MARRIAGE AND STIGMAS

As a young girl growing up, my mom  and her friends  often made remarks like “When you grow up, you will marry a rich fine guy and give birth to beautiful children’’
Now don’t get me wrong, what they said wasn’t at all bad, infact it’s a nice thing to wish your child.

Thing is when I turned 15, I began to find myself not wanting all of that. To me, it sounded so limiting and i hated the fact that people made it sound like that’s the sole purpose of our existence.

 I didn’t and I still don’t understand society’s need to associate success to the number of  kids a person has and their marital status.

Whenever I make comments like ”I don’t think getting married is something I’d love to do”. People are quick to blame my parents bitter divorce and failed marriage.
They’re not entirely wrong but that’s not the whole story. 

Truth is, I just don’t understand why a lot of people especially in our African societies see the idea of marriage and kids as the ultimate achievement, thus without there is no fulfillment. And 99.9% of the time, women are criticized the most.

And unmarried female in our society is scorned for being single, for having no kids. It’s so bad they become gossip headlines and prayer points too amongst others.
No matter the level of success a person attains, the first question asked is their marital status, and if single they assume the person is miserable or sad. Some in our society will go as far saying the person did money rituals and the condition was to stay unmarried...urghhh the ignorance 😫
What’s worse is the hell this stigma has dragged many through and into.

 The endless talk and speculations have led many into the wrong marriages and the worst humans possible. Females especially, once they clock 30, the accurate time keepers of the society will begin the tongue wagging. It really is pathetic considering the number of frustrated and miserable people we have in various marriages today.

I read online one time where a lady said she didn’t want kids so she had her womb removed and the number of negative comments were expected but still very annoying. 

All manner of things were said, some sentenced her to die alone. To me it just mirrored the level of thinking that still exists in our society today, nobody for ove stopped to ask how she was doing, nobody tried to think “what if she experienced a life changing trauma that she still hasn’t healed from and doesn’t want to bring another person into the world”, “what if she wasn’t mentally sound to take care of a whole other human being”, “what if she had issues with her health”. Nobody!!! All they cared about was she was not letting them decide what she does with her body and wasn’t going to succumb to the society‘s views of what a woman’s role on earth should be.  But I applaud her, she was strong enough to know that she isn’t fit emotionally and mentally to raise kids . 

She made the best decision for her and whatever baby she would’ve had because she saved that child a life with an unfit mother and lack of proper child care that she realized fast enough she was incapable of giving. 

My point is people should stop pressuring single people to get married and have kids. And singles should stop getting married for the wrong reasons. If you are not emotionally, financially, mentally, and physically ready don’t embark on the journey.

Marriage is the solemnization of the love shared by two persons, it isn’t meant to be a form of validation from the society. And no one should be made to feel inadequate simple because they haven’t found someone to share their life with or don’t have kids or don’t want to!
Take charge of your life decisions. At the end of the day theirs yours and yours alone to live with!
Be smart!
Stay safe
Love y’all.