I am a sad woman. I am very sad about the way something as beautiful as marriage destroys people these days. I am sad about the unnecessary deaths in many marriages. I am sad about men killing their wives and women killing their husbands.
I am sad about men and women holding on to violent spouses and dying in the process. I am sad about the way our society push these people to their deaths by chanting divorce is not an option. I am sad that fathers are losing their daughters to violent spouses and mothers are losing their sons to violent women.
I am not happy. I don’t know who will be happy hearing that men who are supposed to love and protect their wives are the ones killing them. I am not happy that instead of walking away from abusive men, women are resorting to killing their husbands.
No marriage is worth anybody’s life. Marriage is good and beautiful between two people who love and respect each other. But it is horror between two people who see themselves as rivals and enemies. Marriage shouldn’t end anybody’s life. That’s not the purpose for two people coming together as one.
I don’t know how these people live together knowing that they can’t stand each other. I don’t know how women have sex with men who beat the living daylight out of them and go ahead to give birth to children for these brutes. I don’t know how they live with men who inflict pain on their bodies and souls. Some of them endure these ill treatments until they die in the process.
I don’t know how some men deal with violent women. I don’t know why a man will choose to live with a woman who tears his clothes at the slightest misunderstanding, break their properties and hit him or break his head whenever they argue. I don’t know why these men choose to endure violence living with women who bear weapons like warriors and ultimately die at their hands.
I know you must have heard of the nurse who dispatched her young husband to the great beyond last Sunday because she suspected him of cheating on her. I wonder when death became the punishment for infidelity. I kept asking myself why that man didn’t leave her. Neighbours stated that the woman was troublesome and violent.
According to reports, neighbours and their landlord attested to years of violent spousal abuse the deceased suffered from his wife. They said the attack that finally killed him was triggered by jealousy from the nurse, who accused her husband of infidelity.
She stabbed him in the leg after confronting him about his supposed infidelity. He died in the hospital. The anguish his family feels right now cannot be imagined. He was just 32-years old with two children. What becomes the fate of these children?
Last month, another woman killed her husband after having sex with him. The mother of three confessed to killing her husband in Osun State. Her reason was that she was just angry with him. She contacted someone to do the dirty job for her.
They have been married for seventeen years. They have three children. But not even the thought of her children stopped this woman from choking her unsuspecting husband with a pillow after they had sex like normal couples do. Her accomplice later finished him off with a knife.
Also last month, one man beat his wife to death over alleged infidelity. The man said that his late wife had been deeply in involved infidelity for quite some time to the extent that she was dating their next door neighbour. He beat her until she died from her injuries even after hiding his violent acts from her family. He claimed she attacked him first for refusing to give her money.
Also recently, a man killed his wife in Benue State. He beat her till she passed out from the kicks and blows he rained on her. Neighbours ran to rescue her but they arrived too late. They met her corpse in their home. The annoying part of this sad situation was that this killer husband escaped through the window when he saw the crowd coming for him.
Another man also murdered his wife after impregnating their house girl sometime last month. He strangled her to death. This sad incident happened after a series of domestic violence arising from his sexual relationships with the maid.
Prior to the incident, the couple had faced lots of problems leading to persistent domestic violence. But the situation got worse when the deceased caught her husband in bed with their house help in their home. She had found her husband on top of their house girl.
According to family members, the man was fond of sleeping with the maid and had been caught by the wife on more than three occasions and whenever the deceased insisted the girl left the house, he would descend on her and beat her mercilessly.
At some point, the deceased succeeded in sending the girl out of the house but she came back two months later and told her husband that she was pregnant. The house girl’s pregnancy aggravated the problems in their marriage.
The deceased had at one time returned to her parents’ house for refuge but was persuaded to return to her husband’s house by their Pastor. But she didn’t live through another violent attack from the man she calls husband.
One day, he lured her to the farm and strangled her to death. He also tried to cover up the act by telling people she had collapsed. After killing her, he invited his brother to help him convey her to the hospital and lied to him that she slumped few minutes after she complained of feeling dizzy.
These stories are not fiction. They are not from movies. They were not made up. They are still cases with the police. Men and women are dying at the hands of their spouses and people still stigmatise some of them who are bold enough to run for their lives. Some spouses have turned killers, yet pastors are still telling victims of domestic violence to go back to their abusers and pray more.
When it comes to spousal violence, anything can happen. You don’t negotiate with an abuser, you run as fast as your legs can carry you. Don’t listen to anybody who tells you to stay and pray for them to change. Tell them to send their children to take over from where you stopped.
Anyone who sends you back to an abusive spouse wants you dead. Keep culture and religion aside. When you die, you become another statistics. You won’t come back to life again. Just one blow or kick in the wrong place can end your life. You should know that your life is so precious and you must refuse to endure abuse. Leave to live, men and women.
You don’t have to throw your life away just to please your pastor, your parents or the society. They are not the ones receiving the beatings, you are. You are the one suffering bodily pains. You are the one dying slowly. You shouldn’t endure domestic violence. If you must pray for the person to change, pray from afar. Don’t go and die for nothing because of a violent marriage.
People are free to say whatever they want about you leaving your abuser to start life all over. They can call you names for refusing to endure abuse, but who cares? You should look out for yourself and live your life to the full.
Marriage is not a do or die affair. Don’t force yourself on someone who delights in scarring your body and soul with pains. When you die, life continues for others. The world won’t stop for your sake. Your family members advising you to endure some more will move on with their lives in a flash and you will be dead, gone and forgotten. No man or woman should die over an abusive spouse. It’s not worth it.
I know people will be quick to claim God hates divorce. Does God love wickedness and maltreatment? Does God delight in spouses killing one another because they want to be seen as a family? Does God want men and women dying in marriages? Does God love violence and murder? I don’t know the God you serve, but the God I serve doesn’t want people dying in abusive unions.
RE: Men, marry your kind
Mind-blowing sister Kate, you are too much. I thank God I can read everything you write. I thank God for a courageous woman like you. Keep it up!
-Princewill
Kate, we are waiting to read from you the evils that women also do to men. That’s when we will consider you a fair, gender neutral writer. For now, you are simply a chronic men hater.
-Garba Aminu
Kate Halim, it would have been better you are called Kate Hell because you are a daughter of Lucifer. Why do you hate men? Are you married? If you are married, the man is in first hell on earth. You must be the daughter of a harlot. I wish no man will come near you so that you will not continue to duplicate your kind.
-Tony Amadi
Kate, you are too blunt. Although you make sense sometimes, please try and use your column to help others build their relationships. Many people are looking up to you for advice.
-Igwe Osigwe, Port Harcourt
Kate, you have a voice and a good one at that. You are the voice of reason and common sense. May your good days be long on earth. Ride on with your bitter truths. God bless you.
Nwachukwu V.C, Aba
I am disappointed with your write up. You don’t deserve a column in any newspaper. If I am asked to define you, I will simply say that Kate Halim means evil.
-Eze Callistus
Another good and articulated write up from you Kate. I always look forward to Saturday because of your direct articles. You just don’t mince words. You say things as they are. That’s why you are now my favourite columnist.
-Amaka
Kate, you are nothing but a cheap feminist seeking attention. Your useless brain is working upside down. Blame yourself for anything that happened in your relationship, stop deceiving young ladies. You are not a marriage material and that’s why you are still single and writing rubbish to deceive other women. You are not married and you are writing about marriage deceiving people out of your frustration. Marriage is everything and you don’t have it, too bad.
-Uzo