Face me I face you

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I read on a social media platform today about a girl who had fallen in love with a boy before she realized that he lived in a one-room apartment. When she found out, she felt really sad and planned to leave the young man but he showered her with more love and affection that she found it hard to quit the relationship.

No man has ever treated her the way the man does and even though he has little he is still generous to her to a fault. He said he is making plans to move out and will not renew his rent after it expires this year but when she asked how much he had towards a new rent he said thirty thousand naira only!

She vowed never to sleep in that one-bedroom apartment in a “face me I face you” compound but she found herself going from just visiting to sleeping over and getting used to her lover’s one-bedroom apartment. She is worried that she may get too used to living that way and end up with him in that kind of setting and wants advice.

Love is blind they say but I do not believe that love should be blind to poverty. It is okay to love a poor man but that poor man should be seen to be making a conscious effort to come out of that state. Nobody sees a fire and jumps into it and so in this case there are a lot of factors to consider; what does the man do for a living, what kind of life does he live, is he focused and responsible? What are his habits and what kind of family does he come from?

I will never advise a woman to marry a man who lives in a public yard except she lives in the same type of arrangement. To go from high to low for the sake of love is not very smart except she can hold the fort for both of them.

Marriage is deeper than good sex, love and affection, it is about lifetime commitment and a bit of comfort, so when the love goes down a bit and it surely will, and the sex frequency drops and the issues of life happen, the commitment and comfort come to play. At a point in marriage, love is not enough for anybody can love anybody from a distance but the commitment to make it work and the comfort both parties provide to each other will carry the marriage on, and this applies to those who understand.

Some people grow from grass to grace so I am not saying that there is no chance for such a person to make it in life. It is only in extreme cases that a woman at a certain level will descend low to marry a very poor man and it will work. Before it works, the lady must take a decision to either go to that level with him then work towards growing together and work really hard at it if the man is a willing and sensible partner or; pull him out of poverty and have the patience to bear with him when he doesn’t improve at the level that she expects.

A lot of times, the second option backfires, someone I know picked a guy off the streets, polished him to her level and even got him out of the country and gave him the red passport. When he found his feet, he became a total ass and was really bad to his wife. After three children, the marriage crashed painfully and he sued her for half of what she had because she was still doing better than him financially and guess what? He got his desire.

Sometimes poverty makes people really mean and after someone helps them out of it, they start to show resentment towards that person for trying to play god in their lives. This by no means does not apply to every poor person, some of them reciprocate that kindness their entire lives but I have seen it many times where a woman descends to the poor level of a guy and it backfires on her.

Men are built to bring ladies out of poverty but if it works the other way round well, what can I say? What I know for sure though is that I will not go into poverty with my eyes wide open especially when I do not see any potential. Mbanu! I will not do it. If tomorrow he makes it, I will take it that it was never meant to be and if he never makes it, I will thank my lucky stars and still support him if I can. However, if I love him with the love of Bollywood or Nollywood, I will marry him and see what I see.