applause for its home-hitting storytelling and excellent cinematography. Its filmmaker and cinematographer, Barnabas Emordi, AKA Barny Blockbuster, is known for his camera work on other acclaimed productions like Ada Omo Daddy (2023), The Ghost and the Tout Too (2021) and Elevator Baby (2019).
In a chat with Zikoko, Barny shares his experience on the set of ATCJ, the importance of visual styles in film and his personal challenges in Nollywood.
How did you join the A Tribe Called Judah crew?
Barny: Aunty Funke (Funke Akindele) and film director, Adeoluwa Owu, brought me in during the script development in April 2023 before we went into preparation for shooting. When I read the script’s first draft, I saw the possibility of a big picture. This film has all the right attributes that drive the Nigerian audience to the cinema, like family and love. I and the entire team believed it would be a banger, but it exceeded expectations.
What intrigued you about the story?
Barny: Family. I think stories that pull families together are my speciality. In Elevator Baby, Day of Destiny and MTV Shuga Naija 5, the characters are uniquely complicated. A clear example is Pere Judah in A Tribe Called Judah. He’s one of his mum’s favourites, but he’s influenced by the environment he grew up in, his family and various complexities that have made him unique. He can still be called a good person who makes the ultimate sacrifice by stealing to save his mum’s life.
Many moving parts in the characters’ lives make them endearing to the audience, even if they aren’t perfect. That’s the beauty of humans — recognising our differences and coming together as a family or country to battle against whatever the world brings us. No matter how different the troublesome sons in A Tribe Called Judah are, there’s one consistent thing about them: they genuinely love each other, and they love their mother. They’re also united as a family, which is the core of the entire film.
What’s your favourite thing about the film?
Barny: I enjoyed being on set; it was beautiful to watch Funke Akindele at work. The details and intensity she puts into her work are motivating. I loved that and the dedication of the crew too. I had the tools I needed — I could bring out my visual style and execute properly.
How would you explain “visual style”?
Barny: Visual style is the element that builds the world in a film. Stories are different, and so are their visual styles. Visual style elevates the storytelling and the audience’s emotional attachment to the character. If all the elements and subtle techniques come together right, I’ve done my part as a cinematographer.
For A Tribe Called Judah, we aimed for realism. The visual style was to capture the essence of family, love and sacrifice. We employed lighting techniques that felt natural for various scenes. We used different cameras, like Arri Alexa 35 and Canon Sumire Primes, to make the audience emotionally attach to the Judah family.
What draws you to familial stories?
Barny: I genuinely love family. My family is fantastic; they love, support and care about every aspect of my life. They are my biggest supporters. I’ve also made incredible friends who are now family. They love wholeheartedly. I love films that preach family values, love, togetherness and sacrifice. Also, we practise communal living in Nigeria, and the family unit is the most important social institution in the world.
How do you balance creative independence with working with others?
Barny: The most important thing is understanding the overall vision for a project and knowing you’re a vital tool in bringing that vision to life. Filmmaking is a collaborative process. I know my work, but I fully understand that I’m a part of the team. This makes it easier to collaborate with other individuals.
As Barny Blockbuster, what would you say makes a blockbuster?
Barny: In the Nigerian context, a blockbuster is a film that makes over ₦100 million at the box office. It comes with joy that I’ve done this with Elevator Baby and Ada Omo Daddy, and now, A Tribe of Judah.
Image source: Barny
What was life like for you before Nollywood?
Barny: I was in school. I graduated from Delta State University with a degree in Mathematics in 2015. Before NYSC, I wanted to get busy with something meaningful. I reached out to my friend, Gbenga Gomez, a cinematographer and steady-cam operator who was already in the industry at that time, to let me follow him around and help with anything on set. During that period, I fell deeply in love with filmmaking.
Some people have deep meanings behind their love of filmmaking. For me, I’ve always loved watching movies, Nigerian or foreign. From the VHS to the DVD era, I watched all I could get my hands on. But the stronger pull was the money I thought I could make. My early days as an assistant on movie sets gave me a tangible amount of money that kept me going. I felt that if I worked hard and stayed committed to the art, it would lead me to success in the future. That motivation deepened my love for filmmaking.
What’s the first film you made?
Barny: It was with my friends. We used to do random jobs on film sets and put money together to make short films in our neighbourhood. It contributed significantly to our learning process, and we could trust each other to become better filmmakers and storytellers. But my first feature film as a camera operator is Elevator Baby.
Source: @barnyee
Which of your films was hard to make?
Barny: Man, every film is hard to make in Nigeria. Ask other Nollywood filmmakers, and they’ll tell you the same thing. Something always comes up, like disturbances from touts, inadequate daylight to film and low budget. Budget is the biggest issue; a budget needs to be in place right from the film development stage. When the audience complains about weak plot in Nollywood movies, I think about this.
Imagine there’s no money to pay story developers. When they should be in the writing room for months, they can end up spending only a week in the writing room. That’s a problem. An inadequate budget will make a production that should take months to wrap up in weeks.
But the beauty of these problems is that we explore all our resources and creativity to deliver an excellent production. Nollywood still competes internationally; our stories are screened at international festivals and receive notable awards. Prominent brands are coming to Nigeria to collaborate with us because our genuine love for the art is evident to them.
Do these brands come with bigger budgets that have improved production quality?
Barny: The bigger brands are playing their role. Production quality has improved massively over the past few years, and money has been an important factor. Our scripts and productions are getting bigger. I’m genuinely excited about the next few years in Nollywood because there’s a certain level of excellence that’s notable. We’re already working on amazing stories that’ll excite the audience and strengthen the industry. It can only get better.
What’s a good budget for a movie?
Barny: It largely depends on the scale of the film you’re trying to make. Averagely ₦100-200 million for a mid-size film in Nigeria. It can go up to a million-dollar budget for a film like The Black Book. Budgets are determined by so many factors. It’s always tricky to call a number because you’ll need to factor in marketing and so many other aspects.
Are there emerging trends in cinematography you’re excited to explore?
Barny: I’ve been quite excited about the new sets of Arri lighting technology recently introduced to the market. It would help us to expand our lighting arsenal, expose us to various effects that’ll influence and stylise the way we approach lighting design in Nollywood. It’s pretty easy to operate as well, has the best colour rendering index (CRI), large range of lights, minimal power for maximum output and efficiency. It’s an outstanding development.
What challenges do you face in your work?
Barny: My biggest challenge is finding time to schedule all the projects I’ve set out to work on to avoid clashes. There’s always little time between finishing up a project, sitting down to study a new script, breaking it down in your head, and then, having a conversation with the producers or directors of the film to understand their vision. Filmmaking takes time, and one needs to prep and put things together so that execution can be great. That’s my primary challenge at the moment.
Seems like you’re suffering from success
Barny: I can’t complain. When things are like this, it also speaks to my efficiency and capacity to do great work, and that makes me bankable. Producers trust me to use their money well and deliver, and I have to live up to their expectation.
Does the volume of your output bother you?
Barny: I freelance, and that makes me open to working with all the biggest production companies in Nigeria. If one is consistent with executing big projects at high levels, it’ll attract more clients to you. That’s been my case, and so far, I like it.
What’s the difference between working freelance or non-freelance as a cinematographer?
Barny: If I wasn’t working freelance, I’d be stuck working with one production company for the duration I signed in a contract. Production companies may not produce more than one or two films in a year due to development and preparation time. Freelancing lets me take on as many jobs as possible. It gives me the freedom to execute projects that align with what I’m trying to achieve in the industry.
Chima* (36) has two children under five years old, and compared to the average income of most Nigerians, he’s a high earner. But when I asked how parenting has affected his budget and cost of living, he simply responded: “I’m now poor”.
I didn’t go into parenting blind. I knew having children would stretch my finances. But I wasn’t prepared for how much.
It was a full house growing up — six children and just as many cousins and extended family members dropping in at one point or the other. It was chaotic, but I loved it. When I started thinking about marriage and having my own family, I decided I wanted six children too.
Of course, my girlfriend (now wife) was horrified when I first mentioned it during one of our “planning the future” talks. Coming from a much smaller family with only one sibling, she couldn’t fathom having six children. The conversation went something like this:
Me: I’ve always wanted to have six children like my parents. Don’t you think it’d be an adventure?
Girlfriend: Six, as how? Who will “born” all of them?
We eventually reached a compromise — four children. That was the plan when we got married in 2018, but I can confidently say the plan has changed now.
I was earning ₦400k/month at the time, and it was more than enough in the beginning. My wife’s salary was ₦100k/month, but it was mostly for her needs or when she took me out for a treat. I took care of everything else. The major expenses were the ₦800k annual rent, feeding, clothing and transportation, and of course, romance bills. My wife and I made it a duty to go on weekly dates. We also regularly had staycations. We were comfortably middle-class.
We had our first baby in 2019, and the financial implications began to dawn on us right from the birth. My wife delivered by caesarean section, which tripled our hospital bills. We spent roughly ₦800k on that, which was a huge chunk of my savings. Then there was the cost of other essentials, like the baby’s bed, car seat, bath, carrier and others.
My wife also had problems with lactation, so we had to lean on formula. I can’t recall how much each tin cost, but we typically went through two tins in a week.
Then there were the clothes. It was as if the baby grew an inch per day. We had to buy new clothes every three weeks. We thought we wouldn’t have to buy diapers for a long time because we got quite a lot as gifts, but most of them were the smallest size. As baby grew, diaper size increased, so we ended up giving out most of the gifted diapers.
By then, my wife had stopped working temporarily to care for the baby, and my salary was our only income source. ₦400k that made us ballers before struggled to take us through an entire month. I was almost always broke by month’s end. Weekly dates and staycations? Those became a thing of the past.
We had another baby in 2021. I blame the pandemic for this. We’d originally planned to space our kids by three years, at least, but what’s there to do when you’re locked up together in the name of global safety?
I got another job around the same time, and my salary increased to ₦500k/month, but it hardly made a difference. We had to move to a bigger apartment (₦1m yearly) and take an additional ₦1m loan to cover the agent fees, renovation and furnishing.
Remember all those expenses I mentioned when we had our first baby? Multiply it by three. We now had two babies, while struggling with inflation and removing ₦100k out of my salary each month for one year to pay back the loan. My wife had to suspend all plans of returning to work because daycare and a nanny were additional expenses we couldn’t afford.
I love my children, but my wife and I jokingly call them “money-sucking creatures”. They eat like the world is about to end and grow out of clothes like someone is pursuing them. If they’re not eating, they’re spoiling something.
I was complaining to a friend about having to change their game tablets because they’d spoilt them, and the friend was wondering why they couldn’t do without the tablets. I just laughed. When you have kids, don’t give them something to entertain themselves so they can expend the unused energy on your walls and home appliances.
It’s starting to look like we’ll stop at two children, so we can continue to afford food. I still earn ₦500k/month, and 60% of that goes into child care. I try to stretch the remaining 40% to save for rent and other household expenses. But the truth is, every expense is still related to child care.
For example, the new fuel prices mean I spend at least ₦20k weekly to fuel the generator so my kids can sleep at night. I pay ₦1m for rent because I need more room for them. Our feeding bill is almost ₦160k monthly because of the extra mouths to feed. I can’t spend ₦10k without thinking too much about it. I feel poor.
My eldest will be old enough to start school next year, and the thought of school fees is already giving me heart palpitations. My friend is paying ₦400k per term for nursery school, and the school’s planning to increase fees because of the economy. I don’t even want to think about it. My wife and I are considering homeschooling till primary school. We can’t starve because we gave birth na, abi?
Again, I love my children and consider them a blessing. But my quality of life has drastically reduced because of them. I lived better when I was earning less than my current income. If you aren’t stupidly rich, and you plan to have children in Nigeria, just accept that you will see pepper.
One of the worst things you can experience as a Nigerian is trying to access the funds of a relative who died without a legal will.
I speak from experience.
My aunt passed away in 2020, and we’re still struggling to access her pension. It’s one reason I now advise anyone going for even the smallest medical procedure to get a probate-stamped document from a high court so someone else can access your money, at the very least.
But back to our struggle.
My aunt first became ill in 2017. She’d had a medical procedure which led to complications, leaving her bedridden and unable to feed without a stomach tube. She basically lived in the hospital for the three years that she was ill. And the bills? They ran into ₦1.2m weekly.
The illness took her job at a government parastatal, where she’d worked for 16 years. The government didn’t pay her hospital bills, and they made her resign after the first year. When the parastatal’s medical team visited and saw her condition, they decided they couldn’t keep paying someone who couldn’t work. The salary in question was just a little over ₦100k/month.
At my aunt’s place of work, you don’t just resign and go home. You have to submit clearance documents at several offices to update your employment status. I helped her husband with this clearance process — which took months. I thought that was stressful, until the real stress came.
When she passed away in 2020, we assumed accessing her pension of almost ₦6m would be straightforward. She and her husband kept no secrets; that’s how we knew about the pension in the first place. He also knew her passwords, and they even had joint properties. But there was no will, and that was the problem. Although he was the next of kin, he couldn’t access the funds unless a court gave him a document called a Letter of Administration. That was the first hurdle.
Getting a Letter of Administration in Nigeria can take as much as five years. You’ll need to hire a lawyer, pay them 10% of whatever property you want to claim, and then try to survive the many court delays.
You’ll also need two administrators for court approval: a spouse and another family member.
So, I stood in with her husband, as they didn’t have children. Fortunately, we had a well-known lawyer who fast-tracked the process, and we got the Letter of Administration after one year.
The next step was getting cleared to receive pension benefits from the government parastatal where my aunt worked. We had to provide pay slips, show evidence that she didn’t owe anything and meet several other requirements. At one point, we heard that the place where they kept some documents we needed for clearance got burnt. Again, we had people on the inside who helped fast-track the process, but even with that, it took another year to complete the clearance.
The bank runs came next.
The deceased’s account had to be changed to an estate account, so the administrators (her husband and I) would be signatories and be able to access the funds in it. This was the account where the pension fund would go. It took another couple of weeks to update the account.
With that done, we could now move to the pension fund administrator (PFA). But there was one thing standing in our way: The Nigerian government.
For individuals who work with private organisations, pension payment is straightforward. Your employer deducts the monthly pension from your salary and remits it to the PFA. For government workers, however, the pension is deducted from the salary but isn’t remitted to the PFA for years. So, you could have a pension account with a PFA, but there wouldn’t be money inside.
That was what happened to my aunty. When we arrived at the PFA in March 2023, they told us that PENCOM, the regulatory body for pensions in Nigeria, hadn’t remitted any pension fund to her account for the entire number of years she’d worked. The money was essentially in the air.
The only thing the PFA could do was write PENCOM, requesting the funds so they could pay us. They also told us that the payment could take as much as three years to come in. Apparently, PENCOM gives preference to retirees over the family of deceased pensioners.
At this point, we can only keep disturbing the PFA to send reminders to PENCOM. We’ve spent so much money and time on this in the last three years, and it looks like we have one or two more years to go. I’m tired and have accepted the possibility that it might even take longer.
I’ll say it again: Please go to any high court and get a probate-stamped document, indicating who you want your money to go to if something happens to you. The last I checked, it cost about ₦10k. Save your family the stress.
We’re celebrating the Nigerian culture of meat and barbecue with Burning Ram on November 11. Get tickets here.
…eight Nigerian men share how they marked the special day.
“I spent time gisting with him (my father)” — Ayodeji, 27, Lagos
I visited my dad with fruits and spent time gisting with him — he always gives me the tea around stuff going on in the family, life advice and just general gist. I also spent a good part of the day on Twitter and Instagram, where I saw some people’s negative and positive experiences with their fathers. Reading the stories made me appreciate mine more and cherish the moments spent with him.
“I celebrated at home” — Feyisayo, 40, Akure
I’m an introvert, so I was indoors with my family after Sunday service. In the morning, my wife and children presented a gift to me and told me how much they appreciate me. That’s perfect for me.
“My wife spoilt me with food” — Opeyemi, 32, Lagos
I went to church. Then, my wife took me to get a burger. At home, she made white rice and turkey stew for me. Even though I thought I was just doing my thing, my family and friends said I’ve been killing it, and the kind words got me emotional.
“I spent the day at work” — Ifeanyi, 37, Port Harcourt
I was at work, where I posted my kids’ pictures on socials, like I do every Father’s Day. I got some lovely messages from friends and family too, and it felt awesome.
“I spoke to my kid and had some wine” — Imoh Umoren, 40, Lagos
I video-called my kid; I work in Nigeria, and he’s in the U.S. He wished me Happy Father’s Day. Then, I opened a bottle of wine because it’s not easy. My father died when I was a teenager, so I had no chance to buy him anything. The day made me a bit sober as I contemplated the efforts I’ve put into fatherhood.
“It was a reassuring day of love for me” — Vikky, late 30s, Lagos
Unfortunately, my wife and daughter travelled on the day, but we spent the whole time before the flight taking memorable pictures. My wife’s passion and vibe mean so much to me. She made sure to tell me she appreciates my effort, reassuring me of how much she loves and cares for me. It was awesome, special, and I felt like a baby.
“I was in class for most of the day” — Femi, 29, Lagos
I had to attend my postgraduate lectures that day. But there was a huge outpouring of love for my dad in the family group chat. It felt warm, and I’m glad. I think I might’ve underrated how much I love my dad.
“I enjoy fatherhood now” — Nath, 26, Ogbomoso
I tried to run away from fatherhood — I had my kid when I was still a child myself, and it was strange for me — but it’s a thing of joy now. There was little or no time for us because I just started uni. Now, we spend more time together, and I’m happy about it. We didn’t do anything special this Father’s Day, but seeing fathers get their annual flowers was great.
According to the Zikoko Bureau of Statistics, a week hardly passes on Nigerian Twitter without firstborns being the subject of one joke, drag, hot take or the other.
Everyone always has something to say about firstborns, and as advocates for the common man, we had to give firstborns the floor to share their thoughts.
