The
emotional story of a teenage girl who went to live with her sister in
her husband's house and faced series of s*xual harassment and abuse, has
triggered a thought provoking piece from a therapist and columnist.
Read below!
File photo
Dear Aunty Temilolu,
I live with my sister who is the third wife of her husband because
my parents live in Ghana. He’s been harassing me sexually since last
year, rough-handling me and grabbing sensitive parts of my body at every
given opportunity. His son was my boyfriend and he knows. At first, we
were only kissing but after we broke up, he came back and we had sex
several times.
Last year, I had to lie to him that I was pregnant, then he left
me. Two weeks ago, my brother-in-law offered me N100,000 to sleep with
him and I rejected it. However, out of fear of being raped by him, my
friend advised I reported at the police station. When we did so, my
friend was framed up for threat to life, allegedly asking for
N12,000,000 with no evidence presented by my brother-in-law.
She spent a night behind the counter and was even berated by the
police for intervening while they questioned her why she had to remain a
virgin at 20! When her uncle whom she stays with was invited, he had to
part with quite an amount to bail her and by the time she got back
home, she met her luggage outside with the door firmly shut against her.
She’s an orphan but her uncle said he no longer wanted to have
anything to do with her. Eventually, I discovered my brother-in-law
settled the police with N250,000 while I have since been in trouble at
home.
Parents of my darling, precious, glorious, dignified, world-famous and heavenly celebrated Nigerian sisters,
I apologise again for skipping “How to start protecting your girls
from future wife-battering/abusive marriages!” Believe me; the world is
in total disarray. The average girl you see on the street is in serious
trouble and not herself. Over time, I have been bombarded with so many
text messages from girls whose brothers-in-law want to sleep with them.
And they are usually too scared to tell anyone because they don’t
want to destroy their sisters’ marriage and because it would be so hard
to believe their saint of a husband and son-in-law is a lecher! Most of
these girls fall for the “largesse” this brother-in-law parts with. And
in a situation where he’s an alpha and omega even to his
parents-in-law, the girl simply shuts her mouth and pretends nothing is
happening.
Remember, this is an age where sex has been turned to an indoor
game and seen as no big deal-her body is even enjoying the transaction,
feeling safer in his arms…OH! MY GOD! Teenage girls are naturally very
gullible. They love, love, love, tender, loving care- they deserve it
anyway; every female wants love and attention!
However, where the parents are not around or interested in paying
attention to these girls, someone else willingly gives this attention,
sinking his lecherous fangs on them and sweeping them off their feet
with very little or nothing, distorting their minds and character,
raping not only their innocence but their entire being and turning them
to filth to be trampled upon by men! This is exactly how it starts. This
is how she’ll end up sleeping with her lecturers, her employers and any
man who would do her a favour and buy her what her parents can’t
afford! But why, why, why? What has gone wrong with our society? How did
godly upbringing go extinct? Is this how it will continue? What sort of
children would these girls bring into the world? Can someone please
join me to stop this situation from getting worse? Imagine those who are
meant to protect these kids asking why one should remain a virgin!
Girls…girls…girls, a lot of parents who send their children to
leave with one relative or the other probably never thought they would
need to do that sometime in their life. Most times, it’s as a result of
financial hardship or a broken marriage where the girl is with mummy and
mummy cannot afford to fend for herself least of all her offspring or
where daddy is irresponsible!
Now, this is the reason why I keep screaming into your ears to
vigorously pursue your studies, avoid boyfriends and earn fantastic
grades that could fetch you admission into a higher institution and
eventually get you an income! When you concentrate on boys when you are
supposed to be studying, chances are you will get pregnant, drop out of
school and become a cleaner or the like!
And in our society, once you have a child outside wedlock, aside
being stigmatised and called “after-one,” it will only take the grace of
God to get a good man who is willing to marry you and take care of your
child. Even if he’s hopelessly in love with you and your child, what
about pressure from his family to settle for a fresh babe?
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Credits: Temilolu Okeowo for Punch Newspaper - temiloluokeowo@gmail.com 07086620576 (sms only)