Temitope Falusi’s Story – Part 7

Tolu and I went our separate ways that night for good . Few months later ,I heard his girlfriend got pregnant and things were good for them. I moved on with my life because that was the only option I had at that point.

In 2004 ,I met Ezekiel through a friend but I was just not interested in having a relationship. He did all he could, but I turned him down but after a long process of looking for the right person to be with, he kept coming back. So in 2006 July, I started dating him but really not interested that much. 

Among the guys I met, some loved me but in most cases they didn’t have legal papers to stay in the country, so one way or the other they moved on.  Ezekiel and I started living together in 2006. After a period of time,I noticed he had bad temper but I thought I would be able to cope .  He was so hot tempered that he could slap his parents when they talk to him in a poor manner. There was a day his father came to visit us and said something he didn’t like , he started abusing him right in my presence. I was so upset that day,and I told him It wasn’t right to talk to one’s parent in such manner.

I thought of breaking up with him after witnessing such incident but I endured, thinking he would change.   A drama came up someday when we were about to go out, he asked me about something I couldn’t remember, and because my response was not satisfactory to him he broke the light bulb in our bedroom on my head. He did this in the presence of his dad and his friends ,the light in our apartment went off because of this. This prompted me to take my things and abandon him, but he came begging, promising to change his ways. 

I came back to the house after a week and started living with him again. You know when you think because your last relationship went so bad so the next will be better, but I got it all wrong. At this point I started thinking of the adage that says,”When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.”  When he got upset sometimes he would pick up things like he was going to break it on my head but sometimes he wouldn’t. He would twist my hands and  threaten to call the police( that I was illegal immigrant and that I was also assaulting him), but after all he did to me, I continued staying with him only that I tried to avoid having conflict with him. I made up my mind that whenever he started his trouble I would pack my bags and go to a friend for a while. And that was what happened most times. In spite of all, I still went back to him, because I thought  he would see that he was wrong in all he was doing and change for the better one day. 

In my bid to make him change, I started engaging in prayer and fasting for several days,believing God that he would change but things went from bad to worse by the day. He gave me an order that I should stop bringing my friends to the house. I lost a lot of good friends in the process because when they came ,they never returned. It was later I was told that he frowned at them that they had to leave.

I lost eveybody,so it was just us. I was so afraid of him, I was left with no choice than to co-operate with him in order to have peace of mind. He took advantage of the fact that I was an illegal migrant and this made he feel like a king around me. It was a tough decision though, it felt I literally jumped from frying pan to fire. But I got closer to my God, I held on to Him so tightly and I was hopeful. We had our daughter in 2007 and things looked like it was getting better, but instead he collected all the child’s maintenance and claimed all sorts of money meant for our child because I was not eligible to receive them.  After a while, he started a printing business and he had problems with taking clients’ work to them and at some point he asked if I could help him with the delivery of the printed job to some clients.  So, what I did was to go to work and he would pick me up after work and I’d have to carry the printed documents to different shops one after the other. After running the errands, I would go home to cook for him then I would take care of my daughter and go to bed.

By 7a.m, I used to resume work so I would wake up by 5am to get my child and myself ready and made sure I leave the house at 5.30am. First, I had to take my daughter to a friend`s house and go to work from there. 

Ezekiel’s job was at nights, and he used to come home early in the morning. Practically he did nothing at home, in order not to quarrel, I wouldn’t say anything. This problem persisted for a long time and I endured it.  Sometimes in 2009, he called me to inform me that his mother wanted us to relocate to Canada. I told him he could go alone because he knew I was still an illegal immigrant. He said he couldn’t help me because he knew I would leave him at some point whenever I got my documents to stay. 

I didn’t have any legal papers to travel with him and he knew this, but he told me he already discussed that with his mother. She told him he should get me pregnant, and I should keep my pregnancy but he should bring my first child with him.

 I disagreed with him and the problem I had with him was that he didn’t like me arguing and disagreeing with him, he used to threaten me whenever I did that.  One day he came home and started shouting that he would take our child, I was really scared so I quietly went to stay with my friend. I was very scared that night so I started calling people that I knew could stop this move. I called one of his cousins, Steven and explained the situation to him. He told me he would call his mum and speak to her. He said he would also call Ezekiel and say I was bleeding, so I called the ambulance and I told him I had been trying to get in touch with him(Ezekiel) so he could come and pick me but all to no avail . And that was why I went to my friend’s place. 
 To Be Continued….