The ones who are just tired
“I’m the olóríẹbí (family head), and as a Yoruba man from Ijebu, it means I always have to take the lead, especially in finances. I’m at the age when there are a lot of family weddings, burials and namings. But I’m not rich. No one cares if I take loans. Try to send olóríẹbí money too.” — Pa Gbade, 64
“They say I act like their junior mummy, but I can’t help it. They can make it easier for me by not waiting until everything has scattered before reaching out to me. I don’t have money for everything you need, but it’s not until EFCC arrests you for internet fraud that you’ll tell me you need money. Help me help you.” — Janet, 31
“Firstborns need check-ups too. Let us know you’re looking out for us. Not every time billing or thinking we’re fine. Also, sometimes. I need space. It doesn’t mean I hate you.” — Harvey, 25
The ones who want you to know you’re on your own
“I don’t have the solutions to all your problems. Emi gan mo need help.” — Tolu, 25
“I’m not your role model, please. I don’t have it all figured out.” — Uduak, 26
“Don’t do drugs. There is madness in our family, and I will leave you on the road if you craze.” — Stephanie, 26
“The same piece of advice I gave them when they were about to get their first jobs is what I want them to always know: Be responsible for every and anything you do.” — Abisola, 33
The ones who are tired of billing
“Don’t text me to “check on me”. Just ask for the money you want straight up.” — Ore, 26
“There’s no special allowance for firstborns o. It’s like you think money appears in my account as per birthright. Let me be a baby boy, please” — Joshah, 23
“The day I go broke, I’ll come back to you for urgent ₦2k. There’s no law against begging your younger ones.” — Grace, 28
The ones who really want their siblings to stay winning
“My sister is much younger, so I’d tell her to believe in herself. Think about how far you can go, then reach higher. Dare to dream.” — Stephan, 45
“I may be hard on you, but it’s because I know you’re capable of so much. You can do whatever you set your mind to. You can blow, and you will. And maybe then, you’ll stop billing me.” — Harmony, 27
The ones who want you to remember they’re human
“I’ve made mistakes, and I’m not perfect. I’m not always the best sibling, but all I do is out of a place of love. Be kind.” — Anne, 24
“Sometimes, I don’t want to pick calls or respond to your requests. No, I’m not being wicked. I just have a lot going on. You’re lucky to have someone older to rely on. I don’t. But adulthood and capitalism don’t discriminate. There’s only so much I can do.” — Joel, 35
“If I give you advice, and you take it, but it doesn’t produce the desired results, remember I’m not God. I advise because I care for you, but I’m not always right. And I don’t carry respect on my head. I deserve it because my eyes constantly see shege. It feels nice to be recognised for all the sacrifices I make.” — Tosin, 28
Sunken Ships is a Zikoko series that explores the how and why of the end of all relationships — familial, romantic or just good old friendships.
In this episode of Sunken Ships, Kiki* (22) shares why she blocked her uncle and how it goes beyond supporting different candidates.
What was your relationship with your uncle like pre-elections?
Kiki: Pretty normal. You know how in every Nigerian home, there are different kinds of uncles? The rich ones who always give you money, the stingy/broke ones, the one you’re convinced is a pervert, the cool one and the rest? He was one of the rest. A bit younger than my dad, but not young enough that we had things we could relate to. His children are also younger than me, so we didn’t have much to talk about.
However, we weren’t enemies. I spent holidays in his house, and when we had family events, we had proper conversations. He didn’t treat me like a child who didn’t know anything, but he provided support only someone older can give. He’d send me articles he read and thought I was interested in so we could talk, but he also sent those ridiculous BCs and bulk messages on Whatsapp. He was okay, and so was our relationship.
How did the fight start?
Kiki: I won’t call it a fight, but we started having issues over WhatsApp. I hardly use the app, but that day, I decided to check people’s statuses. That’s when I saw that he’d put up the poster of a particular candidate running for President. I swiped up to have a conversation with him because I couldn’t believe who he supported. I wanted to know his thought process if any. He didn’t reply immediately — probably because of work — but we eventually had a conversation.
The words he sent that day shocked me. I wanted to scream at him, but I maintained my peace. We had this long back and forth that ended with me blocking him. I didn’t have the strength, and he wouldn’t change his mind.
A week later, while I was out with my mum, she stopped by his house. When we got there, he brought up the fact that I’d blocked him to my mother. It’s one thing for him to support someone who’s incompetent, but to report me to my mother over it? I lost it. I reminded them that I’m an adult and can decide I no longer want certain people to have access to my life. My mother told me it didn’t make sense for me to fight family because of politicians. That people have a right to vote and campaign for whoever they want. I told her it’s more than that.
Kiki: If someone doesn’t align with my values, I can also choose to remove their access to me.
It’s not just about picking a different candidate. I think that’s very reductive of the issue. You can disagree on the policies of different candidates. Candidate one wants to increase tax by 5%, and candidate two wants to reduce it by 3%. Or one candidate wants to make Lagos the capital of Nigeria, while another wants to make Edo state the capital. These are differences you don’t have to cut off friends and family members over.
But he’s endorsing a corrupt, terrorism-affiliated, allegation-heavy candidate whose policies might as well lead to the end of my life. I’m upset that he supports someone who’ll most likely make millions of people suffer. I have every right to choose to no longer associate with someone who willingly chooses death and suffering.
It shows his beliefs and values align with said candidate. If the candidate he supports has made degrading comments about people from certain tribes, it means my uncle feels the same way. If the person is known to align with thugs and thieves, then that’s something my uncle stands for. I don’t stand for those things, so why should I keep him around?
What’ll happen after the elections?
Kiki: Nothing. He’s still blocked and will forever remain blocked. Why should he remain in my life? He’s been reporting me to family members, and they’ve called and begged, but that’s their business. I don’t know why they think my uncle and I must talk by force.
The topic of how young Nigerians navigate romantic relationships with their earnings is a minefield of hot takes. In ourLove Currency series, we get into what relationships across income brackets look like in different Nigerian cities.
Image Source: Unsplash (Actual interview subjects are anon*)
After 30 years at the bank, Mr Patrick* retired in 2014 and moved into his house in Warri, Delta state. He shares what led to his early retirement, how his friend ghosted him after an investment deal and putting his children through school on an epileptic pension supply.
Occupation and location
Fabric trader in Warri, Delta State
Average monthly income
It’s hard to say because the market isn’t fixed. But he gets about ₦30k in a bad month — which has been the case for most of 2022 — just enough to reinvest in the business. The only money he’s sure of is the ₦51k pension he receives every month and ₦588k in rent per annum.
Monthly bills and recurring expenses
Feeding: ₦40k on average. His wife assists with this most times.
Fuel: About ₦20k, subject to the frequent hikes in fuel prices.
Data: ₦5k
Transportation: ₦13k
Electricity: ₦6k. His two tenants jointly contribute ₦4k to the bill sometimes.
Savings: ₦15k
How did you meet your wife?
It was in 1992. I was ready to settle down, and a relative knew someone they thought I’d be interested in. I reached out to her. After a year of talking and getting to know each other, we got married. We’ve been married for over 27 years now.
How were your finances at the time?
I was a bank worker for a long time, in different roles with different pay, so I can’t remember. I do know that in 2008, my salary was about ₦135k. The naira was still good then, so I had enough savings from that to buy land in three different areas.
How much did the lands cost?
I got one for ₦1.8m and the others for about ₦350k each in 2008. But I’ve had to sell two of them — one in 2015 for over ₦2m, and the other for ₦3.5m in 2017. Oh, I forgot about the land on which I built the house we currently live in. I got that for ₦600k.
Why did you sell the other two?
In this Buhari’s Nigeria? I had three kids in the university, and with the bank retiring me two years early, I had to look for a means to survive. Retirement age is supposed to be 60 years, but mine came at 58 as punishment for a fraud case I was associated with in 2014.
I was the operations manager, and the head of funds transfer embezzled a lot of money using my password. We were close — family friends even, so it would never have crossed my mind to suspect him. It wasn’t until the internal department in charge of records went through the books that they discovered ₦4.4m was missing. The money had been taken in bits stretched over a year. When they traced it, the evidence led to us. They arrested both of us, but I was let go after he confessed that he did it on his own.
Why were you still retired?
For allowing someone else use my password. So while he was sacked and had to refund everything he stole, I was retired early and stripped of ₦3m worth of incentives.
How did your wife react?
I’m blessed to have a partner as understanding as her. And my kids are really great too. Everyone understood money wasn’t as available and adjusted. My wife is a businesswoman — she sells clothes — so she had to heavily support the family during the two years that followed. When our second child gained admission into the university in 2015, things were really hard, and she had to sell her gold necklace to assist with the fees.
How was life post-retirement?
It came with its challenges. In May 2014, I decided to invest ₦2m in my friend’s fuel station, and he was supposed to pay me ₦150k monthly for three years. Less than two years after we started, he fell ill and had to travel out of the country for treatment. I understand it cost him a lot of money. But the money stopped coming in even after he came back.
Ah. Why?
He kept saying business was bad and there was no money. When I noticed he was avoiding my calls, I travelled to meet him in Edo state. Sometimes, after plenty begging and chasing, he’d send some money. He became a prayer point in my house.
Did you have a contract?
Yes, we did. But I couldn’t involve a lawyer because everyone knows going to court costs money I didn’t have. So I let it go. I don’t hold any grudges. Like a few months after the bank incident, my former colleague reached out to ask for forgiveness.
What do you do now?
I run a fabric business. When I started in 2016, business was good, but with how bad the economy has been, my business has suffered greatly. People are working hard just to make ends meet, so they’re not thinking of getting new fabric. Sometimes, I go a week without selling a thing. Still, I open shop Monday to Saturday just in case a customer comes. Some months, I could get orders to supply a friend for an event, and the profit would be about ₦50k – ₦70k. Part of the money goes back to the business and shop rent at the end of the year.
And your wife?
She still sells women’s clothes from home. Most of her customers are either regulars turned friends or are referred by friends, so they meet up at our house when she has new stock. When they’re not buying on credit, they pay the money in small bits like they’re paying for crayfish. According to her, she makes about ₦80k – ₦100k profit on ₦200k stock. She used to get a ₦28k monthly pension, but that stopped coming about two months ago.
Why?
Do we know? When the money comes, we rejoice; when it doesn’t, we’ll be fine.
Besides housekeeping, how do you spend on relationship sturvs with your wife?
I buy her catfish barbecue. It costs about ₦3k, and she really enjoys it. So I get it on birthdays or give her between ₦5k – ₦20k to buy something for herself when I make good sales at the shop or whenever money enters my hand from rent or cash gifts. We go out sometimes, but it’s mostly with other married friends, so I spend less than ₦15k.
That’s nice. What does your wife do for you?
On birthdays, she cooks like it’s Christmas — rice, chicken, drinks for the house. My 60th birthday though, she also got a cake and invited our friends over. When I asked how she funded everything, she said the kids helped.
So you don’t really buy gifts for each other?
When things were better, she’d buy me perfume, a watch, clothes or whatever she thought I needed. Even then, I mostly gave her money because she’d rather buy what she wants by herself.
Do you have joint investments or accounts?
We’re very transparent with our finances, but we’ve never tried to put our money in the same place. The only thing we do that’s close to a joint account is our monthly osusu with a couple of other people. We contribute ₦15k each.
What about your kids?
They’ve long graduated from school and are working now. They don’t ask for money. Maybe it’s because they’re doing okay for themselves, or they don’t want to stress us. But they even send us money. This year, they put us on some sort of monthly allowance — sometimes ₦30k, sometimes ₦50k. It helps around the house.
Do you have a financial safety net?
Not exactly. I still have two plots of land in Warri and family land in my village. But that’s all.
What’s your ideal financial future?
Future? At 63 years old, it’s hard to have plans for the future. I hope both our businesses pick up, my children become successful in their careers, and the economy becomes favourable for us to afford more land, vehicles, and investments.
If you’re interested in talking about how money moves in your relationship, this is a good place to start.
Ada (22) tells us about her relationship with her dad. She was a daddy’s girl growing up, but that relationship changed because her dad was more invested in his job than her.
So, your dad…
Ada: When I was little, they told me I looked like my dad, that even though I was a girl, my dad loved me so much I took his face.
There’s nothing we didn’t do together. Whenever my mum shouted at me, I would report her to my dad, and he’d take me out for ice cream. My mum told me she’d given birth to my dad’s best friend. At a point, it felt like we were a family on our own, and my mum was the outsider.
How?
Ada: Every Sunday from the age of five till when I went to boarding school when I was ten, my dad and I spent Sundays together.
My mum would stay in church really late. My dad would buy me Super Yogo and sugar cane, and we’d walk back home together, leaving her. Then he’d dish food for us to eat together. When my mum comes back, my dad and I would go to the supermarket to buy groceries. He’d give me money to buy whatever it is I wanted, but he’d still buy me chocolates, ice cream and snacks. I’d end up saving the money because I wouldn’t need to spend it on anything.
You were a daddy’s girl
Ada: A big one. It was just me growing up, and my dad was very invested in taking care of me. My mum always complained that he was spoiling me, but my dad didn’t care. He’d cook for me and serve me my food, wash the socks I wore to school and carry me to my room whenever I fell asleep on the couch.
I don’t think I ever doubted that my dad loved me. He took care of me and encouraged me. He always expected great things from me and I was so happy whenever I hit and surpassed the goals he set for me academically. I told my dad everything and he was my best friend. We played board games together, washed the car together and watched the news together.
Ada: When I went to boarding school at the age of ten, I saw my dad less. He hardly came for my visiting days, open days or PTA meetings. My mum did all the running around for that. My dad was busy working. Whenever I came home for the holidays though, we spent time together but it wasn’t as frequent as it was when I was younger. In fact, the more time passed, the less I saw of him. My final year in secondary school, he came only once, the day of my graduation.
I think his job was the major cause of distance between us. He worked every day including Saturdays and so he spent his Sundays resting. We no longer did our Sunday routines and it hurt.
It was our chance to catch up and talk about our week. We’d fill each other in on the people annoying us in our lives and he always gave me advice on what to do and how to do it. Not being able to do that means there was a lot of me my dad no longer knew about. He didn’t know that my dreams had changed and my life was going in a different direction.
I’m sorry about that
Ada: I was losing my best friend and it felt like there was nothing I could do to get him back. The work he did made him angrier and we fought more. He was always angry. He’d come back home and just start picking on me. If I cooked, there was always something wrong with the food.
When I was 17, I remember when I was watching television with them in the house. It was a funny scene and I started to laugh, but then he said I was laughing too loud and should stop. The father I grew up with wouldn’t have done that to me. My mum said he had a stressful day at work and my laughter was disturbing him.
I stopped staying in the living room with them and kept to myself. Whenever I knew he was coming home, I’d find an excuse to not sleep in the house because I can’t be apologising for breathing.
What’s your relationship like now?
Ada: He’s about to retire and now he’s trying to build a relationship with me. He keeps giving me money and buying me expensive things but I don’t really care for it.
I don’t see him anymore because we don’t live in the same state. My mum keeps begging me to try to repair the relationship, but I’m tired. Why am I the one that has to do the work of repairing it? He recently apologised to me for hurting my feelings, but he still constantly tries to make me feel like it’s all in my head. It’s not. I’m self conscious about hanging around people because I grew up with a dad that started treating me like a disturbance. The money he’s made from the work won’t change that, and neither will his apologising.
Sunken Ships is a Zikoko series that explores the how and why of the end of all relationships — familial, romantic or just good old friendships.
The subject of this week’s Sunken Ships, Chris* (23), tells us about his relationship with his mother. How she never wanted him to be born nor showed any emotional affection towards him and what it’s like watching her start a new life without him
Tell me about your earlier memories of your mum
Chris: For as long as I can remember, my mum never wanted me. She got pregnant by a man she didn’t know had a wife and child in another country. When she found out, she was devastated. I think she carried all of that resentment and hatred to me.
She worked in a bank and was very busy so various nannies raised me. My mum would have left before I woke up and would come back by the time I’d gone to sleep. I remember not seeing her for a whole month. It’s not like she travelled. We lived in the same house, but during weekends and holidays, she’d stay in her room and I’d stay in mine. That was my normal.
When did you realise it wasn’t normal?
Chris: School. In primary school, I interacted with other children that actually spent time with their mothers. One of my classmates even said that when he’s ill, he goes to his parents’ room and lays on their bed because it makes him feel much better. I had never been allowed to stay in my mother’s room without her permission, talk less of laying on her bed. I was in awe.
When I was 9 years old and a bit under the weather, I crept into her room while she was at work and slept on her bed. I just wanted to see what it was like. When she came back, she beat me so hard she removed a milk tooth. She told me never to try that again, and I didn’t.
Chris: My mother was never emotionally present, and her room felt like the only space in the house where she could forget I existed. Seeing me there must have spoilt that.
When she sent me to boarding school when I was 11 years old, it was the happiest she’d been. She never came for my visiting days or PTA meetings. I made a friend whose parents basically adopted me as their own. They tried to make me feel less alone and I appreciated it.
I wish my mum were more involved, but I realised she needed to provide for us. I just wish she showed me a bit more emotion. Do you know she only told me she loved me once?
Can you explain?
Chris: I was 18 years old and had just graduated from secondary school. When the ceremony was over, she hugged me and told me she was proud of me and loved me. She’d never mentioned it again since then.
Do you love her?
Chris: I do. The older I got, the more I realised that she’d never love me, but it didn’t stop me from loving her. Now I love her out of fear and I no longer try to do things to please her. If I have to decide between something that’ll make me happy or something that’ll make her happy, I’ll choose myself.
She never failed to remind me that the only reason she worked so hard to provide me with all the chances life has to offer was so nobody could ever use it to insult her. She provided and cared for me, so asking for love was too much. I got the memo, but I wish it didn’t take so long.
Chris: It made me aware of my place in her life. As I said, my love for her changed the more she told me those things. I also felt bad for her. Imagine having this much hate in your heart for someone who never did you anything wrong. It must be difficult.
What’s your relationship with her like now?
Chris: I moved out of her house in 2020. So, we hardly see each other. She also remarried in 2021 and I had no idea till the wedding day.
How come you didn’t know?
Chris: She never bothered to reach out to me except she needed something, and she didn’t feel like including me in her new life. The only reason I knew about the wedding was that I saw it on her WhatsApp status. I knew she was dating the guy, but I didn’t know anything else.
God abeg. I’m so sorry.
Chris: It’s okay. I’m pretty happy with where I am now. She’s making a conscious effort to have a child with this new man she married and I hope it works out. Maybe she’d treat this one differently than me. At least she’d finally have a child she wanted.
Arike: When I was three years old, my dad died. It was just my mum, my two older brothers and I from the moment he passed. And they were hit harder than I was. I barely knew the man and was too young to understand the loss.
My mum tried so hard to compensate for my dad’s death. She worked so hard to put the three of us through school, and she still put in the effort to be there for us emotionally. She came for every PTA meeting, open day, visiting day, Christmas carol, etc. She always found a way to just be there for us.
The older we got, the fewer responsibilities she had to bear alone. She relaxed a bit when my brothers grew older and started caring for themselves and me.
Whenever people told my mum to remarry, she would say it wasn’t something she was interested in. She told them we had a system and adding someone to our lives meant we’d disrupt this system we spent so much time perfecting.
What was the system like?
Arike: If anything was wrong with the home’s generator, fridge, television or any other electrical appliance, my oldest brother handled it. He had a knack for separating things and trying to put them together again.
My second brother handled the cleanup. He’s very tidy and obsessed over which cleaning products to use for which part of the house. He took great pride in having the place spotless.
My mum and I handled feeding. She’d started teaching us all how to cook by the time we turned eight, but my two brothers were disasters in the kitchen. That’s how my mum and I became very close. We’d spend time cooking and just talking. About each other’s day, school and life.
Our bond grew with each meal we made, and when it was time for me to go to secondary school at 11, I didn’t want to leave her. After my first year, I begged her to remove me from the boarding house and make me a day student. The thought of her spending so much time alone because all her children were in school? I didn’t like it. I think she didn’t like it too because she agreed without fighting.
Was it only cooking you bonded over?
Arike: No. When I was the only child at home, we did everything together. I basically moved into her room because I thought actively living in two different rooms gave me more places to clean.
