Making Plans

Seems like I haven't updated in ages! So much going on, apologies to everyone.

In the hectic period of December 2004, when I had all the coursework deadlines, exam revision and things to do, I felt God was telling us that His plan was for us to get married in summer 2005. I was trying to push the thought out of my mind, thinking this was absolutely impossible. I was facing an even more hectic 2nd semester as my course workload was going to increase, plus I had a dissertation to write that summer. I was worrying about how to tell our family that we were planning to get married in the next year. I was worrying that there wasn't enough time to plan a successful wedding.
Eventually we had our Christmas break from uni. I remember that holiday clearly. In the middle of Christmas celebrations, revising for January exams and what not, I was worrying and worrying. Mr and I came back to London and started talking seriously about it. We put all our concerns and worries into prayers. In the end we decided to go ahead with it, that we will do as much as we could and then let God take control of the rest. We tentatively chose a date in July 2005 (I remembered we had jokingly mentioned the date as a possibility in the past, see here) and so we began the planning process.
First thing to do was to inform our families so that they could start making their own plans. On New Year's day in 2005, myself, Mr and my two sisters went to spend the day with his older brothers and their families. From there, we called my parents and told them of our plans. I was dreading the call because I expected my dad to hit the roof. Surprisingly, he didn't. He asked us a few questions. Some stuff about me having to finish my degree and make sure I pass my exams. I promised that the wedding won't affect my studies in any way. And then he said it was okay! (That's some faith). He said he and my mum would start putting things in place. That went well, I thought. Then we called Mr's parents. They sounded pleased too, and said they would start putting things in place at their own end. When we hung up, Mr and I looked at each other and said something like "so we are really going to do it this year!" and went to announce the happy news to the rest of the family. It was like "Hey everyone, we are getting married in July!" If anybody was worried or surprised, they didn't show it. Everyone started talking at once. His older brothers started asking Mr about plans to bring their parents over because we said we wanted the wedding to be in England. My sister-in-law started discussing about planning every detail, asking about my bridal train and offering to help. All the kids were jumping up and down and telling me they wanted to be my flowergirl or pageboy and were already asking what they would wear. My sisters started planning their summer holidays around the wedding as they were going to be bridesmaids, naturally. It was a bit surreal, I was in a daze, my mind was swirling with so many questions and ideas and it was just beginning to sink in that I was getting married soon. Mr on the other hand was already talking and then I realised, right Favoured Girl, snap out of it, there's so much to do and so little time. By the time we left his brother's house, I was already dreading how busy I was going to be over the next few months.
Over the next few days, we informed other members of our families, our pastors and our friends. I remember telling my good friend on the same course as me, and she sounded excited. But she expressed concern over how I was going to cope at uni with the added stress of planning a wedding. I must have sounded more confident than I felt, cos I told her I don't know, with God all things are possible (while agreeing with her and wondering what I had gotten myself into!).
Soon the holidays were over and I had to go back to Nottingham. Mr and I agreed that we would meet up once a month in London, aside from the marriage classes, so that we could deal with issues that we couldn't sort out over the phone, visit the necessary people, meet vendors, look at venues and so on. You can just imagine us trying to squeeze everything we had to do in 2 weeks into a single day everytime we met in London lol. After many calm (not!) conversations, we drew up a budget for the wedding and got the ball rolling.
I got back to Nottingham, resumed lectures and started revising for exams. Some of the lecturers were already talking about the summer dissertation. During one class, the lecturer was giving us advice on how to manage our time mroe effectively over the summer. He gave us this sage advice: "Don't be like one of my students last year who finished her exams in June, went home and got married over the summer, and then failed her dissertation because she didn't have enough time to research and write it properly". I could have laughed but I couldn't because I was in the same situation. My two friends in the class turned to look at me with funny looks on their faces. After the lecture, they teased me saying "Did you hear what the lecturer said? One student did what you are planning to do and she failed!" I knew at once that I was going to have to be much more organised with my work and with the wedding plans. And boy did I become organised. I made very good use of my diary, appointment book and the academic year planner on my wall. I made a time-able for everything I was doing every hour of the day. It meant I was constantly busy, because if I wasn't studying, then I was planning. If I got tired of studying, I would do some wedding planning. And if I got tired with all the planning, I would take a breather and go and study! I can definitely say that during those months between January and July 2005, I was never bored.
During those months, I also really learnt to trust God more. There were some things that could not have happened without God's divine help, but I'll talk about them in the next few posts.

