I have always heard many people asking older girls in their community about when they are getting married as if they can marry themselves or must propose to men.
Don’t you know that such girls also have feelings and desire to have families and children in stable, honored marriages?
Why then pressurize them with questions they can hardly answer?
Some have resorted to witchcraft for solutions because they believe they have been bewitched after reaching a certain age without getting married.
Some of these single girls who become spinsters are treated like they are cursed. This traumatizes them, and some end up making irrational decisions after losing hope of ever getting husbands.
The tale of being a spinster is not a simple journey to walk along within our African cultures. All eyes keep on you as people wonder what happened to you. It is as if the girl is abnormal. But who can find a virtuous, noble husband on her own?
If she dared, don’t you think she would be accused of being too desperate? Won’t the men run away from her if she proposed? In our society, it is rather tricky for a woman to make the move.
Then why can’t we let them be until Mr Right comes? We should not judge them since there is no specified hell for the singles.
My encouragement to any working, but unmarried woman is: use your earnings strategically and invest in valuable ventures like a house, businesses alongside your job or anything that can earn you side income. Do not spend your money on only luxurious things and forget to invest.
I am sure what they go through – the peer pressure and awkward comments from people – traumatize some and turn the situation unbearable. My friend Esther told me such pressure can cause depression.
“If someone feels unwanted because she cannot find a partner or has been left out by peers who are already married, she ends up making mistakes, chooses an unfitting partner and ends up in divorce,” Esther, who is in her late thirties, told me.
She also thinks people do not get married because of similar reasons.
“We also ought to understand that society is changing; so, people prioritize differently. Some choose to study further so they can acquire better opportunities, while others make some money first so they provide for their families, and join marriage much later,” adds Esther, who first pursued career and is now settling down to think about marriage.
However, she confessed that her mother and aunts have been asking her for “updates”. She had to calm them down because it was becoming too much on her.
It is okay for parents to know what is happening in their children’s lives and help them focus on their future, advise them on relationships and marriage as their parental role. However, it is worse when parents are the ones traumatizing their children because they are not married. Our kind role should be encouraging and giving hope.
In this era of dot com and too much exposure to social media, we need to be our children’s best friend and encourage them to always confide in us. We should build a good relationship and trust to save them from ‘getting married’ to social media whenever they are depressed and traumatized.