We’d run errands, watch movies and go to the spa. All my mum’s friends called me her handbag because she never went anywhere without me. We’d even go on international trips together. She was my best friend, and I was grateful to have her in my life. She was there for all my significant milestones, from my first period to my first heartbreak. There was nothing about myself I couldn’t tell my mum, but all that changed.
Why did it change?
Arike: Valentine’s Day of 2011. I was 14 and was waiting around school with a friend who was a day student as well. School had closed, but we stayed back in class to finish some assignments.
After a while, we gave up on the assignments and started talking. That’s when she gave me a note for Valentine’s Day. I always knew I treated her differently than I did a lot of people, but I thought it was because we were very close friends.
After I read the note, we hugged. Then she kissed me. I was shocked, and my initial reaction was to pull away, but then, I relaxed a bit and actually liked it. From then on, something changed in how I spoke to my mum. I started keeping secrets from her.
Arike: After that kiss, I kissed many more girls, either at parties or in empty classrooms. I liked it a lot. I knew I’d always want to do it, but I wasn’t sure how to define myself. I still liked men, but I wasn’t sure how my realised attraction to women fit in.
I liked to read, so I Googled a lot of questions like, “Is it possible to like men and women?” That’s when I figured out bisexuality.
I couldn’t tell anyone. As much as I liked kissing girls, I also realised it wasn’t something society encouraged. I remember church services in which they’d preach against homosexuality and my mum’s comments about queer Western couples we saw in the media. I’d heard stories of how being queer had scattered families, and I didn’t want to lose my mum’s love and friendship.
But you eventually told her?
Arike: Yeah, I did somewhat recently. My brothers had found out about it. They followed me on social media and saw some of my comments and posts, so they asked me one day if I was gay. I told them I’m bisexual and they took it pretty well. They asked if I would tell our mother, but I said I was looking for the right time.
That time came when I visited my mum for a couple of days. I had moved out when I was 23 and occasionally came to spend time with her when I could tell she was missing me.
The night before I left on that particular visit, I stayed in her room like I used to and told her I had something to say. I told her about my first kiss with a woman, liking women and how I’ve even dated some in the past.
She listened to me without saying a word, and although it made me scared to talk about it, I had to. I knew it’d significantly reduce my anxiety, so I powered through. When I was done, she said she was going to bed. I went back to my room and slept too.
The following day, she didn’t leave her room. I don’t know what she was doing inside, but I knew she wouldn’t come out until after I left. I won’t lie; it hurt — a lot.
I considered my mum my closest confidant, but she couldn’t even look at me when I told her I was bisexual. It took a month before we spoke again. She told me being bisexual meant men were still an option and I should choose it. That’s when it dawned on me that she wouldn’t get it. I couldn’t decide who I would fall in love with, and if she couldn’t accept that, then we’d have problems.
What was the worst part of not being able to talk to her?
Arike: The fact that I couldn’t tell her anything anymore. I couldn’t tell her about my girlfriend or all the new queer friends I’d made. I couldn’t tell her about funny relationship drama or when I got my heart broken. I couldn’t go to her house and have her make me amala and ewedu while we gist in the kitchen.
However, I still tried to keep her up to date with my life. I’d send her gifts like I usually do, texts about what’s going on in my life and why. She hardly ever replied, and if she did, it was with an emoji or “ok”. My mum has always been chatty, so it wasn’t because she didn’t know what to say.
Did she ever come around?
Arike: Yes, she did. My brothers were talking to her. They asked if she would choose homophobia over speaking to her only daughter again. I think that made her realise if she continued ignoring me because of my sexuality, I’d stop making an effort too. I was already reducing my texts and gifts. Slowly, I was removing myself from her life.
Now, she’s making baby steps. She still occasionally prays for me to find a good husband, but when my girlfriend and I broke up, I told her about it. She listened and sent me some cookies she baked to cheer me up.
I know she’s trying her best, but our old relationship is gone, and I don’t think it’ll ever come back.
We know parents judge their children’s partners on the first meeting. We’re not trying to cause fights, but shouldn’t these partners get to judge their in-laws too? We asked seven people to tell us the first impression they had when they met their partner’s parents, and the responses were chaotic.
Folake, female
I was in my “party animal” phase when I first got introduced to my current mother-in-law. I could swear I’d seen her at one of the clubs I used to go to, but apparently, she’s a pastor so it wasn’t really adding up. I never said anything about it, but there was this air of awkwardness during that first meeting. Till today, I don’t know if my hunch was right or if too much alcohol was making me overthink things.
David, male
My father-in-law had once tried to trigger the release clause of my ex. Man kept asking her out on a date, and was sending her money to help her “think about it” . I know because she told me about it at the time. The man doesn’t know I have his gist sha. When we met, he asked me what my intentions were for his daughter. In my head, I thought “Sir, let’s not rain curses upon ourselves”.
Jeremiah, male
Her family was so chilled. In fact, too chilled; I felt like Daniel Kaluuya in the first part of Get Out. I was legit worried something was going to happen and my family would have to run a GoFundMe campaign to search for me. It was later I softened up to the whole thing and realised I was just used to hard life.
Ibrahim, male
I met my girlfriend’s parents at a party. To be honest, I thought her mum was my girlfriend’s older sister. She looked really hot and was already entering my eye. I got snapped back to reality when I saw my girlfriend go to hug her and call her mummy.
My father-in-law had actually asked me out a few years back. It was funny in my head because I wasn’t sure if he remembered me or not. But he acted like he was meeting me for the first time. I did the same too sha before my relationship unfolds like a Yoruba movie plot.
Naomi, female
I thought my mother-in-law was evil because of the way she kept smiling at me. It creeped me out so I started smiling back. Let’s creep each other out, Ma. I’m not going anywhere.
Zaynab, female
My partner’s parents were really cool. My father-in-law was watching a football match the day we went to visit. It turned out he was a Chelsea fan like me, and we literally just connected over that. Nobody else in their house watches football, not even my husband. So, for him, it was like, “Ope o! I’ve finally found a gist partner”. My mother-in-law was super nice. She even refused when I tried to help her cook. She looked genuinely confused that I wanted to help out.
Sunken Ships is a Zikoko series that explores the how and why of the end of all relationships — familial, romantic or just good old friendships.
Angela* was her father’s favourite child, and he made it obvious. They did everything together, but all that changed when she decided she no longer wanted to be a Christian.
Describe your relationship with your dad
Angela: My dad and I were close. I’m the second child f four, so it’s not like I have any unique title like “last child” or “only girl”, but there was something about my relationship with my dad that felt different.
While all my family members were doing their thing in the evenings, I’d stay with my dad to watch television and discuss politics. We supported the same football club, had the same favourite food and the same bad temper. My siblings knew my dad had a soft spot for me, so whenever they wanted his permission for something, they’d always make me ask. I don’t think he maltreated them; he just never hid how much he liked me.
I went to boarding school like my other siblings and went to university in a different state as they did too. The only thing I believe I did differently was not being in a hurry to move out of the house.
Why?
Angela: I didn’t want to. I had a job close to the house, I owned a car, and I got to spend time with my parents.
I grew up in that house, and it’s comfortable. I’d help around the house, pay for a couple of things and keep them company. My parents never said they wanted me gone. They were getting old, and I didn’t like the idea of older people staying in a house alone. Staying with them meant that in an emergency, someone would find them.
That makes sense. So how did it affect your relationship with your dad?
Angela: Initially? It didn’t. We watched sports, the news and played ayo together. We even became closer because I was older and understood some things better. He’d give me family gist, and we’d gossip about my mum.
All was well and good until I decided I wanted to stop attending church. My parents raised us as Christians. We were in various groups in the same church we’d attended since I was born. They took going to church very seriously, and I did too until I started losing whatever attachment I had to religion.
I was working late, so I’d skip mid-week services and feign sickness to skip Sunday sermons. Faking it got harder each week because finding new excuses to stay out of church got more complicated. I knew I had to tell my parents, but I didn’t know how.
Did you figure it out?
Angela: Yeah. One Saturday, while my parents were in the living room, I told them about my decision to stop attending church because I wasn’t a Christian anymore. My mum kept asking me questions, but my dad was dead silent. When I’d finished answering my mum, my dad just said to me, “Service is by 8 a.m. tomorrow,” and he stood up and left.
I knew he would be difficult, but I didn’t expect him to take it as severely as he did. We were supposed to watch the 10 o’clock news together that day, but he didn’t come out of his room.
The next day was church, and I refused to wake up on time. At around 7:30 a.m., my mum knocked on my room door to tell me it was time to leave. I ignored her. She came two more times until my dad showed up. He was so angry, he kept screaming at me, and I shouted back. We’d never been like that before. Our temper was usually reserved for other people, but that day? We let each other have it.
Angela: It was. After we finished shouting at each other, he told me he didn’t want to see me in his house when he returned from church, and that his house won’t be a den for immoral people.
I’d lived in that house for 25 years, and he suddenly kicked me out because I didn’t want to attend church. A part of me didn’t want to leave because, at first, I thought he was bluffing. But nobody knew my dad better than me, so I knew he was dead serious.
So you left?
Angela: Before they came back from church, I’d packed whatever belongings I felt mattered into my car and driven to my friend’s house. I dropped their key for them. My mum called me a lot that day. When I refused to answer, she started calling my siblings. They told me I shouldn’t have left and begged me to return. But my dad didn’t call, and I didn’t either.
Even though I was annoyed by their decision, I got them a cleaner who’d stay in the house 24/7 because I still didn’t want them to live alone.
Wow. Did he ever reach out?
Angela: No. I’d call my mum and speak to the cleaner, but he never talked to me. Initially, I would ask them to put him on the call, but he never agreed. Then, I stopped asking. One day, my mum called me to say he’d been rushed to the hospital, that he woke up and wasn’t breathing correctly. He’d had COVID the year before, and apparently, it did some significant damage to his lungs.
My other siblings were out of the country, so I was the only one keeping shifts in the clinic. I’d sleep on an uncomfortable chair and cry every day because, even though I hated his guts for throwing me out, he was still my dad. When he eventually got better, he still refused to talk to me directly. I was so annoyed because he didn’t even say he was sorry or tell me thank you.
I think that was when I realised I’d lost my dad. My mum says he misses me, but is proud, but I don’t care anymore. If he’d rather have a Christian than a daughter, then so be it.
Maybe in the past, it was cool to pay all your bills while carrying the burden of five relatives who call you for money every time. But these days, everywhere choke. Learn to guide your pocket with these tips so you can have some breathing space.
Don’t be black
We hate to break it to you, but this was your first mistake. You can’t experience black tax if you aren’t black. So find a solution to that and be free.
Don’t be the first child
As if it’s not enough that you’re black and are, by default, obligated to remit funds to your family every month, you just had to be the first child too. Maybe, give up your position and tell them you’re not doing again.
Tax them first
Don’t give anybody space to ask you for anything. Preempt it by voicing out your problems and asking them for money first. In this life, you have to be wise.
Face your front, and air everybody
Whether you ignore their messages or switch off your phone once your salary drops, you just have to do something. Else, your ₦200k will become ₦20k before the month even starts.
Run away
You can only ask someone you can reach for money. If this thing is getting too much, my dear, disappear.
Maybe it’s the definition that’s making it pinch your body. As they say, everything in this life is about your mindset. So you need to stop thinking of it as black tax and start seeing it as forced philanthropy. That way, you’ll feel better when you do it.
Be ridiculously rich
How can you think of it as philanthropy if you’re managing your last ₦10k and food prices are going up every market day? You need plenty of money so it doesn’t feel like stress anymore.
Don’t talk to your extended family
Why is it your business that the Uncle Soji you’ve only met once as a child is having a wedding, and you have to contribute money to cook Jollof rice?
Sunken Ships is a Zikoko series that explores the how and why of the end of all relationships — familial, romantic or just good old friendships.
Debo* was Bola’s* older cousin and closest friend. When Debo’s mum — Bola’s favourite aunt — died, they both had different responses to the loss, and their relationship never recovered from it. Here’s Bola’s story:
Bola: I’ve known my cousin, *Debo, all my life. He was 13 when I was born but was somehow the closest cousin to my age. I think that’s what made us so close.
He was the one the adults put in charge of me and my younger siblings. I spent a lot of my childhood at his house, and he was basically my senior brother. As the firstborn, I had to take care of my siblings, but having someone look out for me felt nice.
He’d be the one to pick me up from boarding school, and because most of the seniors had a crush on him, they never punished or bullied me if it wasn’t a general punishment. He was an advocate for my enjoyment, and I loved every moment I spent with him.
What Changed?
Bola: When I was 14, his mother died. She was my favourite aunt and the whole family took a big hit. I tried to talk to him about it because nobody else really understood how I felt, but he wouldn’t pick my calls or talk to me. Now, I realise he was dealing with it in his own way, but I wish we’d had a conversation first.
The next time the family got together after my aunt’s death was when I was 16. I was done with secondary school and had developed quite an attitude. I felt like I was better than everyone. I stopped hanging out with Debo because he smoked marijuana, drank and was unserious with his life, and I didn’t want to turn out like him. I was extremely judgmental.
How did that affect the relationship?
Bola: Eventually, I got over myself, and Debo and I started talking again. Not like we used to, but for a while, things were better than they were right after my aunt died. That’s why I was shocked when one day, he video-called wearing a hoodie and there was snow all around him.
And that was how he told us he’d travelled abroad. I get that we can be superstitious as Nigerians, but he wasn’t that kind of person. I thought he would’ve at least let me know before he moved continents. That didn’t stop me from being happy for him though. He seemed excited, and by extension, we all were too.
Bola: For the first year or two of him being out of the country, we were fine. We’d talk over the phone, he’d comment on my WhatsApp status, like my pictures on Instagram; we were good. In fact, during one of his calls, he told me he heard I needed a new phone and sent me some money to complete what I’d saved for it.
But from that moment on, when I call, he’d start hinting I wanted to ask him for something, and it was very off-putting. Then he got married even though he had already three daughters in Nigeria, and that annoyed me even more. So, I blocked him everywhere. We haven’t spoken since.
How long has it been since you spoke?
Bola: Five years. He still calls my parents and siblings, but he never asks to speak with me. So, I don’t think he wants to.
Do you want to speak with him?
Bola: I don’t know. Last year, I unblocked him because I thought I would send him a message, but I never did. I also wanted to see if he would reach out, but he never did. He also didn’t act like he noticed I’d unblocked him.
Have you tried to reach out?
Bola: No. I’m still hurt because of everything that happened. I’m annoyed he left his three daughters here to marry another person and start a life with them. It’s not like he doesn’t take care of his children, but they’re just going to grow up without having him around.
I’m hurt he didn’t reach out to me before he travelled because I wish he had.
I’m also hurt he implied I only spoke to him because I wanted something from him. I’ve never asked him for anything before, even when we were younger. He’s the last born in his own family and was the one telling us who to beg for things. I don’t understand why he was projecting on me.
What about your aunt’s death? Did you ever bring it up?
Bola: I never did. So many years had passed since the death; bringing up the hurt I felt about him not talking to me during that period would’ve just opened up old wounds. My aunt meant so much to me. She was basically my second mum. I thought he’d get it and understand my own pain. He was older, and I needed my big brother, but it felt like I could no longer have that.
Plus, it put a huge strain on our relationship. We don’t talk to each other the way we used to, so there was really no way to mention it after.
Do you think you might’ve had a hand in the relationship crumbling?
Bola: We both had a hand in it. I could’ve been a bit more understanding and he could’ve been better at communicating how he felt.
Don’t you think it’s a bit selfish to have expected that from him when he was probably grieving too?
Bola: I’m older now, so I know people deal with grief differently. I shouldn’t have expected him to try to heal with me. I was a child and a lot more immature than most kids my age, so of course, I was hurt. Maybe it was selfish that I wanted him to be there for, but it’s what I wanted.
I never told him or made him feel bad about it. I just felt that way in my heart. Now I know I should’ve given him space to take as much time as he needed, but our relationship is still damaged. A lot has happened without him, there’s so much physical distance between us and only so much opening we’re willing to do.
Will you ever reach out to him again?
Bola: I will. Maybe when I learn to be the bigger person, but I’m currently not. So we’ll see.
Why do we talk about Nigerian aunties often but rarely about Nigerian uncles? These men have been pushed to the sidelines, and I won’t stand for it. If you have a cool Nigerian uncle, show them love today because the truth is, they’re the best. And I’m here to prove my point with the following reasons:
Nigerian uncles support your “bad” decisions
Are you looking for an ally in the family after piercing your nose? Your best bet is a Nigerian uncle. These men know what’s up, and they’ll be around to defend your actions. You’re not the first to do this thing and you definitely won’t be the last.
Nigerian uncles know how to mind their business
How many times does your uncle ask questions about your weight or when you’ll marry? Not saying they don’t do it, but unlike Nigerian aunties who know how to insert themselves into any and every drama, Nigerian uncles are at least 50% less stressful than Nigerian aunties.
The most they will do is yab you for being a failure in life, and in Nigeria, yabbing is a love language.
Just like Grandmas, Nigerian uncles have the power to embarrass your parents
Nigerian parents like to act like they landed from heaven as saints and have never made mistakes in their life. It’s always giving lies and deceit. Nigerian uncles are goats because they’re always around to humble and embarrass your parents. They have tea from your parents’ hoe phases, the time your father jumped a fence and the time your mother went to the club with her boyfriend from SS2.
Free money
Who doesn’t like free money? Granted, you may have to laugh at a few dry jokes. But best believe the recharge card money will be worth it in the end.
Nigerian uncles always know somebody that knows somebody that can solve your problems
No one has more connections — or at least pretends to have more connections — than a typical Nigerian uncle. Is it admission you want or a Tokunbo car? Before you say pim, they’ve asked for your CV or your JAMB/WAEC results. Their connections don’t always pan out and you may sit at home for two years after secondary school, but it’s the thought that counts.
They’re always on hand to gas you up on the smallest achievement
Unlike your parents who’ve used see-finish eye to wash you up and down, Nigerian uncles are easily impressed by small achievements. You don’t have to come first in school or work at a tech or Big Four company all you have to do is stay alive, show politeness and be able to greet them in your native language. They’ll love the shit out of you.
Nigerian uncles have the best taste in 1990s/2000s music
We can all agree that the 1990s and the early 2000s had the best music, right? Now that we have that out of the way, can we get into how Nigerian uncles know all the popping tracks and deep cuts from back in the day? They’re like you, but older and with rappers that don’t mumble.
Steal a Nigerian uncle’s playlist (if they know how to make one) and upgrade your music taste today.
Nigerian uncles always have our backs when we’re fighting with our parents
Unlike Nigerian aunties who like to join their mouths and support your parents in fights, our uncles are usually on our side. They’re available to remind our parents that times have changed. Yes, Uncle Deji, tell them o!
Tobi* loved their dad. They were the best of friends and did everything together. But things changed and they started to fight too much, until Tobi felt the only solution was to put as much distance between them as possible.
How would you describe your relationship with your dad growing up?