Marriage Classes

Just as I was settling back into life on campus, lectures and coursework assignments, I got a call from Mr one day. He told me that he had gotten a call from my aunt, who had gotten a call from one of the coordinators in our church. Apparently, my name and Mr's name had been put down to attend the marriage preparatory classes without our knowledge. They were calling to check up on us to ask why we hadn't attended the first two meetings! Well we had no idea! Who wrote our names down on the list of people getting married? Till today we don't know. Anyway, my aunt had called Mr and persuaded him that we were ready to start attending these classes, as we had been engaged for over a year and we were serious about getting married in the near future. Mr was now telling me that he had agreed to the classes. We were to attend them once a month. They were being organised by my church in London. At first I was fuming. What? In the middle of my busy schedule already, you want me to be travelling to London every month for marriage preparation classes? Do they know that I am reading my books here? How am I going to fit this class into my time-table now?
Anyway Mr calmed me down and explained it to me that it was a requirement by the church if we were planning to get married soon. Plus he would have to attend as well, and that way we could meet up every month and hang out, since the classes were only about two hours or so. I asked him if he would foot my travelling bill and he said yes. Eventually, I agreed to attend the marriage preparation classes.

The plan was this: I would leave Nottingham very early, around 7.00am and get to London for 9.30, meet Mr at the station and we would attend the preparation class. Then we would hang out for the rest of the day. Around 8.00pm he would drop me back at the station and head for his town and I would jump back on my coach or train and head back to my town. Since he was paying for my tickets, it wasn't a big deal after all! So for the next seven months, once a month we both left out respective towns and headed to London on a Saturday morning. I remember telling my flatmate the first month that I was going to London the next day. She asked me when I would be coming back and I said - tomorrow. She must have been amused.

The first time we turned up for the class, we were asked if we had set a wedding date and we said no, we were just going with the flow. The classes were quite interesting actually. There were four other couples attending at the same time as us. Our tutors were a pastor and his wife, and sometimes the Senior Pastor and his wife came in to add to the discussions. They covered every topic about marriages, (such as: commitment, the marriage vows, dealing with in-laws, handling finances, forgiveness, sex, submission, handling conflict, love languages etc) and we had a question and answer session as well. As the classes were taught from a christian point of view, the teachings were a mixture of biblical references, practical applications and the personal experience of the writers of the course. Mr and I learnt a lot and it was interesting when we were asked practical questions of how we will apply the principles we were learning to our relationships.
While we were attending the classes, Mr and I started praying about the timing of our wedding. By the end of 2004, we were sure that God wanted us to get married in 2005. Looking at it from a human stand point, it seemed like such a crazy idea and almost impossible. I was in the middle of a challenging Masters course. We were in two separate towns far away from each other. My dad was still unaware of what was going on. And since I wanted a summer wedding, it meant we had less than 8 months to plan it all! Plus I had to write a 20,000-word dissertation about the same time as we were planning to get married. How was it all going to happen?
Let's just say that with God, all things are possible.

Move to Nottingham

Soon the days passed and it was time for me to move to Nottingham. Mr turned up at my doorstep on the evening of 17/09/04 to help me move all my stuff. We finally left London around 11.00pm in the night. The journey was fun though. I remember being so excited about the year ahead. I was glad to be out of the 9 - 5 work life and be going back to student life.
We arrived in Nottingham around 2.00am and popped into a filling station to buy the essentials: a map and two bottles of water. We finally located my flat after about 15 minutes squinting at the A to Z. My flatmate had already moved in, so she had put some things together. She had gone to her parents to spend the night, so she wasn't around when we got there. Fortunately I had the keys to the flat and we were able to get all my stuff in. Mr and I stayed up all night trying to unpack and arrange my stuff. Eventually we dozed off at about 5.00am.
Early the next morning I made a shopping list of things I needed for the house cos it came partly funished and it was almost bare apart from the basics. We popped out to go to Ikea (the haven for student furniture!) and Argos to get stuff. Then we went to the supermarket to stock up on groceries enough to feed an army for a month, lol.
That afternoon when we got back to the house, my flatmate was there with her parents. We introduced ourselves and they left. Mr and I got talking about visiting each other and stuff. But we both agreed that with him in Essex and me in Nottingham, we really couldn't meet up often. And I also knew that with a hectic schedule of lectures and school work, I couldn't really afford to take many weekends off. I remember feeling a bit sad too, cos that day was our second anniversary. Seemed like we had been going out for ages, really it had just been 2 years! We celebrated our anniversary with lunch and a kiss, then it was time for him to go. We promised to speak to each other everyday. I waved him off goodbye and that was it! I was now on my own in Nottingham. Fortunately I already had a group of friends there so I didn't feel too lonely.
First day of school was spent doing the normal stuff: registration on the course, getting my university username and password, registration in the library, the surgery and a welcome lecture from the Vice Principal of the Business School etc. During all these necessary trips, I met three Nigerian Masters students and I found out one of them was on my course! We swapped phone numbers and became friends at once, and we are still good friends now. We went to the freshers' fair together, signed up for the AfroCarribean society and a few other societies/clubs, located where everything was, and caught a bus tour round the university park. It was all cool stuff.
Gradually I settled into life back at uni, woke up to the shock that Masters was a whole different ball game from undergrad and made more friends. My housemate was very cool and we got on quite well. She was training to be a teacher, so she was a responsible level-headed girl. She had a boyfriend who lived and worked in Sheffield, so he came to visit once or twice a month.
Mr and I didn't see each other but we kept in touch over the phone every evening. I don't think a single day passed in that whole year that I didn't talk to him once or twice. Thank God for T-Mobile free call allowances! I missed hanging out with him though, but we made the best out of what we could.
A month after I moved to Nottingham, I invited my friends round for lunch and a discussion and from then on, it became a monthly occurrence. I'll talk more about that in future posts.

