An image of me
Imagine spending almost seven years with someone you love, building a life with them, having children together, and believing that marriage is only a matter of time, let's have money first, right?
Then one day, you discover that while you were waiting for your forever, they were already building another future with someone else.
This is Ava, and this is my story.
I met Neil during my undergraduate days, we were in the same department, and he was one of those people I naturally became close to. At some point, he told me he loved me, I loved him too, so saying yes was easy.
Our relationship started simply, but with time, we became inseparable.
We studied together, worked on assignments and projects together, prepared for exams together, and we supported each other whenever things became difficult.
We were practically growing and grooming together.
After graduation, we both moved to Abuja to start life. We didn't have everything figured out, but we had each other, and at the time, I thought that was enough.
We started living together
We shared bills, responsibilities, meals, plans, laughter, arguments, and everything else that came with being a legally married couple.
Then I had two children for him, we weren't married
At that point, I wasn't thinking of him as just my boyfriend anymore, I thought of him as the man I believed I would grow old with.
The father of my children, my family.
Whenever I brought up marriage, he always had something to say...
"Let's give it some time." or "we need to be financially stable."
And because I trusted him, I waited.
I wasn't asking for a wedding immediately, i just wanted to know that we were moving in the same direction.
Years passed, then slowly, he changed.
His phone became more private, he started taking calls away from me. Becoming more careful about what he says and who he was talking to.
I noticed it, but I ignored it.
After almost seven years together, you don't easily believe that the person beside you could be living a completely different life behind your back.
Until I found out
There was another woman in our picture
And she wasn't someone he had known for years, he had met her only six months earlier.
Six months, hmm
The same man who had spent seven years, telling me to wait was already discussing a future with someone he had known for six months.
That was when everything finally made sense to me that maybe all those years, I was waiting for a future he had never planned to give me.
The painful part wasn't only that he found someone else.
It was realizing that I had built my life around someone who wasn't building his around me.
I kept asking myself, "What did I do wrong?" Because sometimes, the problem isn't that you weren't enough.
Sometimes, the other person simply never intended to give you what you were waiting for.
And this is the lesson I took from Ava's story:
° Don't keep someone waiting for a future you already know you don't want with them in
° If you're a man or a woman and you know deep down that you won't end up with that person, please, let them go.
° Don't keep them around because they are comfortable.
° Don't keep making promises just because you don't want to lose their attention or your access to em
° And if all you want is to play games, be honest about it, tell the person.
The truth may break their heart today, but giving someone false hope for seven years can break much more than their heart