Tobi: My dad and I were super close when I was younger. We used to wear “and co” and read the books he liked as a child. We always had something to talk about. Everyone around us knew how close we were. If anyone did anything to me, I’d go report to my dad. I trusted him a lot.
What changed?
Tobi: Entering JS 1 in 2009. Growing up, I was never made to do things like wash my own clothes and sweep. Being thrown into boarding school was hard. He could tell I was going through a lot, but he didn’t want to do anything about it. It seemed like a very wicked choice to me.
With the amount of time I spent around my classmates, we would share experiences of our family lives. I soon realised there were some things my dad did I casually dismissed because they seemed normal. It wasn’t always like that, but something changed once I entered secondary school.
He would passive-aggressively preach about me. He always complained I was too quiet, and he took my quietness as anger. Every time we prayed in the house, he kept trying to “deliver” me from anger. Then, there were the strange punishments — he would tell me to kneel in a wardrobe knowing fully well I hate the dark, or fast compulsorily, or lock me in my room.
During holidays, I’d try to avoid everyone by spending a lot of time in my room, hiding. If I wasn’t in my room, there’d be something he’d berate or punish me for.
How was it like when you finally graduated from secondary school?
Tobi: It got worse. I didn’t get admission to the university because I was too young, so I spent some time doing tutorials for exams. In the lessons I attended, there were these boys from our church who I occasionally hung out with. Once that started, my dad complained about people seeing me talk to boys. It escalated to the point of him slapping me because they walked me home. It was tiring because he never treated any of my younger siblings like this. I was the bearer of everyone’s mistakes, and I took all his anger.
How did he treat your siblings?
Tobi: As the eldest child, whatever they did was somehow my fault. Even if I wasn’t present or aware. Plus, he was always kinder in the way he spoke to them. Sure, he hit them, but he always hit me harder.
That’s why when I got into university in 2017, the one thing I pushed for was my own place off-campus. Living in the hostel meant you’d have to go home once school closes. I put a lot of distance between us, and it helped that he didn’t try to force me back. He never looked for or tried to see me in school. The few times he called, I’d tune him out. His voice became white noise.
That sounds better
Tobi: It was. Everything was going great until the pandemic started in 2020. With the lockdown, there was already a lot of mental strain we were going through as a society. It broke my spirit, and I didn’t know what else to do, so I tried to talk to my dad about my mental health and how I felt depressed. His response was to pray it away.
It felt like he was trying to use God to punish me. Whenever I did something he didn’t like, he’d try to pray or fast the problem away. It was ridiculous. Then, he tried to convince me that locing my hair was somehow responsible for why my life is the way it is, that God was angry with me. It really affected my relationship with God.
Tobi: After he got tired of shouting at me, he started to hit me. It made me realise I’d never have a proper relationship with my dad. He’s destroyed everything that could’ve been used as a bridge.
As the lockdown restrictions eased, I got a remote job that allowed me to still pursue my degree. I moved to live with a friend and didn’t step foot in the house for a year. Then, on the 30th of December (2020), I went to pick up some clothes and left the house for another year.
What about now?
Tobi: I’ve been spending more time at home now. I haven’t moved out yet because I can’t afford to, but I do try to leave the house whenever I can. Currently, I haven’t stepped foot there in two months. It’s from friend’s house to friend’s house. Finishing school and getting a job reduced the amount of control he had over me. So there’s not much I need him for.
What about your mum and siblings? Do you miss them?
Tobi: I do miss them, but there’s no amount of missing them that’ll make up for how terrible I’d feel if I lived with them. I’m choosing myself. My siblings have a better relationship with him than I do, so they’re fine. I check in on them regularly.
Have you ever tried to talk to him about how you feel?
Tobi: Recently, I asked him if he knew he was harder on me than any of his other children, and he said he did know. He felt I was going to spoil, so he had to prevent it. Funny because I still spoil las las, but that’s his own. I didn’t want to hear anything else he had to say.
It’s possible that when you think about breadwinners in the home, your mind automatically goes to the man. Regardless of what society expects, this isn’t always the case in every family.
We spoke to six Nigerian women about being major financial providers in their families, and here’s what they had to say:
“We don’t talk about it”
— Joke*, 36
I’ve been married for four years, and my husband has only officially worked for one year since we got together. He lost his job due to some kind of office politics, and now, he just does some online freelancing to make money.
I cover all the bills — including rent and our children’s school fees — from my ₦100k salary. It’s challenging, and I must have taken loans from every co-operative at my job. At this point, we don’t even talk about me having to take care of everything anymore; it’s just expected. I can’t say anything so as not to seem disrespectful.
“My mum expects me to send money home”
— Gina*, 20
I’m a student at one of the federal polytechnics, and I also make hair for my fellow students to get some money. My mum is a single mother of two, and she sells sweets to fend for us.
I understand how tough things are at home, and I send what I can, especially to support my little sister who’s still in secondary school, but it gets frustrating that my mum expects so much from me. I once asked her where she thought I got money from and she didn’t say anything.
I hustle daily to support my family and pay for school, but I hope I don’t get pushed into doing what I’m not supposed to do.
I earn 70% more than my husband does. So naturally, I take on more responsibilities at home. That isn’t an issue in itself, but the pressure from our extended family is out of this world.
My husband is generous, and our extended family takes advantage of this. It has gotten so bad that they now feel entitled, and if he doesn’t send money, they say his wife doesn’t want him to help them. Now I find myself spending most of my salary just to satisfy family demands — while they think it’s coming from my husband. People think we’re rich, in reality, we have to stretch out my husband’s small salary to afford rent and other utilities.
“It’s tiring”
— Lizzy*, 33
My husband is out of the country, and I’ve been the only one catering to the children — well, except for the yearly rent that he sends.
He’s been away for three years now, and I still wonder if it’s that difficult to send something to assist in feeding and school fees at least once in a while. His family also doesn’t care to know how we live. But if I dare ask him for money, his mother will know and send one of his siblings to harass me.
I like to console myself by assuming I’m a single mother so I don’t feel too disappointed.
I know how hard my parents worked to ensure my siblings and I didn’t lack anything while we were growing up.
Now that I have a job and they’re both retired, I’m only too happy to take on our financial needs, especially with three of my siblings still in school. It’s tough because I don’t earn so much, and I don’t have a glucose guardian, but I try my best.
It means I can’t just spend on enjoyment sturvs for myself or randomly go out with friends, but it’s a sacrifice I’m happy to make. My parents did more for us.
“We’re a unit”
— Hadiza*, 31
My husband resigned from work in 2021 to further his studies in another state. I’ve had to shoulder all the home expenses and even assist with his school expenses.
I don’t have a problem with it because this is something that we already talked about and agreed on together. But it’s difficult because we have three children. Anyway, the fact that this should be temporary helps make it easier.
*All names have been changed for the sake of anonymity.
Navigating life as a woman in the world today is interesting. From Nigeria to Timbuktu, it’ll amaze you how similar all our experiences are. Every Wednesday, women the world over will share their experiences on everything from sex to politics right here. This is Zikoko’s What She Said.
This week’s #ZikokoWhatSheSaid subject is a 28-year-old Nigerian woman who’s recently had a South-Eastern wedding. From the point of view of a younger millennial, she talks having multiple ceremonies, bride price negotiations and how everything surprised her.
Let’s start at the beginning of the “getting married” process. What happened right after the date was fixed?
My first thought was, “Okay, you’re ready to do this adulting thing.” Then, it was like rush, rush, sharp, sharp, let’s get this done. We’d already scheduled the date at the time of my proposal, to be about six months after. So the experience was overwhelming. There was no time to actually sit down and process it. Going to the market, going to see the family, just all over the place almost immediately.
I thought people get engaged first, then one day much later, they say, “so when should the actual wedding be?”
People wait when they’re just not ready to get married. But why propose when you’re not ready? What’s the point? Do you want to become a Lord of the Rings?
LOL
Jokes aside. Yes, there are people who get engaged and don’t immediately decide on a date. But personally, I think once you’ve proposed to someone, the next thing to do is start planning. I wouldn’t say it’s the normal way. We just wanted to start doing our thing together.
What was the point of waiting when our parents already knew it was official. Six months is enough time to plan, especially if you can fund it. And that’s why it’s important to be in an intentional relationship; you guys are already talking about these things. It’s also very good for men to be intentional. It makes things so easy.
How so?
Because if he’s already determined, “I want to be married by February 2022”, he’ll make sure he proposes on time. Then, you both already have a date to work towards. There’s no uncertainty, at least, not too much.
Fair enough. So what were the next steps?
We officially went to meet our parents because you don’t want a case where you accept a proposal, and then, your parents are like, no. So the next logical step was to build a relationship between us and our parents so they know we’re serious.
I’d already told my dad about him, and I went with him to meet his parents. Then, we set dates that were friendly for everybody. After that, I had to draw up a list for the traditional wedding, and a different one for the white. I started asking friends for their wedding Excel sheets, and all that.
That’s a lot. What surprised you about the wedding preparations, and what didn’t?
I would say everything surprised me. Everything. First, I had no idea it would cost the extent of money I spent. But I think what really shocked me was how the wedding matters to parents as much as it does to you. The idea that your wedding is yours? More often than not, whether they’re bringing money or not, your parents are in charge. One parent would say, “I know you want it this way, but this is what we want.” The other one wants exactly the opposite. So you can’t just say this is what I want, and go to sleep. It also matters to them. And it’s not really from a bad place.
Like what, specifically? What were you parents/families’ expectations?
Okay, so my husband’s family is Catholic, and mine is Anglican. If you know these two Orthodox churches, you’d understand what it was like. It was the case of, “Where do we now get married?” I even have a Catholic background from my maternal side. So for a while, it was a huge conversation. When it looked like we would marry in the Anglican church, his family still asked why not a Catholic church? I mean, even if your husband has agreed to something, you still have his family to contend with.
Right
Also, Igbo people always go to their villages to marry. The average family has way better houses there than they do in the city. When you go, you have to add some value to the house. Maybe do a makeover, touch up the paint, clean, retile and so on. Things that ordinarily wouldn’t be a big deal.
But your parents would say, “No, this person is coming. We have to…” Or maybe, “You’re the first doctor in the family. This wedding has to be this or that. We can’t keep it inside the gate. We have to visit the extended family, the kindred, so that everybody passing through can see you and what you’ve done.” They just expected us to grant all their hearts’ desires, especially culture-wise. So compromises had to be made.
Like what?
I ended up getting married in an Anglican church in Lagos instead of a Catholic church in the east. Because we’d done the traditional wedding in the east, we wanted most of our loved ones, friends and friends of family who couldn’t make it to be part of the ceremony in Lagos.
How exactly did the decision go?
It went really well. Everyone was happy, and at the end of the day, nothing mattered. Just the joy on everyone’s faces.
You mentioned earlier that the wedding expenses surprised you. Tell me about that
As an Igbo lady, I had to tie a George wrapper. When I went to the market, I saw how ridiculous things were, like really, really pricey. You see people on Bella Naija and asoebi pages on Instagram, and you think, “Oh, this will not be expensive na. Max., maybe ₦50k.” Then, you touch the material in the market and hear ₦300k.
Even these wedding tailors on Instagram shocked me o; calling prices here and there. There were many times I wondered if I should’ve maybe saved more. But then, who wants to spend their life planning for a wedding that may or may not happen, so I just really managed everything. In general, the expenses got me thinking sha.
I had to walk around the whole of Balogun market to find something that worked with my budget o. And I ran away from IG tailors. LOL.
LOL. What about the formal introduction and bride price negotiations? Can you tell me about that?
I think my case was quite unconventional. When it comes to the typical Igbo family wedding rules, and what I even expected for mine, it didn’t end up like that. It was completely different, and I’ll explain. My parents are based in Port Harcourt, and my husband’s parents are in Lagos. So when I told my dad there was somebody who wanted to speak to him and express his intentions to marry me, he was like, “Who is this young man?” And I told him everything.
When we were to see my dad in particular, work came up, our schedules were scattered, so we couldn’t go. But my dad would have frequent phone conversations with him, and when it was time for the introduction in August (2021), his parents sent some of their relatives in Port Harcourt to see my parents.
They went with drinks for what we call Iku Aka — to knock on the door and say, “This is the person we want to marry?” At that point, my dad already knew my husband well. If we had gone to Port Harcourt to do Iku Aka, gone back again for the introduction, and again for the traditional wedding, I mean, all that travelling just didn’t make sense.
No bride price involved?
I come from a family of five girls. For the bride price, my dad often says things like he’s not selling his girls. But because our culture demands it, he went to his village to tell them, “What do I need to do to make this a peaceful process?” We’re from Imo State, Owerri, so they came up with this “normal” list, which I found very ridiculous.
I can imagine. How was it sorted?
My dad just met my husband’s dad and told him to bring the cash equivalent. When we went for my traditional ceremony, I saw them sharing the rice, and all those things from the list, to the women and men in our family. My dad didn’t make any trouble, and everyone just followed suit.
Wow. So no bride price madness? I’m happy for you
Hmm. There was a bride price for being an undergraduate, and different ones because I’m a graduate and a lawyer. They even had one for if I had a master’s degree or professional certifications. When I saw the list, I cringed. But I think my parents weren’t obsessed with that stage. They wanted to do what was right by where we were from, but they just said, “You know what, just do what you can do.”
So after they’d come to symbolically pluck you from your father’s garden?
LOL. We’d chosen a date when all our family members in the east could attend the Trad because a couple of people also couldn’t come down to Lagos for the white wedding. In our bid for the perfect date to accommodate everyone, we chose one we later realised we couldn’t get married on.
What?! How?
According to customs and traditions, Igbo people have four market days: Nkwo, Orie, Afor and Eke. In Owerri, we don’t get married on Eke market day. It’s believed if you do, the God of Eke would strike you with afflictions. In my husband’s place, they don’t get married on Nkwo market day. And what I mean is, even if the wedding is not on the day itself, you can’t go to a woman’s place to bring her back home on that day.
The main goal of an Igbo wedding is to sip the palm wine and give your husband to drink. That’s the most significant part, not the elaborate party. So imagine a scenario in which, on the day of the wedding, everybody is already cooking outside, and I get a message from my husband’s people that we can’t get married because it’s Nkwo market day in their own place, and they can’t come to my father’s home in the village. This was 4 a.m., so we were like, “what’s going to happen to all these caterers, all the guests?”
Wow. Sounds like a disaster
In fact. We had to start thinking. My husband’s people eventually came up with a plan to remove handing over the palm wine, because it would bring curses and all of that. They had to come the following day for that, so I had a two-way traditional wedding.
But guess what. The day we handed over the palm wine was now Eke market day. Remember I said in my own place, we don’t do wedding ceremonies on Eke. We’d already booked our flight to go back to Lagos the next day, so we couldn’t shift it. It was just messy. We had to do it hush hush in my father’s sitting room, and that was when the bride price was paid.
Again?
Well, even though they’d already sent money to buy the things on the list for the traditional wedding, there was still the main bride price. And all my dad collected was a ₦1000 note.
They put a lot of money on a tray and gave it to my father, saying, “Is this enough payment for us to collect your daughter?” Symbolically, my dad just picked some notes. I can’t recall if it was ₦1k or ₦500 notes they put on the tray, but my dad picked a note and said, “I’m not selling my child. I adhere (sic) you to take care of her. But I’m taking this one as a symbol of the agreement between our two families.”
And how do you feel about the whole experience almost a year later? What about it makes you happy?
I’m so glad I got to see all my relatives in the village. Looking at the pictures make me happy. Listening to our parents retell the stories of the trad day to their friends and how successful the event was makes me happy.
Our wedding album just came in yesterday, and I was grinning sheeeppiisshhllyyy (sic) as I flipped through… It made me smile to see our parents, siblings and dearest friends with sparks in their eyes and large smiles on their faces.
So yeah, the pictures and memories will always make me happy. And generally, I feel good about the experience. If I had to, I’d do the whole thing again. But maybe with me more in control. LOL.
If you’d like to be my next subject on #WhatSheSaid, click here to tell me why
Sunken Ships is a Zikoko series that explores the how and why of the end of all relationships — familial, romantic or just good old friendships.
Anita* and Cynthia* are cousins with a four-year age difference. They spent a lot of their free time together as children, but one incident changed the trajectory of their relationship. Now, it’s been over a decade since they spoke. Here’s *Anita’s story:
I’ve known Cynthia all my life. That’s the good thing about family. You don’t have to find them; they’re already there.
Cynthia and I were close in age, unlike many of our other cousins, so we spent a lot of time together. Easter, birthdays, Christmas, name it. If there was a reason to go over to her house for the holidays, I’d take it with joy.
Until one day, I was at her house and she ignored me. That’s when I decided I’d never go back.
The short story is that she chose her friends over me. The long story is that her parents were throwing a party for their children and their children’s friends. I was around two days before because I’m family and I just spent a lot of my free time at her place.
That day, she had promised me we’d play some games together, and I was very excited. Then, the guests started arriving, mostly girls from her boarding school. When it was time for us to play our game, I reminded her about it, and she said she didn’t have time, that she was busy. It turned out she was “busy” watching television with her friends. For the whole day, she ignored me completely. I went home the next day as planned, and never went back to her house again.
Why didn’t you go back?
I was hurt. I felt abandoned by the only friend I had. Making friends was a tough thing for me to do because a lot of people only wanted to talk to me because their parents told them to. I was one of those “smart” children parents wanted their children to associate with. At the time, she saw me as a person not just a way to improve her intelligence.
Plus, the situation brought insecurities I didn’t even realise I had. I started to withdraw and stopped being the happy and cheerful person I once was. From then on, I began to see myself as less than everyone else. Self-esteem issues are a bitch, and I can tie mine to that one scenario.
But you’re family, how did you not talk to her for over a decade?
I just avoided her. She might be family, but it doesn’t mean we have to talk to each other all the time. I went to boarding school too, and for some reason, our calendars never synched. We were hardly on holiday simultaneously, so not seeing her was easy. Whenever her mum asked me to come over to her place, I’d make up an excuse.
We didn’t even go to Universities in the same country, so dodging her wasn’t a challenging feat. We only ever saw during Christmas because we gather at our grandma’s place for the holidays. Even then, there are a lot of cousins and many rooms to hide in. I just talk to someone else, and if I can’t, I hide.
Did you ever bring it up with her?
No. I wonder if things would have been different if I had just told her, but the situation was so embarrassing. Even saying it right now is embarrassing.
Also, I was hoping she’d bring it up herself. I wanted her to approach me and ask why we weren’t talking anymore, but she never did. One of our cousins did though. She asked me why I didn’t speak to Cynthia anymore, and I asked her, “why doesn’t Cynthia talk to me?” It’s not like she made an effort to reach out and I refused to speak to her. I talk to her mum, who is an absolute sweetheart, so if Cynthia talked to me, I’d probably talk back.
The conclusion I’ve reached is that she doesn’t like me. Maybe she never really did.
Do you think you’d ever tell her?
Maybe. It took me years to work through a lot of the issues I developed based on that experience — the years of battling insecurities, questioning my self-worth and other things. I’m still figuring it out, but it’s a lot less now. In a way, I’m thankful to her for teaching me early that people will leave you for other people. It’s not a reflection of your worth; it’s just how it is.
If we see at Christmas this year, maybe I’ll bring it up. I can’t keep dragging something that happened years ago. I’m an adult now, and so is she. Plus, it would be nice to actually hear what she has to say. It might have been a big misunderstanding, and I’m overreacting.
Sometimes. I’m not close to many of my family members because a lot of them are much older. She was one of the few people who was actually around my age. I miss what we had and what we could have had.
Do you hate her for how she made you feel?
I used to, but not anymore. One thing I realised a little too late is that she grew up. She may have been around my age, but she still had four years on me. She also had friends outside of me. Sure, she could have handled that situation better, but I’m not the only friend in her life. I tend to be very intense when I care about someone, and I usually expect that intensity in return. However, not everyone can give it, and that’s fine because it means I just have to find people who can.
I’ve grown up as well. I’ve been the older cousin who’s had to entertain the younger ones, so I get how she feels, but I just wish things happened differently.
The Nigerian experience is physical, emotional, and sometimes international. No one knows it better than our features on #TheAbroadLife, a series where we detail and explore Nigerian experiences while living abroad.
Living in Lagos was so hectic for today’s subject on Abroad Life and her husband, she didn’t know he could cook until he made her a surprise meal in Canada. She talks about waiting for two years to travel, having her mum take care of her first child, and the peace of mind that comes with being abroad.
When did you decide to move abroad?
I had my first child in the UK in December 2012. I’d known for a while that I’d probably have a not-so-smooth delivery because of my blood group, but midway through my pregnancy, the doctors in Nigeria found out I also had a fibroid and told me I’d have to deliver through CS. My husband and I decided to travel to have the baby to reduce the risks of complications.
I got to the UK, the doctors checked me and said I didn’t have to do CS because it was a minor issue. After I argued, they referred me to a specialist who told me the same thing. Throughout the process, everyone I met — nurses, doctors, attendants — was so friendly, professional and confidence-inspiring. I felt safe. I was in a general hospital in the UK, but the quality of care was just spectacular. And life in the UK was stress-free.
When I eventually had my baby, there were slight complications, but I had a natural delivery and the baby and I were fine. After that, I decided I didn’t want my child to grow up in Nigeria. Abroad just felt better.
What did you do about it?
My husband and I had spoken about moving to Canada before my childbirth experience, but it wasn’t serious. When we got back to Nigeria, we decided to start the process full-time. First, we hired an agent to help us, but it didn’t seem like it was moving quickly. My husband has a cousin who’s been in Canada long before us, so we reached out to him and he told us we didn’t need an agent because he could run us through the process. So we collected our money back and did our thing ourselves.
Between February and April 2014, we were able to submit our application.
Why did you pick Canada?
I know people in the UK who are constantly looking over their shoulders because they have incomplete papers or expired visas. Migration to Canada is much more straightforward and drama-free. The other option was Australia, but we ultimately picked Canada because we have family here.
When did you eventually move?
2016.
Two whole years after submitting the application?
Yep. It’s like that sometimes. You just have to wait in the pool of applicants until you get your provincial nomination and invitation to apply for permanent residency.
What was the wait like?
It was tiring, but we also had it in the back of our minds that there was light at the end of the tunnel. From the moment we stepped back into Nigeria, I became hyper-aware of the flaws. First, there was no AC at the airport when we landed because, apparently, they were being repaired. Imagine my child who had lived for about a month in the UK being plunged straight into that heat. It was terrible. I also started noticing how stressful or nonexistent access to basic amenities like good roads and stable electricity were. All of this made the move even more necessary.
Expectation vs reality: Canada edition.
Because we have friends and family here, they helped us manage our expectations before we travelled. I think, for many people, moving abroad automatically means you’re going to start living well, making good money, buying cars and good houses, etc. But we already knew that we’d have to wait for a bit and integrate into society before we get those things.
We had to live with people for some time before we got our own place. Then, we had to find jobs. In Canada, finding well-paying jobs in your field is difficult. They usually want you to have Canadian job experience even when you’re just coming in. Your job in Nigeria will most likely not count as experience. For example, I studied engineering and was already an IT supervisor earning in dollars in Nigeria. When I got here, my first job was as a technical support person. I basically took calls from people who needed help with their internet. It felt like a downgrade, but it’s what I had to do.
With time, I got promotions, but I lost the job because of the pandemic in 2020. I eventually got a government job that same year and started my master’s which I’ll complete this year. I can’t wait to become hot cake, working at the big firms again.
Love it. Let’s talk about family life in Canada.
When we lived in Nigeria, my husband and I had would wake up by 4:30 a.m. and be on the roads by 5:30 because we needed to get to work on time. Our child barely lived with us. He was always with my mum. We picked him up on weekends. In fact, we enrolled him in a school close to my mum’s place because we didn’t have time for him. If we continued like that, I don’t think we’d have been a close-knit family.
Here in Canada, things are much different. I remember when I went to work one day, before the pandemic, and my husband had made rice and beans. What? I didn’t even know he could cook. Even I wasn’t cooking in Nigeria. There was no time for all that. But finding out my husband can cook was shocking for me, I can’t lie. Now, we have two children, and we live like a proper family. We have meals together, everyone does chores, we play, we do everything together because we have more control of our time. We’re not spending unnecessary time in traffic or being unproductive because there’s no light.
When I had my second child, I took care of him myself. I had time to do it.
A lot of Nigerians abroad tell me it gets lonely.
Not for me. I have two kids, a job, a husband who’s my gist partner, school, and extended family here. Also, I’m a boring person. With all of this, I don’t have the time or headspace to get bored. There’s always something. Also, my city has a very high number of Nigerians, so it’s almost like I’m in Nigeria.
Interesting. Tell me a bit about Canadians.
They’re nice, friendly people who hate confrontation. None of the blatant, American-type racism you hear about. If you experience racism here, it’s subtle. You probably wouldn’t even notice it.
Are you a citizen now?
My entire family is Canadian now, yes. Once you spend three years as a permanent resident here, you can apply for citizenship, and that’s what we did.
Please tell me you’ve been flexing that passport.
I’ve only travelled to Nigeria with it. I have young kids and I’m doing my master’s, so I can’t just hop on planes around the world. Before I came to Nigeria though, I went to the UK, and my God, it was the most stress-free travelling experience ever. When we landed, there was a place for people from Canada, America and maybe one other country to pass and scan their passports, while people from other countries had to get on a long queue to be questioned by immigration officers. It felt delightful to just walk in for once.
What’s your favourite part about living in Canada?
I like that I can plan my life and know that things will go according to plan. I can decide I want to do something and no rules will suddenly pop up saying I can’t.
I feel really good about my decision to move. I know someone just like me who had slight complications while giving birth in Nigeria and died. Here, things just feel much safer.
And your least favourite part?
Honestly, I can’t think of anything right now.
Hey there! My name is Sheriff and I’m the writer of Abroad Life. If you’re a Nigerian and you live or have lived abroad, I would love to talk to you about what that experience feels like and feature you on Abroad Life. All you need to do is fill out this short form, and I’ll be in contact.
Bonding with your family members doesn’t have to be boring. As we celebrate International Family Day, here are six ridiculous ways you can spend time with family.
Slaying together at an owambe
It doesn’t have to be the party of a person you know; gather your family members and dress like you’re trying to outshine the people getting married. A family that looks good together stays together.
Praying against your enemies
How else will you move forward as a family if you have enemies plotting your downfall? Make it a family event and pray against your enemies together. The more voices are praying, the faster the answer to the prayer.
There are many superheroes or supervillain families in movies, but hardly any in real life. That’s why you and your family need to start one. Not only will this make history, but you’d also get to spend quality time with your family.
Fighting over the will
When someone in your family dies, fighting over who gets what is a sure way to promote family unity. You get to spend lots of time together and will interact by force. It’s just unfortunate that someone has to die for this to be possible.
When the family demon finally dies, everyone can come together to celebrate. Throw a party and have a perfect time. At least, this is one death everyone can enjoy.
Going for deliverance together
Generational curses will not break themselves. You need to carry the generation to the place doing the curse-breaking. This might be just what your family needs to move forward.
We bring to you, letters written by women to women they love, miss, cherish or just remember. To celebrate the support women continue to show each other, this is #ToHER.
From: The woman who thinks she’s the favourite niece
To: Meye, her best aunt
Dear Aunty Meye,
I want you to read this knowing how much I love you. Going months without talking to you because of a silly fight made me realise how much I need you in my life. It would kill me if I ever found out something happened to you in the middle of our pointless silence. But knowing us, it’ll probably happen again, so here’s a letter to remind you how much I love you, even when I ignore your calls.
One thing you always say to me is how alike we are, and maybe that’s what’s kept us connected for so long. When I was a kid, you understood my tantrums too well. You knew how to calm me down and get me to use my words rather than yell. There were times you’d spank me for those blow-ups, especially when we were in public, but you’d come back to hug me before I cried. I think that sums up our relationship; one minute you’re calling me your baby elephant, then we’re suddenly at war, and the next minute, we’re cuddled up again.
It was easy for anyone to think you were my mum because of how present you were in my life. My mum was your eldest sister, and you were 16, so you stayed with us after school to take care of me when she was away. On some days, you’d tell me you wish you had more time to be a teenager rather than my nanny. I know you never say it out of spite, but I hear you when you express how much time went by in your life.
My words can’t compensate for the time, but I want you to know you gave me love that I’ll always be grateful for. When people thought I talked too much, you listened to me. You answered a million questions I asked and waited for the multiple more I had. Thank you for singing to me when I couldn’t fall asleep at night. Now that I’m older, I know it was to distract me whenever my parents were fighting. Thank you for loving me like your child, Aunty Meye.
When I was 13 and you moved to Canada for school, I spent weeks adjusting to your absence. Nothing hurt more than the days I woke up needing encouragement when my parents fought. I needed your hugs. Still, thank you for being one phone call away no matter how busy you were. Going back to uni for another degree in your 30s must’ve been hard, but I’m proud you weren’t afraid to try. Thank you for encouraging me to get mine too, whenever you called — even though it led to our fight in March [2022].
I’m sorry for our stupid fight. We’d gone back and forth on moving to Canada for my master’s degree. You’ll never admit it, but I know it was also for us to be close to each other again. I wanted that too, but I just didn’t want Canada. I wasn’t even sure what I wanted. I just needed you to trust that I had it under control. But like an African aunty, you were worried about my future.
I understood you only wanted a better life for me. A soft life, actually. I was only angry you were acting like everyone else and hounding me about going to school. You’d call it tough love, but I expected you to be on my side. That’s why I ghosted you for months. I was hurt that you didn’t believe in me, and at the same time, I was sad that I’d disappointed you.
When I found out you were sick, I knew the silence wasn’t worth it. I’d never forgive myself for not taking your calls or responding to your texts. I’d probably stare at them every day if you ended up gone. You are my favourite aunt, and I know I’ll always be your favourite niece.
We’ll probably have another fight in about two months, but by then, I’ll be closer to Canada, so we can settle it in person. Until then, read this letter and admit that you missed my endless questions and gist.
Unfortunately, we sometimes fall out with our favourite family members. If you’ve ever had to stop talking to your favourite cousin, then you can relate to these eight things.
1) Family functions become annoying
Your cousin is not around to make moments lively. You’re stuck listening to your family members make weird comments about you for the next couple of hours.
2) You doubt just how related the both of you are
If they’re your cousin, maybe they’re not blood-related. Abi is it possible you’re sharing genes with someone so annoying?
3) You start cropping them from family pictures
Before you post pictures of your family, you’d have to meticulously erase them from the picture. Unfortunately for you, they’re in a lot of pictures. When you’re done, just start calling yourself a tech babe.
The best thing about having a favourite cousin is that they have background knowledge. You don’t have to explain everything because they understand. If you try to find a replacement, you’d have to fill someone in on generations of gist and that’s just stressful.
5) You realise just how much you hate your family members
All the excitement you reserved for owambes and other family gatherings was because you got to see them. Now that the two of you are fighting, there’s no excitement again. That’s when it dawns on you that you don’t like your family members.
There’s nobody to cover for you when you do things your parents might not completely agree with. Now, you have to be honest and tell your parents the truth? Who does that?
7) You can’t even insult them
At least if you’re fighting someone, you can say things like “you’re ugly” and “God will punish your generation”. Unfortunately, you and your cousin share the same genes. Also, your generations will intersect. Cursing them is cursing yourself. Wahala for all involved.
8) You can’t even block them everywhere
You might block them on social media, but you can’t block them in real life. When Uncle David is getting married, both of you will jam in real life.
The subject of today’s What She Said is a 22-year-old woman who is really close to hating her dad. She talks about him making her mother’s life difficult, being uncaring, and being denied basic things because he’s petty.
What’s the earliest memory of your childhood?
It was this time when my dad yelled at my mum. They had a fight and I saw her crying so I went to meet him, told him I was upset and he should apologise to my mum. He did. I was really young then. Like 5.
My dad has multiple POS stalls run by people he employed. Before he started the POS business, he had a cow farm, ice block and concrete block industry, a small restaurant, and still had a corporate job. These are the things I could remember. They were way more. He gives money to outsiders, it’s just when it comes to me, my mum and four younger siblings that there is a problem. It would be a different thing if I wasn’t old enough to witness what it was like when my mum’s business was doing well and she fully had it covered. She wasn’t rich, but nobody could say we didn’t have what we needed amongst our peers, but that was so long ago. Her shops got robbed twice, so it was back to square one.
Why do you think he listened to you and apologised?
My dad likes his kids when they’re super young. It’s when you start to having a mind of your own and challenging him that the fighting begins. Like now, the last two kids are the ones currently enjoying his attention. I won’t say I started rebelling against my dad at a particular time. I had a sharp mouth, so from the beginning, I got reprimanded a lot.
But this was okay. People liked me, and I was a smart child, so he used to boast about me. My contact with him increased in SS3 because then I had to start asking for all my shit directly and from then it’s been hell.
Why did you have to start asking him for things?
I used to ask my mum, but the friction between me and my dad is nothing compared to the one between him and my mama. I’m sure she has high blood pressure because of him. So I honestly would rather ask him directly than have her begging him on my behalf for anything. It’s too stressful.
So how did asking him for things work out for you?
You prepare a speech sort of. Then, you prepare yourself to hear any and everything. Ranging from him telling me to ask my mother, to the fact that I have siblings and should be considerate. If he then gives you, it might be half of what you asked for after you’ve cried into your pillow for like three days and maybe once to his face.
It’s exhausting, this ass-kissing. So I try not to ask him for things. I tell him every time I have to that he should know I’m coming to him as a last resort because I don’t like how he’ll talk. It doesn’t mean anything to him that he’s always my last resort. I actually don’t get that bit. It’s weird that it doesn’t bother him. My mum says we should be used to it by now, but it’s a lot to get used to.
He’s also very petty, so he might not give you what you’re asking before because you might have done something to him in the past.
How do you cope?
I don’t. I have a job, so I don’t have to ask him for things often. I pay for small things at home too if I get frustrated. Like buy fuel, pay bills etc.
My siblings are not so lucky. So it’s somehow. I want to save, but I feel guilty for doing it because my siblings need assistance. Thank God for friends. They help me emotionally, mentally and financially to be honest.
No, it’s for me. I’m trying not to make it out to be like I’m working for them. I’m a child too. I don’t want to grow up and regret not doing right by myself or feel like it’s their fault I deprived myself of things because somebody had more kids than they could handle. It’s for me.
I just want to be able to buy what I want, buy meds when I need them and eat what I crave once in a while.
What’ll make life easier for you?
I don’t know. A miracle? My mum somehow getting to actually start a business without my dad making her spend her capital and consequently failing? Me figuring out what I can learn that’ll earn me significant money? Or the system in Nigeria suddenly working? I don’t know. Every day I want to have a shit load of money because I know it’ll solve half my problems, but almost every other day I simply don’t want to exist so I don’t have to think about any of these things at all. I want to either figure shit out or stop this life thing. There’s no part of this that isn’t exhausting: I’m doing a lot, but it’s not enough.
Your mum’s capital; why does she spend it?
It’s long. She used to work in a different city and when her transfer to the city we lived in was taking too long, my dad made her quit because he couldn’t take care of us alone. Then she heard two of my siblings were admitted to the hospital because they fell sick. She didn’t need much convincing after that. After her shops got robbed twice, she had to start from the bottom again.
He wants her to carry her own bit, pay for stuff and all that but business will not have started and he’s already shedding bills. Whenever she starts a business, my dad stops paying bills at home so she ends up spending her capital. One time, on the day she started a new business, he asked her which responsibility she wanted to handle.
What’s your relationship with him like now?
I haven’t spoken to him in two weeks, and I prefer it like this. It’ll cause problems when we eventually talk, but he’s not a person you should be around often if you want to be healthy. I can’t be around him for two days and not cry, and I’m not a crier. Not even when Yoruba men break my heart.
My mum used to hide to cry because she didn’t want to influence how we saw our dad or treated him, but I have eyes. There was a time my dad’s friend accused her of influencing how we acted with him, but I cleared him so I know we wouldn’t be hearing from him any time soon. My mum is far from perfect, but I won’t let anyone say rubbish about her.
I don’t even think my dad realises we don’t like him. He compares himself to fathers who don’t do anything for their kids and wants us to think we’re lucky because he paid our school fees after we’ve cried and cried.
I don’t think I hate my dad, but I’m slowly getting there.
For more stories like this, check out our #WhatSheSaid and for more women like content, click here
Being a black sheep is mainly dependent on the values your family lives by. These six Nigerian women talk about being the black sheep of their family.
Fego, 25
Both my parents are pastors. So with my hair, my partying, drinking, and dressing, I am the one that doesn’t conform. I neither go to church nor believe in the bible anymore, but they don’t know that. My hair is a major issue right now. I cut it and dyed it yellow, and my mum constantly complains. Especially when I’m home. She says how can she preach against such to her people, and her child openly doesn’t care. I don’t share their opinions on marriage or relationships either. When I told my mum I didn’t want to get married, I’m sure she added another prayer point to her nightly prayers.
Yinka, 18
My parents are Jehovah’s witnesses, and I am not interested in it. My mum expects me to get married as a virgin, but between March and now, I’ve had sex with three different people. I even went to the club this week. The funny part is that they don’t even know this stuff. The only things they know is that I send nudes, and I don’t go to church. If they knew the rest, I would be a dead sheep, not a black one.
As the first child, I’m expected to train my brothers on morality and religious things, but my principles differ from those of my parents. I’m doing my best in school, but according to my parents, I have character issues. I differ so much from their set standard that I am called deranged and a child of Satan on a daily basis when I’m at home. This is just because I’m feminist, pro-choice, pro LGBTQ, and borderline atheist.
Anu, 25
My stepbrother has a conventional well-paying job and is married with children. I, on the other hand, work a lot of jobs that include me being on my phone or laptop a lot. My mother thinks I am doing fraud. I also left my previous husband, so she is always talking about marriage and settling down.
I lived with family a lot growing up. The first time I had a general fight with everyone, I had just gotten back from boarding school, and somehow someone went through my bags and found a picture with myself and some other guys in my class. They called a family meeting on my head. It was weird because I didn’t even have a boyfriend nor had I kissed a boy at this time. They said a lot of things all in the name of trying to make sure that I don’t end up a teen mum like my mother. So, I basically started fighting everyone.
This is a big problem because, in my family, everyone wants to get involved in your life, and they are supposed to not be challenged. Also, I don’t go to church, I wear nose rings, and I like women and men. I never allowed them to tell me what to do with my life. Over time, I think I became invincible to them, or they all just chose to act like I don’t exist. Now, I only meet them at family functions if I choose to show up, and I told my mother to not give anyone my number.
Zainab, 21
I am currently dragging the position of black sheep with one of my cousins. She is an atheist and is in a lovely relationship with a single father. I don’t want to get married and I have a strong aversion to children. I also have tattoos and lots of piercings. When I got my tongue piercing, they called a meeting to discuss how I have spoilt. Now, because I am the one still in Nigeria, they feel they can pop in with their unsolicited advice. It annoys me a lot, and I can’t wait till I leave this country and they can find the next scapegoat, or sheep, or whatever.
Love Lifeis a Zikoko weekly series about love, relationships, situationships, entanglements and everything in between.
Audio: It Was Love At First Talk
Akintunde, 35, and ‘Depeju, 26, knew they would marry each other after speaking on the phone for the first time.For today’s Love Life, they talk about fighting for the first few months of their relationship, how they got past that and what it feels like to become parents.
What is your earliest memory of each other?
‘Depeju: I met the big head through Facebook. He slid into the DMs on my birthday to wish me a happy birthday, and then he added “Sweetheart” to his message. I thought he was a jobless 30+ married man that did not really have anything to do with his life, so I let the “Sweetheart” slide.
Akintunde: I actually used the “Sweetheart” to test the ground. I wanted to see if she would be offended by that or if she would be good-natured about it. She didn’t show offense, so I was encouraged to proceed with my agenda.
‘Depeju: Normally, I wouldn’t have replied to that DM. I don’t usually reply Facebook DMs. They’re always filled with “hello angle” and the likes. But when I went through his wall, I saw that he was reasonable and had intelligent pieces of writing, so I replied him with “Thank you Sir.”
All this because of a birthday notification…
Akintunde: I can’t recall if it was the birthday notification that brought her to my attention. I just know I ended up on her wall and saw an angelic babe.
‘Depeju: I’ll remind you: You sent me a friend request because you were sending friend requests to plenty girls at random.
LMAO.
‘Depeju: After the “Sir” reply, we got talking. I really can’t remember what got us talking but I know it’s something around the fact that he sucks at dancing. The conversation became frequent real quickly and we exchanged contacts, so he called me.
We spent more than one hour on the phone. During the course of the call, he said, “I’m AS. Find out your genotype because I’m not here to play.”
After the call, I knew that I wanted to marry him. I didn’t have to doubt. It was love at first talk.
Akintunde: Omo, I didn’t come to play. But I’ll be honest: you are also very interesting to talk to. You and your spri-spri English. Before we met, I dated someone I really liked but things went south. After I broke up with the babe, the people I dated or had flings with were either not my type or something just didn’t click. They were either so boring and just wanted “Love”, or just simply subpar. I’m big on having conversations, and I was looking for that person whom I’d be able to have conversations with about anything and they’d be able to hold their own.
So, that first phone call with ‘Depeju showed clearly that yeah, na this be the one for me! I clearly liked her already and there we were talking for about three hours during the first phone conversation, something my life lacked at that point. I didn’t need any further sign to know that this was the girl I wanted to marry. It was why I asked her to quickly get her genotype checked because I didn’t want to love up and then later realise that things would not work out.
Does this mean you both were single when you found each other?
‘Depeju: Funny enough, I just ended a relationship a few weeks before then.
Akintunde: And cut your hair. Say eeettt.
‘Depeju: I really don’t like you, this man. But yeah sha, it was a terrible breakup. He was someone I liked, but we both knew that the relationship couldn’t go anywhere because of religious differences. We eventually agreed to the breakup, but it was a bit tough on me emotionally. I cut my hair, ran out of Lagos, went on a tour with a friend of mine. Along the line I celebrated my birthday, and then, this annoying man’s message came in.
Akintunde: I had to break off with different ties I had then. A couple of them took a while because they needed soft landing. I just didn’t want to be brash and make someone go and hurt herself.
Wait, wait, wait. You had multiple ties? I thought…
‘Depeju: Ah, he had multiple ties oh. Flings ni repete.
Akintunde: Like I said earlier, I was really searching for where my soul would fit with…
‘Depeju: Oshey, soul search.
Akintunde: It was the search that brought me into her DM. It was the search that led to the phone call, and that phone call did it for me. But I had to pass through many places before landing my queen. Some of these ‘ties’ were in different stages of being, and it became expedient to go and remove myself from them all.
How did you tell your ties that you wanted to end things?
‘Depeju: Don’t come and form that you did it gently o.
Akintunde: To be honest, I wasn’t really talking with these people, so it wasn’t difficult to end things. I ghosted some and found a way to scatter things with others. I’m sure some of these people are still very mad at me, but they should not vex, please.
So did you start making wedding plans after the call?
Akintunde: What plans? Someone that I later blocked.
‘Depeju: You would think since we knew we were going to marry each other, it would be all lovey-dovey. But no. A few months later, when we started getting to know each other, I told myself, “Ahhh, this is a mistake o.” I knew I had entered one chance.
Ahan, what happened?
‘Depeju: We had so many differences, especially in terms of ideologies and our outlook about life. One major problem was our age difference. Akintunde thinks like he is in his 50s. And well, not to put the whole blame on him, I was childish about some issues too. One time, we had a fight and instead of talking it out with him, I subbed him on my status. You should have seen the way he erupted.
Started talking about, “Are you a child? You have an issue with me, you should talk to me directly.” He went on and on like a father scolding his child. It was then I knew I was in a relationship with my daddy.
Akintunde: I just feel if you have issues with me and you say I am the love of your life, come and tell me. Not throw a mini pity party.
‘Depeju: And another thing: I like evening outings, but for my 50+ man, as soon as it is 6 p.m., his own day outside is over.
Akintunde: You sef. Why do you want to start going to the cinema by 10 p.m.? Nigeria is dangerous, please.
‘Depeju: Oh, and once, we had a big fight one afternoon. That’s how my dude blocked me. He doesn’t like me to call him ‘dude’ by the way. We once had a fight about that too. He wanted to know why I would refer to him as ‘dude’.
Akintunde: Call me by my name when we are fighting. Call me baby in peacetime.
But really though, what was the blocking about?
‘Depeju: Honestly, I can’t remember all the details again. I just know he left me a long list of messages ranting about how he couldn’t take it anymore, how I’m not giving him peace.
Babe, do you still remember?
Akintunde: I think you subbed me on your status after a fight and wrote, “People change”. And I took it personally. Like, won’t this one stop subbing me on her status?
How long did the block last?
Akintunde: I think it was up to 4 days or so.
‘Depeju: After he blocked me, I reached out to a mutual friend of ours and told her we had ended things. The first thing she asked was, “Did you two end it formally?” I said no, that he left a long ass message for me and blocked me. She said I should call him to make things formal, so that one party would not assume that we are done while the other party thinks it’s just a break. I agreed to call him so I could end things officially. The moment I heard his voice, I started crying.
At first, he was forming. He said, “Ehn, it’s not as if I wanted to block you, it’s because I am tired of the way you’re behaving blah blah blah.” That day, we ended up talking for like 4 hours. After that, everything changed. We started making compromises, stopped fighting and started talking about things.
Akintunde: So, technically, the real romance began after “The Second Phone Call.”
How long were you together before you decided to make it official and forever?
Akintunde: 2 years.
‘Depeju: Oh, by the way, this man never popped the actual, “Will you be my girlfriend?” or “Will you marry me?” question. He just told me, “I want to date you and not just date you, I’m here for marriage.” And when it was time, he simply went to meet my mother with his family and decided on a wedding date in my absence. Man was a real 50+ man with enough ego to power Nigeria’s electricity. I’d ask him and he’d say, “Will I now kneel down and be asking will you marry me? Shebi we know we want to marry each other already?”
Akintunde: You won’t let this matter die a natural death. I have said I will propose during one of our anniversaries.
But if it counts for anything, I called her one New Year’s Day and said, “Let’s get married this year na.” At that point, I was completely convinced we had to get our asses married.
The second phone call played a large part in this. Like I said, that was the beginning of the real romance. And seeing as we both seemed very sure of each other and were doing this lovey-dovey thing very well and dealing with issues between us with more understanding and sense, there wasn’t really anything further to check.
‘Depeju: And me too, I was completely and irrevocably in love with him. So even though I already had my ideal proposal in mind, when he called me to say, “Let’s get married na,” I said, “Yeah, let’s do it.”
How has married life been?
‘Depeju: Omo. I have no words, because awesome does not even describe it properly. If there’s something more than awesome, that’s the word I’ll use.
Akintunde: It has been really really really good, to be very honest. Let’s not deny God’s goodness. I’ve enjoyed the different phases and moments, and day after day, I am glad I saw that picture of her and was bold enough to send her a DM.
‘Depeju: And I’m glad I didn’t air you because you looked jobless.
What’s the best part about being married to each other?
‘Depeju: Ah, on this, I could write an epistle o. Because there’s no single best part. From the way he’s intentional about loving me, to the awesome communication, funny moments and all. If I’m to really pick a single best part, then I think it’s the fact that I get to wake up every morning and see the love of my life beside me.
Akintunde: For me, it’s knowing I have this woman in my life. There’s this feeling like it’s a piece of something that found its place/niche. Think of a dovetail joint. Fitting so neatly and cleanly. Without fuss. And this makes every other thing we do or experience so beautiful.
‘Depeju: And yeah, he’s the writer in the family so he tends to describe things better than me. Show off oshi. But for real, I am grateful for the love Akintunde has brought into my life. It’s incomparable and beyond measure. And I am grateful for our child too. We are now parents.
Aww. Tell me about that.
Akintunde: I have come to realise that I’m the cool dad and she’s the mean mom.
‘Depeju: About this, AK said I’ve embraced motherhood more than ‘wifehood’. Also, I’m not mean, he’s just the happy-go-lucky dad. He wiill let that minion get away with murder if he can.
LMAO. How’s romance like with a child in it?
‘Depeju: We have been compromising. We are not allowing the baby to ruin our romantic life completely. After I had the baby, we’d take walks, drive somewhere and just park there and be with each other for hours. We also picked a day of the week to have to ourselves only.
It’s not as easy as it was before, but we’re taking it a day at a time and making deliberate efforts not to let go of our life for the baby. We had my mum with us for a month, and after that, we got a nanny.
Akintunde: A few months ago, we had this getaway planned. The baby with her nanny would go spend the weekend with my parents. Babe and I would get out of the house and go spend the weekend somewhere else. Have a good time. Go pick them up after two days.
First thing babe said after I told her we’d be taking the baby somewhere else away from us, “What will I now be doing?”
Ogbeni, you will be doing me!
I’m screaming. Tell me, what do you love the most about each other?
Akintunde: ‘Depeju is perfection. She has a way to make everything in your life be in their right or appropriate place.
‘Depeju: I love Akin’s kindness. I’ve always thought that my mum was the kindest person I knew until I met Akin. He’s always being kind and a blessing to everyone around him. There was a time he was supposed to send me money for something. But this was back when we used to have our fights, and we were in the middle of a fight. Obviously, we were not talking to each other, so I didn’t expect anything.
He sent this money and told me we’re still not talking but that didn’t mean he shouldn’t do what he’s supposed to do. When he did that, I made up my mind that even when we’re fighting, we can still be kind to each other.
How do you both resolve conflicts when they come up now?
‘Depeju: We talk.
Akintunde: Yes, we talk. We have this saying: “Conversation is our superpower”, and so, no matter what happens, we have decided we’ll always leave the door for conversations open.
‘Depeju: We can spend hours resolving little fights because we talk about everything and anything. We also make decisions together. If I tell you no, and you go behind me and ask him, the answer will still be no because there’s every probability that we’ve talked about it.
Akintunde: Also, we look out for each other. We see parenthood as a shared responsibility, and this has been really helpful to us as parents. That way, no part of the journey wears one or both of us out.
‘Depeju: To be honest, we have just started the parenting journey, so we can’t say we’ve made parenting work until the child turns out not to be a crackhead.
Akintunde: My child will not become a crackhead, please.
‘Depeju: No nau. Just a weirdo, like you.
Is there anything you’d love to change about each other?
‘Depeju: I wish Akintunde will arrange his things in a more orderly manner. One shoe might be in Kaduna, the other in Kano.
Akintunde: At least they are both “K”. Me, I wish ‘Depeju would have a less sharp mouth. Ah.
‘Depeju: LMAO. But I don’t insult people nau.
Akintunde: Not to their faces. It’s me that will hear everything.
‘Depeju: You’re not serious.
How would you rate the relationship on a scale of 1 – 10?
‘Depeju: Omo! O ja scale.
Akintunde: It’s just how my madam has said it. This love is too big to measure on a scale.
For a while now, I had been asking people what the most interesting parts about their love life. So, when someone reached out to me and said she fell in love with her Uncle, I wondered if I was reading right.
The person in today’s As Told To is *Anna, a 19-year-old girl who fell in love with her 23-year-old Uncle. She talks about how her mother found out, and how they all dealt with it.
Names are changed for the purpose of anonymity.
How we met
We never actually grew up together. My extended family has always been very close, but because we lived in different states growing up he was never one of those Uncles you could see whenever you wanted to. When my family finally moved to Lagos, my uncle *David and I both lived in Ikeja, so we saw each other a lot more. He’s four years older than I am, so we had a lot of things to talk about. I am the first child, so it was nice to have someone take care of me for a change. Maybe that was one of the reasons why I fell for him.
Falling in love
During the pandemic, he worked from home and my school was out of session, so we spent a lot of time together and got even closer. We would text till late in the night and it felt nice to have someone I could talk to. He is kind, intelligent, funny, handsome, and treats me the way I wish more people did, like an adult. I was going through a very tough time and David was constantly there for me. He became the blueprint for the kind of guy I wanted to end up with.
When I started comparing him to guys that approached me was when I knew what I felt for him was more than what you feel for family members, so I told him. He said he felt the same way, but we knew we could never be together. We never initiated anything physical. I do not know if the reason was that we were related, or because I made a chastity vow. We even tried to reduce the amount of time we spent together, but because he is family, we still spent a lot of time together.
One day, my mum came into my room and started asking questions about my Uncle. She told me that she was already aware of the situation and *David had told her everything. Apparently, *David never told her anything but she had her suspicions. She went through my phone looking for the conversations I had with him. She did not shout at me or punish me, but instead, she scheduled prayer meetings for me. Luckily, she also promised to not tell anyone else in the family about it. She promised to handle it all and I let her. There was nothing else I could do.
Since my mother found out initially, *David and I have seen in person only once. It was during a family dinner where we were surrounded by lots of other family members. We think it is best to reduce any and every form of interaction we have with one another. Currently, he has a girlfriend and I have gone back to school in a different state.
What does it mean to have your parents say they no longer want anything to do with you, their child? For this article, I spoke to 8 Nigerians who shared their story of being disowned by one or both parents.
This was a difficult piece to write. And this is not just because of the number of people who responded, but also because of the diversity of the stories and the emotions contained in it. I am grateful to everyone who shared their stories with me.
Emeka.
TW:Rape.
I grew up with my mother. When I was approaching 14, I became a full-blown truant and she could not handle it, so I was sent to live with my uncle in the same city. My uncle’s wife is late, but he remarried, and so the new wife was like a step-mom of sorts.
In 2012, their youngest child raped me. He’s six years older than me. I was drunk when he did it, and I couldn’t speak up. I eventually told a cousin, but that one didn’t loud it, and I lived with the trauma for about 7 years.
In 2019, I told my story on Twitter. Instablog and Linda Ikeji posted it on their pages, and it traveled so far that my family members saw it and called an emergency family meeting. Turned out I was not the only one. Some had spoken before, and others were speaking out. But the guy denied it all. It became a full-blown family affair. I was accused of trying to disintegrate the family, and after the meeting ended, I was excommunicated from everyone.
Abigail.
My father has disowned me and my sister twice. The first time was in 2018. We had a family meeting, and he wanted to report our mother to us, but we took her side because we knew he was wrong. We told him we were unhappy because of his stinginess and how it made everyone’s life hard. He called us ungrateful and said we should go and look for our father. A month after the meeting, he came back to say he has changed and is ready to do better, but my sister didn’t speak to him for a year, because even though he claimed to be a changed person, the situation at home did not change.
A few weeks ago, he said we must be following him to church. My sister stopped in 2019, and I stopped in 2020. We did not actually stop attending church, we just stopped following him to his own church because he’s a pastor. Our refusal to follow him was the last straw. That Sunday morning, he said he ceased to be our father and we must leave his house, go and live anywhere we like. He beat us badly and even injured my sister, and we had no choice but to leave. We have now gotten a place. Once we buy a bed and cooker, we’ll move out.
Tinuke.
So, I used to stay with my grandpa. When he fell ill, baba knew he was going to die and decided to give me my own share of his money, as per wonderful granddaughter that I was. I was in 200level.
As soon as the money landed, I told myself, ‘Money is meant to be spent.’ Besides, who would ask me why I spent the money given to me by my grandpa? I started balling in school. When my grandpa died, my souvenir was the talk of the burial party. See, there was money on ground, I had no worries. I had a make-up artist do my make-up and even paid for my mum’s make-up too.
After 2months of spending on unnecessary things, the money finished. Even then, I wasn’t bothered. Until my mother asked me about the money. According to her, my grandpa told her what I was supposed to use the money for.
Ha.
Oya account for the money, I couldn’t. It was then I knew my village people were following me side by side. Next thing, my mother started asking me how I spend money and that she wanted a statement of account from my bank. I used to collect enough money weekly from home then, and according to her estimation, I was supposed to have a lot in my account.
Right there and then, she calculated my pocket money, how much I was supposed to spend from it, and how much I was supposed to have in my savings account. She said bad as e bad, I was supposed to have nothing less than ₦300k in my account but I had just ₦20k in the account. How?
First of all, I chop beating, and then she disowned me, told me never to come to her house again or call her number. The only person who would have begged on my behalf was dead so I was truly done for.
I was on my own for 3months. It was a crazy period. No pocket money, no mother to pity me. I even went to her friends but she didn’t answer them. I had to go to church to meet our pastor. I narrated what happened, and he brought other elders from the church and they started begging on my behalf.
She sha forgave me, but I wasn’t given pocket money for about 6 months. She’d buy my provisions and foodstuff, then calculate transport fare for me. Now, I have learned to save first before spending. Being disowned really helped curb my lavish spending.
Korede.
I’m the only child of my parents. When I was about 6 months, they separated. My father went ahead to set up a new family with another woman and my mother did the same with another man, so I grew up with my grandmother.
Once or twice a year, I visited my father and his new family for the holidays. I was about 5 or 6 years then, and as a child, I was always excited to visit for the holidays and have fun once or twice a year. Eventually, they moved and my grandmother thought it would nice be if I moved in with them. I regretted it.
I am the first male child of my father, and perhaps my stepmother assumed I would be a threat because she made it obvious in how she behaved towards me. Funny thing was, the bad treatment wasn’t so obvious to me. Instead, I was grateful to live with someone else other than my grandmother. Looking back now, I see just how bad it was, and how heartbreaking it was that my father never paid much attention to me. He wasn’t always at home, and even when he was, he did whatever my stepmother told him. I lived with them for 4 years before my grandmother felt something was not right. When she came to pick me, I was covered in bruises.
In 2004, I was taken to Lagos to live with my aunt. There, I completed secondary school and university. My father wanted me to come back, but it didn’t work. After I left Akure in 2004, I never spoke to him, his wife, or their children. He tried to reach me but my aunts kept information away from him, and I kept my distance as much as possible too. I’m not very spiritual, but I know my step-mother fears that I’ll shorten her children’s ration when it’s time to share the inheritance.
Finally, after all attempts to connect with me failed, my father called to say he has disowned me, and that I should never bear his surname again. It was an easy thing for me, because even me I don’t want to see him again. And no, I don’t hate him. Honestly. If I’m going to hate anyone, it would be my mother who dropped me and never looked back, and even at that, I still don’t hate her because I know she has her own side of the story too. My belief is that nobody owes me anything. I grew up learning to fight my battle myself and now I have grown up to be someone who doesn’t depend on anybody. Call it toxic behaviour if you want, but some of us didn’t have the luxury of growing up in a family with both parents present.
Evelyn.
The first time I was disowned, I was 13 in a boarding school, and I got raped. When my Dad heard about it, he called me a prostitute for being raped. He said I was no longer his daughter, and called me a disgrace.
Even at that, I still went back home to him. I was 13, with nowhere else to go. My mom was holding forte for me, pleading with him on my behalf. Isn’t it funny how one parent disowns you and the other still claims you as their child?
The second time, I got a second piercing for my ears. It was as if the Lord came down that day. My mother shouted, and my father beat the hell out of me. He said, ‘I curse you, you are not my daughter anymore, find your own parent elsewhere.’ I was 18 then. I am 20 now, and I no longer live with my parents.
Azeezat.
I am from a Muslim home. My dad and mum are separated and my dad would always tell us that we can’t be Christians. Unfortunately, I didn’t live with him while growing up; I lived with one of his siblings who married a Christian. She goes to church with her kids, and I had no choice but to go with her. With time, I fell in love with the choir department and joined them. I became so committed that within years, I was made the choir coordinator.
Back in secondary school, I practiced Islam in the littlest way: I’d observe the Ramadan fast but pray like twice a day because I wasn’t just comfortable with having to perform ablution five times a day. I covered my hair as well. By the time I finished secondary school, it was glaring to everyone that I wasn’t a devoted Muslim. My lack of interest was obvious. Once, I visited my dad and was told to pray, and I was unconsciously praying in Jesus’ name. I felt so embarrassed but I couldn’t help it. I was used to the Christian way of life and I was interested in almost everything I’d seen them do.
My dad had a series of conversations with me about this interest in Christianity. Sometimes, the conversations came out as threats, but I was far gone. And then I was disowned.
It happened during a family meeting, and even though I had been warned by other family members to listen to my dad and just do his will so I could make him happy, I was stubborn within me. I knew what I wanted and although it hurt me more to disobey my dad, I was committed to following that path. After everyone said their bit during the meeting, I told them I couldn’t change my mind.
My dad announced openly there that he disowned me. He is a responsible father, I’ll give him that credit. He caters for my all my needs even though he had to struggle to make ends meet. He even made sure I attended one of the best schools. But because I held on to Christianity, he told me to forget I have a family and he warned my siblings not to call or have anything to do with me. I was sent out of the house that night.
For three years, I was on my own. I struggled with depression, low self-esteem, hatred, and many other things. I was broke too and very lonely because my closest friends broke up with me within that period. Many people blamed my dad for wanting to change a girl who spent almost her life living with a Christian family. Some of them told him that he shouldn’t have allowed me to stay with the family if he didn’t want me to be like them.
I was the one who made the move to reconcile because it is believed in Yoruba land that the younger should apologise to the elderly. I traveled down to his house and he welcomed me openheartedly without mentioning anything about religion and all.
Ugochukwu.
I was disowned by my father on Saturday. I’d been angry with him for a couple of years and everything just burst out that Saturday.
He said I was being disrespectful to him, and he doesn’t want it to get to the point where he would insult his child. I flared up and shouted at him. I wanted him to tell me how I was being disrespectful to him. At first, he threatened to hit me. And then he actually tried to. I held him off and warned him that I would hit mine back.
If I were to describe my life with him, APC’s government is child’s play. He chose the course I should study. When I got admitted, he expected me to ‘thank’ him. I was like, ‘Did you write the post-UTME for me? Or did you do the interview on my behalf?’ I have no life because of this man. He had this elite level expectation for me, and basically, he controlled my life to fit into that expectation. I have no real-life friends because of him. In trying to live up to his expectations of me, I lost myself and this made me resent him.
I know I have lost him. I won’t apologise to him, neither will I accept his apology. I’m thinking of moving out.
Olumide.
I am gay. At first, nobody in my family knew about my sexuality and life was fine. But then I met up with someone online, and I was set-up. They tied my hands with the shirt I was wearing and beat me up until I was bloodied. My father was informed, and he was told to ‘bail’ me out with ₦700K. Originally, they set it for ₦2m, but they kept going back and forth until they settled for ₦700k.
My mother nursed me back to health. She thought I would kill myself and sometimes, I’d catch her watching me closely. When I was considered well enough, we had the conversation. She asked me, ‘Are you gay? Did they lie against you? Was it a one-chance incident?’ I couldn’t lie my way out of that situation so I told her the truth.
After that conversation with her, she took me to my father. Apparently, they had been talking, and the conversation was an attempt to get the truth. Now that it had been confirmed, my father said so many nasty and negative things to me. He called me a disgrace, placed several curses on me. And then he told me to go back to school.
When he told me to go back to school, I took it at face level. I didn’t know it meant something else. I was in school when I found out that my father called the entire extended family from my mother’s side, and outed me to them by saying that my mother had brought a disgrace to his house. He then told them that he was disowning me, even though he never told me to my face. He told my siblings too, everyone else except me.
It became so chaotic that my mother was caught in the crossfire. She was torn between her husband and her son, and at some point, she had to leave the house. But then she returned to him because she had other children too.
My father stopped sending me money at school. When it was time to pay my school fees, he didn’t. Even when I had an extra semester and needed to pay, my mother and siblings pooled resources to pay for me. When I graduated from university and wanted to come home, my father refused. He said that if I showed up, he would blow my brains out. And no, it’s not an empty threat. My father owns a gun. I had to move to another city where I started squatting with someone. Later, my mother’s family took me in until I was able to do my NYSC and get a job.
I am grateful I have my mother on my side. Despite my father’s refusal to associate with me, my mother tries everything to maintain her relationship with me. We don’t get to see each other often, but we try. Because of her, I have gone home twice. The first time, she was really sick and I had to be there. The second time, it was her birthday and I couldn’t miss that either. In both instances, my father wasn’t at home, but when he called during my mother’s sickness, he found out I was home and he began to yell over the phone. “WHO LET HIM IN? ANSWER ME! WHO LET HIM IN EVEN THOUGH I GAVE A STANDING ORDER THAT HE MUST NOT ENTER MY HOUSE?!” He has people on our street to monitor me and report to him if they sight me on the street. I could sneak in and the family members would not mind, but the people on the street will definitely do their work.
Yes, my father is not the best father, but when he was present in my life, he was fully present. I have been disowned for 4 years now, and I feel his absence a lot. I see him do things for my siblings, things that would have made my life easier if he did that for me too, but he withholds that support from me.
I needed to pay rent at one time, and I didn’t have the means to. Once, my mother and siblings sent me money and when I asked the source, they said it was my father who sent them a large sum of money and they decided to give me a part of it. I was sad, and even in that sadness, I was angry. I told them not to ever do that again. I don’t want the money they have to sneak to me. He is also my father, why not send me money too? Why not call me? He knows where I am, how I am struggling and he doesn’t make any attempt to reach out. Everyone keeps saying I shouldn’t stop reaching out to him, but he is not meeting me halfway. My hands are stretched out, but he is not taking them and pulling me close. Last year, something broke in me and I said, “You know what, fuck it. I don’t care anymore.”
But it’s hard to suddenly shut down that part of me that yearns for him. I am a carbon copy of this man. I look like him, sound like him, does it not mean anything at all to him? Do I not mean anything to him? I admit I made a mistake by getting set-up, but why is he holding it over me all these years? Why refuse to forgive me?
My friend, Onajite, told me this story about her exit from the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society a few years ago. She has graciously allowed me to share her ordeal, in the hopes that it might be beneficial to people in similar circumstances and informative to others.
In the beginning, it all seemed pretty normal. Not celebrating birthdays, not associating with people who weren’t Jehovah’s Witnesses (JW). I mean, I was born into it. Everyone we knew was a Witness, and we were discouraged from making friends with non-JWs. We were divine people and anyone who wasn’t one of us was regarded as the spawn of Satan. As a child, it all felt pretty normal. I felt quite special because everything we did was different. We were Jehovah’s people after all.
I loved being a Witness, but I disagreed with some of the doctrines, like the order not to celebrate birthdays. I wished I could celebrate my birthday with my friends, have food and drinks and be the centre of attention, but I never had that. I pegged it up to being persecuted for righteousness’ sake. JWs have a kink where they enjoy being punished for their faith. I was punished every single day in school for not singing the national anthem because we’re not allowed to. I wasn’t mad or upset about it. On Sunday, during field service, all my JW friends would brag to each other about how we stood up to our teachers, how we stayed faithful to Jehovah and never caved.
You don’t realise you’re in a cult until something in your head clicks, and it didn’t click in mine until I was a teenager. The congregation was anti-secular education. There were plenty of publications, articles and letters, talks at the Kingdom Hall discouraging people from going to school. Universities were painted as some kind of corrupt cesspool where members go to lose their faith. We were told about how when God’s Kingdom comes, you were not going to need your degree in medicine or psychology or whatever you wanted to study because God’s Kingdom would be a perfect world, so there was no reason to go to school. Many Nigerian schools, for some bizarre reason, request a reference letter from your place of worship or a civil servant as a condition for admission. My brother, who was the most devout member, needed that letter, but the organisation treated him like a criminal. They had several meetings and tried to discourage my father not to let him go.
Watching him get treated that way lit the fire of doubt inside me. There was no indication that he would go to school and lose his faith, so why should he be treated like that? On the outside, I was still quite the fanatic, but on the inside, my mind was awash with doubt. I thought: if this doctrine is suspect, what else are we being brainwashed with? Why were they scared of enlightenment? If people went to school and lost their faith, then wasn’t the problem the faith and not the school?
This crack of doubt spread when I recalled cases of sexual abuse against JW children. In all of those cases, the matters were covered up and the perpetrator unpunished, thanks to yet another questionable JW doctrine — matters between Jehovah’s Witnesses must always be settled in-house.
Members were not allowed to report crimes or issues between members to the police. When I was young, a devout member sexually abused a child. I remember how it was covered up. Nobody reported to the police. Another time, a man embezzled another Witness’ money in his company. It was a lot of money, but because they were both witnesses, it was never reported, and he never got his money back. I didn’t think much of all this then, but it began to make sense.
My experience with sexism in the organisation also fuelled my doubt. An elder told us that it was impossible for a woman to give a public talk. One time, a woman mentioned that she had attended a remote women-only congregation where the speaker was a woman, the elder was adamant: if there were no men, that congregation should not exist. Women could only speak while sitting and with their hair covered. I thought, “Women dedicate their entire lives to the organisation and get nothing in return, not even the right to speak?” It didn’t make sense to me, but we accepted it because it was a “directive from Jehovah”.
My doubt finally made me search for ex-JWs content on Google to read the experiences of people who had left the organisation. There was this video of a woman who organised a flash mob in a Kingdom Hall in the United States to protest the cover-up of her rape as a child. It hit me. I couldn’t believe the organisation that nurtured me was capable of such evil. I did more digging and found more people who had been treated so poorly by the organisation. I never dug too deep because I always felt guilty reading on the experiences of ex-JW members, I had to do it secretly and even clear my browser history because I didn’t want my parents finding that on my phone.
I got into university in 2016. When I resumed, I discovered that there was a JW congregation in the university. I began to wonder why we were discouraged from going to school when there was a university JW community. Suddenly, it clicked. We were taught from a young age not to question anything. Whatever happens, Jehovah is the answer. If it’s bad, Jehovah let it happen to teach us a lesson. I recollected all the times the organisation covered up scary crimes. For the first time, I was not under the protection of my family, and when I started interacting with other JWs by myself, I started to see how toxic it all really was — the politics, gossip, shaming, misogyny — it just didn’t feel right.
But I still stayed. I had no choice. I was young and dependent on my parents.
All those little things built up incrementally. My classes clashed with meeting times, and I started going from attending meetings regularly to going once or twice a week to once a month. I was treated like scum for missing those meetings. It felt like I was trying to leave a controlling person who was trying so hard to hold on to me. I got calls and messages disguised as feigned concern for me. It was wrapped in, “We’re calling because we love you and care about you,” but I could always feel the passive aggression. I felt even less connected to them and stopped attending meetings completely.
It is rare for someone to actually leave the congregation. In my 18 years in the organisation, I only saw one person denounce the faith and all its doctrine.
When I stopped attending meetings for about a year, my congregation in school contacted my home congregation to inform them I had left. The thing is, everyone in the congregation has cards. These are like files on your character, how active you are, details about your home congregation — everything about you is on it. So the congregation retrieved my file and informed my home congregation that I had stopped attending meetings.
My father called me one day, yelling at me. Every person in my family stopped talking to me right after. They cut me off. From threats to emotional blackmail to curses, there was nothing they didn’t use against me — they even stopped sending me an allowance. In the middle of that, I fell severely sick. That weekend, all my roommates were away, and I had no money to buy drugs. I was so sure I was going to die, but I started feeling better a few days later.
When I found lumps in my breast, my mother said that it was my punishment for leaving Jehovah and that my troubles were just starting. She said I was never going to amount to anything, that speaking against God or the organisation would lead to my downfall, and I’d regret losing Jehovah’s love and protection. Discovering the lumps was one of the scariest moments of my life and there my mother was, threatening God’s fire and brimstone over me. My family’s reaction overall strengthened my resolve to leave the organisation. I had had enough of the threats and the stonewalling.
After about six months, my father was the first to reach out. I guess he missed me. Slowly, the rest of the family started talking to me. I was glad to have them back in my life. I knew they loved me even with their religion I wouldn’t say they made their peace with it, but they’ve accepted that their daughter isn’t going to “be in God’s kingdom with them.”
We’ve had conflicts since then, for example, when they found out that I regularly donate blood, they went mad as it is against JW doctrine to donate or receive blood, even if you were dying. My aunt almost died when she refused to receive a blood transfusion.
Whenever I’m at home and congregation members come to visit, they make me hide in my room because they’re ashamed of me. At first, it hurt, but now it’s just funny to me. Sometimes, I miss the relationship I had with my family before I left, but that ship has long sailed. I’m done with the faith.
This week’s What She Said is Koromone Koroye, a 30-year-old Nigerian woman. She talks about attending Pentecostal churches when growing up because of her radical, religious father; her experiences with Nigerian Christian communities and her relationship with God.
You have the floor.
In my first phase of spirituality, my relationship with church was connected to my parents. My mum was a Christian, but my dad wasn’t interested. Then later, he became a Christian, and we moved from Household of God to Mountain of Fire and Miracle Ministries (MFM) — both pentecostal churches. When you are a Nigerian child and your parents are Christians, you go to church until you’re at the age where they can’t control you anymore.
Why did your dad become a Christian?
He had a radical experience. I was still a baby, but my mum told me the story. He was sick, hospitalised and not getting better. At that time he worked at Citibank, and two of his colleagues who were pastors prayed for him. Then my dad had a vision where he saw someone dressed in white robes performing surgery on him. When he woke up from the vision, he got better.
Any idea why they moved to MFM?
I think, after his healing experience, my dad was like, “Oh my goodness. I need a church that can match my level of radicalness.” Whatever he saw at MFM spoke to this want.
He also told the pastors who prayed for him about his experience. And I think people who heard the testimony told him he had to take God seriously so he wouldn’t fall into the Devil’s trap again.
There wasn’t anything wrong with that, but it went a bit far. My siblings and I thought there was something off about the church. Once we grew older, we had questions about some practices. Like, why were there so many church programmes and fasting programmes?
Were there particular ways these practices affected you?
One time, we had to fast. We would start fasting at 6 a.m. and break at 6 p.m. — we were kids going to school. On the last day of the fast, which was Friday, we had to do a dry fast from the day before to break Friday afternoon at church.
Before they let us break our fast, we did this crazy prayer. They passed around black nylon bags and were like, “We’re going to pray now. You’re going to start coughing everything out.”
Coughing what?
I don’t know. All around me, kids were just coughing. My siblings and I held our nylon bags, confused. We were the only ones not coughing, and we didn’t want them to think we were possessed. So we joined them.
We also had a lot of routines. Every first Saturday of the month, we’d go to Prayer City of Ibadan expressway to pray for three, four hours while fasting. Imagine being a child growing up in this environment where every first Saturday, you had to do this awful trip to go pray prayers you don’t even connect with. And if you didn’t pray, they’d ask you what was wrong with you.
What changed?
Just before I went to college, at 15, my older brother rebelled. He decided he wasn’t going to our parents’ church anymore. He discovered “This Present House”, a church at the end of Freedom Way in Lekki, and took us there. A lot of us were young. We would sit in a circle and the young pastor would talk to us about real stuff and ask us questions. I loved it, but I still came home to super religious parents, so stuff he said about God was not connecting. I thought, “Where is the fire prayer?”
This disconnect continued until I got into college in the US. There, I stopped going to church. I believed in God, but not that Jesus was the Lord and Saviour. Sometimes I’d find myself talking to God about stupid things I did.
When I was done with school and started working, I moved to an area that was a black community, and I was introduced to the Baptist church. In Baptist churches, there’s a lot of clapping and dancing — it was so pentecostal but in a different way. There, I realised there is something called the Holy Spirit. These guys would know things about you and pray over you concerning those things and I’d be like, whoa, what’s this?
My experience there led me to do some research. As I read the Bible, my relationship with God grew. Nobody “led” me to Christ. I just found myself being like, “This makes sense and I think I learnt it wrong for a long time.”
Did this change when you moved back to Nigeria?
When I moved back to Nigeria, I decided to visit This Present House. This time, they now had a church for millennials and Gen Zs called The Waterbrook Church (TWB). My first Sunday there, I was like, “Oh my God, this is where I belong.” It was like a grown-up version of what we had before. I fell in love with the church, the people, and I threw myself in. I would attend services and prayer meetings. At some point, even my parents noticed.
TWB introduced me to Christian communities and how good they could be when done right. Unfortunately, they didn’t train us well enough. They made people pastors before they were ready, and as a result, things got corrupt — ego and competition to be better than other churches got in the way. It stopped being about fellowship and became about how many people can come. So I slowly began to detach.
I’d space out during meetings. I lost that love I had. A lot of things happened afterwards, inappropriate relationships, drama… It was crazy.
That sounds messy.
It was. And then my dad passed.
Then I realised that the whole “community” they talked about wasn’t real because out of about 20 to 30 people I used to pray with, only one person regularly checked up on me.
That’s awful.
I’d never forget: my dad passed on a Sunday morning at 1 a.m. I sent a text to three of my pastors. I went to church, people sent in condolences, and after that day, I didn’t see them again. So many hurtful things happened after my dad died and I was looking to my church community to hold me up and they did not. Between 2017 and 2019, I lost my love for life.
I’m sorry.
It was really crazy. Because my first contact with Jesus Christ was through people, I disconnected when they failed me.
And then what changed?
In 2020, I saw this sponsored post on Instagram about an 8-week intensive discipleship course on operating with the gift of the spirit. I was interested. When I saw eight weeks, I was like, “Yes, I love a challenge.”
When I signed up, I told God, “If this doesn’t work, I am not interested in church again.” I would be fine with just reading my Bible and praying. On the first day, the teacher said “I’m not here to pastor or baby you. Take this course as you would a school course.” He asked why we signed up, and I told them I was there because I was bored with the routine. I thought there was more to God and Nigerian Christians were not going about it the right way. I told them I was reading the Bible and not seeing the actions being replicated by Christians. And if the class didn’t work, I would tell them bye-bye. They laughed.
The first week, we read three books, answered questions and did a treasure hunt. A treasure hunt meant we prayed to receive clues of words of knowledge, which are pieces of information that you know about someone that you would not have known if they didn’t tell you. I was like, not bad.
By the third week, I was like, “Yo, things are happening.” I was seeing, hearing things. People were calling me saying, “Oh my goodness, you’re so prophetic. You said this thing and it was true.” The course was so intense. We were reading these referred books, practising what we read, having meetings during the week and praying a lot.
In this phase of my spirituality, I saw God as God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. This was before the pandemic, so we would go out, pray and lay hands on people, do assignments, then meet on Saturdays for four, five hours, crazy. The best part was I was surrounded by people who were as radical as I was — but not MFM kind of radical — it was pure love for God; we did not like church. But this changed for me.
The course ended in March 2020, and a month after, the dean reached out to me about a fellowship he was part of. He asked if I wanted to join and I did. Slowly, I got invested. They had this prayer call at 3 a.m., and the day I joined, the call lasted four hours. Halfway through May, they introduced a prayer watch that included meeting four times a day. Because I’m a writer, I was assigned as a scribe. My job was pretty much taking down minutes as prayer points, prayer requests, etc.
Because I volunteered to do this, people started paying attention to me — they would even ask for my opinion of stuff. Before I knew it, I was part of the community. In the beginning, I was like, “I don’t trust you guys. I don’t know yall o.” But they were relentless.
Now, I’m in this place where I’m a part of a community. I still don’t go to church, but my relationship with God is special. I guard it jealously; I do not allow people taint my understanding of God.
Sweet. I’m curious about how your parents’ relationship with Christianity metamorphosed alongside yours.
Something interesting happened with my dad. Three years before he passed, we noticed he became lax with church services. Some Sundays, I’d be off to church and he just be in the living room. It was so weird, but we ignored it.
At some point, he stopped completely. No more prayers; not even at home. I found out later he had given a lot of money to the parish for some building to be done. Since he worked in banking, they also needed his financial advice and he supplied this. But when he needed help with some prayers, they turned him down rudely. He was very hurt by that because he had given his time and finance to the church.
My mum kept going, but after my dad died, she went back to Household of God. Her reason was that the following year when we wanted to do an anniversary service of his death at the church — which my father also helped build — they said no. They refused because we didn’t “remember them” after the funeral. That was the last straw for my mum; she was tired of religious protocol and probably wanted her freedom to worship God without rules and rigid doctrine.
New year’s eve is the one day in the year that carries the hopes of millions of people around the globe. It is the day we round up and settle all affairs of the previous year while looking forward to a new year. Today, I asked Nigerian women about how they spent their new year’s eve.
1. Sarah, Day dreaming of penis
I spent new year’s eve at my mother’s house thinking of all the penis I wasn’t getting and how annoying it is that I wasn’t going to be kissed into the new year. Also, I’m not at my spiritual best right now so, I wasn’t too pumped about joining the crossover service but I did anyway. It’s so annoying that I was sober hence giving my mind room to panic and worry about the new year.
2. Grace, Playing video games with my man
My boyfriend and I spent the first part of the day opening the rest of our Christmas presents over wine and cookies. Then, watched “Death to 2020” on Netflix and planned a stroll around 11:55 pm to watch the fireworks. We ended up playing some new video game by 11:00 pm, this went on for over an hour. We took a break 12:00 am to shout “HAPPY NEW YEAR” and went back to gaming till 2:00 am.
3. Lara, A blunt, phone sex and Jesus
My crossover into 2021 has been one of the most unusual ones I’ve had yet. At around 10ish, I snuck to the back of our house to smoke the fattest joint with my brother. High as a kite I called my favourite lover and had him talk me through the most delicious orgasm. I wanted him to be my last nut of the year and he was. Post orgasmic and high asf, I gather with my mum and siblings to pray into the new year. I loved it. I was so happy and grateful for my lover and my family.
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This new year’s eve has to be one of my best ones ever. Since my lover had to travel, I set out to get alcohol and food so I can Netflix and chill into the new year. I had some weed at home so I was set. However, he got stuck in some gangster level traffic. He left home at 1:30 pm and at 8:00 pm, he still hadn’t gotten to the interchange and there was still heavy traffic ahead. Oga just turned back and came home (yay me!).
I was already buzzed from the drinking and weed. At 11:45, we were both tipsy, so I just randomly started yapping about how he made my 2020 better and my hopes for the new year and how much I loved him. He did the same and we just had that intimate moment into the new year and kissed. It was perfect. In those few hours, we had no care in the world. We were happy as can be and I’ll like to maintain that happiness throughout the year.
5. Nneka, Twitter drama and music
I knew I didn’t want to spend new year’s eve in church, not really into the prophetic declaration and shouting into the year. I’m Catholic and it’s subtle, but I still wasn’t interested. I thought I would sleep through it but that didn’t work. I stayed on Twitter till when I saw Dangobabe’s gist (Loved it). At a few minutes to 12:00 am, I listened to cultural praise by Kcee while doing my night routine and rounded up with the sign of the cross at 12:00 am because I still need Jesus.
6. Temi, Intense penising to fireworks
My partner and I had a silly argument on new year’s eve. We even broke up just a few hours to new year’s day. Somehow, we managed to reconcile our differences. We went to the balcony to watch the fireworks as we did a countdown into the new year. That’s how oga’s penis entered me as we entered the new year. Have you ever had sex to the sound of fireworks? It’s like making love in a warzone. I started the new year with an orgasm and it’s safe to say that makeup sex >>>>>.
7. Oluchi, I slept into the new year
All my life, I have had to spend new year’s eve in church with my family, praying for a better year. I recently got my own apartment so I’m made my own rules. New year’s eve, I drank, smoked, listened to music and slept off watching Family Guy. I woke up to missed calls and messages from family members wishing me a happy new year.
Every week, Zikoko seeks to understand how people move the Naira in and out of their lives. Some stories will be struggle-ish, others will be bougie. All the time, it’ll be revealing.
What’s your oldest memory of money?
I was 5, and my mum gave me money to buy a crate of eggs – ₦1 coin. My own introduction to money was with coins, and this was in 1990. There was the 50 kobo coin. My boxed-up uncle used to give me whenever he visited.
What could 50 kobo buy at the time?
Yoo. Think about what half the price of a crate of eggs can buy a kid now.
What was childhood like though?
We used to get money for school, and I saved a lot of it to buy toys. It was a middle-class living in a good neighbourhood. Full-on Buttie – only English. Whenever we went to the markets, people used to say “una done carry this una American pikin come.”
Hahaha.
We weren’t elite rich but we were comfor – bro I had a skateboard. So, a middle-class family in the 90s that Babangida destroyed? That was us.
What do you mean “Babangida destroyed”?
For context, he increased the price of fuel four times. Still, for most of my childhood, I always saved. And it wasn’t from a need to keep money, it was just from a resource control standpoint. Our parents always told us not to be wasteful, you must finish the food on your plate. If you’re not going to finish it, don’t ask for that much. If you don’t finish it, you’ll die and come back.
Buhaha what?
My dad was chilled, but my mum used a spatula on my head more than she used it for Eba.
Ah. Anyway, what was the consequence of the economic dip in your family?
First of all, the dip became telling close to the end of the 90s. My dad had bought land and started building a house, but he didn’t have money for decking. We got a quit notice, somehow, and so we moved into a boys quarters. A room and parlour, beds came out at night and went back in the morning. My parents slept on one, my two siblings slept on another, and I slept on a long single bed. My parents stopped buying me clothes, so I had to start going to Yaba myself. I had that one shoe that was one size small.
Over the next decade, my hustle mode turned on. I stopped getting money from home. I even started to do what you’d consider shady things.
What?
I was selling contrabands to boarding school students because they couldn’t go out. I’d buy at a price, and then add my own price on top of it. Look, my life was boring, and I needed some excitement. I was consuming a lot of Western culture, hip hop and all. It was a complete opposite to my life, and I wanted to experience some of that shit. But I just wanted to do everything. I was doing well at school and rolling with the geeks. Also, I was in the choir at church, but I was betting. I was also playing ball in the area and knew DMX and Famous Five.
I got into Uni in 2004, the real rude awakening for me. By this time, money no dey. My dad was dealing with health problems. I was trying – wait, just before Uni, I did one small hustle.
What?
I realised that whenever WAEC was pasting centre numbers, the lists were always fragmented and incomplete. So, I went to WAEC office, bought photocopies of the complete list for ₦150. Then I went to one school where I’d see people go to the noticeboard and look out for people frustrated about not finding their names. Then I’d approach them like, “it’s not there abi? I have it here o, it’s ₦200”
Ah.
I did the first day, made like ₦2k, the second day, I made a little over that, and on the third day, the gateman sent me away.
Why?
I learned my first lesson about making money: understanding your fucking climate. If I’d been sorting that guy for ₦200-₦300 per day, he’d have even guarded me. So, back to uni.
Back to uni.
I was just so free. I was smoking like one pack of cigarettes in two days, but I was broke and couldn’t afford accommodation. Now, I was staying in a single room with four other guys – only one person actually owned the room, and it wasn’t me.
The room owner had a babe, and whenever she’d come at night and they want to smash, we’d have to go and wait outside. Then we’d come inside whenever they were done.
Hahaha.
That’s how fucked up my life was. Then I started floating in school – I’d spend the day in class, crash overnight and go to the hostel to shower. I did that for like a month.
I imagine you didn’t just continue this way.
Yeah, I got a job at a cybercafe. I was lucky because as a teenager, my dad already got us a computer – a Compaq laptop in ‘94, bruh. So I already had a thing for computers. Anyway, by early 2004, I collected my first salary at my first job for ₦2,500.
Ah, first salary. What else were you doing in that period?
Sooo, one of my friends was getting into music at the time, and I was quite enthusiastic, so I became his manager. He even recorded an EP, but we weren’t making any money. We were broke and it was hard. I’d drop money to print CDs and stuff, push into the music scene at the time and all.
I was doing all kinds of things, and still managed to maintain a good GPA. My last GPA was about 3.76, then my life changed forever.
What happened?
I got kicked out of Uni in 2008, my final year. Long story short, I was at the wrong place at the wrong time. It does feel like karma.
Wooaaah.
My parents didn’t handle it as badly as I imagined they would. Funny thing is, my dad actually had to leave his first Uni because he had issues with a lecturer and he had to go finish up elsewhere.
Anyway, I was back in Lagos, and I had this artist who I was managing, pushing my man into the scene. In all this time, I was writing exams to gain admission into other universities, and nothing just clicked.
By 2009, I got a job at another cybercafe where I was getting ₦10k a month. The best part was that I had access to unlimited internet. Then I discovered blogging. I started putting up my guy’s music on my blog, then I started charging other people to put up their music for ₦8k per song. Then management companies came too, and I’d charge them over ₦20k. Since it wasn’t frequent, I was making about ₦18k. I was still at my Cyber Cafe job.
Then I met this guy, a senior executive at an advertising company that was also working with entertainment companies. I somehow managed to secure a meeting with him, shared a breakdown on some campaigns and talent they were working with, and how I think they’d be able to manage them better.
He was impressed.
Loud.
Then he asked me, what can you do for us? I told him I could help them with artists’ PR and management. Before I left that day, he gave me ₦5k. Oh boy. I first went to eat at one buka. I eventually started working with him, and was able to save up to buy a used laptop for about ₦50k by the end of 2010.
That year had its own struggles.
What else?
I was addicted to weed. People in the hood had heard I didn’t graduate, and I was mostly on it to cope. It was depressing. There was that period in that year too where I was a sidekick on the radio, and was getting the occasional ₦200 or ₦300.
How did you beat the addiction?
I woke up one day, tired of the addiction. I read a story about how Gandhi cured his love for women by going to bed with women and not having sex with them. So I decided to go to where we used to smoke and sit with smokers for one month, without actually smoking. I did it for one month, and that was it.
Mad o.
Yeah. Anyway, being in the entertainment scene meant that I met a lot of the interesting people at the time, like 2Face. One of my guys working in another advertising agency was leaving, and was looking to hire a replacement.
I got a meeting with the boss, and they said they were going to hire me at first as an account manager. Basically, I was tracking everyone else’s output, uploading and stuff.
He asked me, “how much do you want to get paid?”
I said, “how much do you want to pay me?”
“₦20k.”
“Let’s do it.”
This was early 2011, and I just needed the job and access to the internet. Remember the other ad exec, he decided to put me on payroll officially. He paid me ₦35k – ₦55k from two jobs.
What were you doing at the ₦35k gig?
Helping their talent hustle studio time, booking events, writing press releases. At my ₦20k job, I moved to copywriting: ads, press releases and all that. I was enjoying it more, and in 2012, I ditched the account management gig and focused on my job as a copywriter. My salary climbed to ₦50k. Then I started getting a commission off the sales that I made. I was also getting bonuses from profit sharing at the end of the year. The highest bonus I ever received was ₦200k.
When I left in 2014 though, my monthly salary was ₦80k.
How much did the next gig offer?
₦300k.
Mad o.
I’d already built a reputation, and you know what’s funny? I actually left for for ₦125k, but as I put word out that I was leaving, I got more offers. Two of them were offering me ₦400k. I tabled it to the ₦125k people and they bumped me up to ₦300k. I took the ₦300k offer, and I’m glad I did. It wasn’t just an agency doing the advertising side, they were also a full-blown digital agency. I joined as Head of Digital.
Two months later, I got another raise to ₦400k.
Ah, how?
Someone on my team was about to leave the company, and he asked for ₦300k as his condition to stay. They gave him the raise, but then they didn’t want him to earn the same as me, so they bumped me up to ₦400k.
Over the years as I garnered more experience, I started taking some consulting gigs on the side around digital strategy. I was doing well enough that I could afford to get a place – my first place as a working person. I also bought a car.
Suddenly, all the things you panicked about in 2008 disappeared?
Fuck all that shit. At this time, I could take care of my mum conveniently. One time, she wanted to celebrate her birthday and I just sent her ₦300k. The problem at the time was that even though I had money, there was no intention going into saving and investing. Then I started dating my wife.
What changed?
My wife saved my life. She’s my anchor. She’s great with money, She made me take a course on Coursera where I learned about financial literacy. I do the hard hustling, and she does the planning of our lives.
That’s where I learned what you spend, save, invest. All the babes I was hanging out with it just wanted popcorn and cinema at the time, but she was the one for me. We’re married now. We moved. After our first kid, we moved again. My son was turning 1 and I needed him to grow up in a place that was safe enough for us to go on evening walks.
How much is your rent now?
First ₦300k. Then I started paying ₦600k. Now I’m paying ₦1.5 million. I panicked when I was about to move, but I quickly learned that I just had to save ₦125k per month.
Back to your salary.
I got a raise in 2018 that bumped me up to ₦581k. But I was entitled to bonuses that could bump me up to ₦1.2 million, but it never really came. In 2019, I started listening to offers again. One bank came with a solid offer to lead comms, but the amount of shirts and ties I had to wear ehn, I just cancelled.
I wanted more action, so I chose a role in a startup instead. This time, in Business Development.
How much did you join for?
₦1.8 million. My salary hasn’t grown since then, but I’ve gotten performance bonuses. The highest I’ve received at a time is about ₦600k.
What’s your current mindset with money?
You spend it, it comes back. Now, this is not on some careless shit, but I believe that the more I give, the more it comes back. I have ₦144k and someone came with an emergency and needed a ₦50k loan, I didn’t even think twice. Like, look at how far I’ve come and I didn’t die. Is it now a small inconvenience that will now kill me?
Looking at how far you’ve come, how much do you feel like you should be earning?
Double my current salary, for starters. I do a lot of work that I don’t get paid for, but I’m building my reputation.
What’s something you want right now but can’t afford?
I want to invest in companies with money that I can afford to lose – $5k here, $10k there.
What’s the last thing you bought that required serious planning?
I have three kids – two of them are adopted. I bought a Sienna so the driver can take them around conveniently. The family van cost ₦2.3 million.
When was the last time you felt really broke?
I always feel broke, bro. In fact, I never have enough money after I save all my money. I only always have like ₦200k in a month.
What do you wish you could get better at?
We run three small businesses, all these businesses were my wife’s ideas. My own ideas never dey commot money. I also spend a lot on education.
Tell me about that.
I’ve done some courses with a solid business school, and some other schools. I just finished a course in Project Management and am currently studying Product Management.
Do you have any financial regrets?
When I started earning well enough, I should have been saving more. But then, I’m glad it went that way because I won’t have experienced a lot of things. Money is good, guy. I still enjoyed it, but I wish I should have just saved more in dollars.
How would you rate your financial happiness, on a scale of 1-10?
5, considering where I’m coming from, haha. It’ll be 10 when I pay for life insurance and when I buy my house.
It’s been a wild couple of years.
I believe the universe is amoral, it doesn’t believe in good or bad, only happenstance. Being kicked out of school led me to all the choices that led me to where I am. At that point, it looked like my world had ended.
![It’s Taken Us Three Years [and Counting] to Access My Late Aunt’s Pension](https://dev.zikoko.com/wp-content/uploads/zikoko/2023/10/Will-1.jpg)
can still become their favorite, all you need to do is believe.