Predictions

Just before we finalised our moves out of London, I went to church one Sunday and after the service, the Senior Pastor said he wanted to see Mr and I, so we should come and visit him after church. Which was cool so we arranged the time and paid him a visit. It was a nice chilled out discussion this time. He asked us a few questions about our relationship and future plans. We told him we were engaged but we hadn't made any definite plans for our wedding yet. Then he asked us when we would most likely want to get married. I said "In about two years' time" at the same time as Mr said "Next week" and then we looked at each other in surprise. The pastor must have thought both of us were not serious. Did we not have our plans laid out yet? I was thinking, "I didn't know this guy was so keen!" LOL. The pastor then asked me why I thought we should get married in 2 years' time. I explained to him that we were making plans to live in different cities, I was due to start a Masters course in two weeks and there was no way I was going to be able to fit in a wedding with my studies. Besides my dad had only just met my boyfriend and he had no idea that we were engaged and getting that serious. The pastor said that I should not worry, and he predicted that by the end of my course, I would be married. In my mind I was thinking, "How is that going to happen?" but I kept my mouth shut. Meanwhile Mr was smiling and agreeing with the pastor when he was talking.
After we left the pastor's house, we got talking in the car. I was quite doubtful as to how we would organise a wedding while we were both taking huge steps in the next two weeks. Then there was the small problem of informing our parents. Eventually we decided to leave things for a bit as they were. We would revisit the issue later on.

Separating

After getting the crush out of my system, I was swimming in the land of bliss in my relationship. Everything was fine. Until six weeks later. Mr called me one day to give me some news. The good news was that he had gotten a job. Yay! The bad news? The job was outside London so he would have to move away. What!?
Okay fine, I knew he had been job hunting since he finished his Masters. Okay I admit I knew he had gone for a few interviews outside London. I can also admit that he told me he had been called for a second interview at some town far away from civilisation. But it hadn't really dawned on me that he might actually get the job, accept their offer and pack his belongings out of London. I had never pictured us being in a 'long-distance' relationship. Fair enough we would still be in the same country, but it just wouldn't be the same anymore! We would be in different cities, so we won't be able to just meet up and hang out whenever we felt like it. He won't be able to pick me up from work anymore. I can't visit him knowing that I can easily catch a tube back to my own house. We will have to book trains to see each other.... and for how long will we be in separate cities again??
All these thoughts were running through my head as he started telling me all about the job, why it was a good move for his career, why he has decided to accept the offer, his plans for the future, etc. I listened in silence. One part of me was thinking, "yeah go for it!" and another part of me was thinking "you can't be serious, what about us?". Eventually he stopped talking and asked me what I thought and I almost burst into tears. I said I needed to think about it. He said he didn't have much time, as he had to give the company his response in less than a week. I told him we should sleep on it and discuss it again when we met up at the weekend.
In the meantime, I went to agonize over this latest turn of events. I thought that telling him not to go for the job would be a completely selfish thing to do. So what was my option? Tell him to go for it? So what about us? I was worried about what the future would hold for us. Eventually I prayed about it but I was still very worried.
Some days later I got a letter from a university. I had applied to them the year I graduated to do my Masters, but when I got a job, I deferred my entry for a year. They were now writing to invite me back to the course. Right, so something more for me to decide. That evening I told Mr about the possibility of me going away for a year at university outside London. So both of us had these decisions to make. He was about to go off to the East of England for a job, and I was about to go off to the Midlands to study! How complicated is that?
What to do? More prayers. I prayed for Mr and his job offer, trying not to pray selfish prayers...lol. I also prayed about my offer of admission to the Uni of Nottingham, should I leave my job, leave my family and friends in London and go? I told God about my worries for our relationship and the fact that we would be in two different cities for at least a year.
For some days we discussed it back and forth. Eventually I told Mr that I felt at peace with his plans to go for the job. I also told him that I felt God wanted me to go to Nottingham for my Masters. The timing was convenient as well. I told my parents also that I might be leaving my job in London to go and continue my studies in Nottingham, and they seemed fine with it.
We talked about what the distance would do in our relationship. We would obviously have to rely mostly on phone calls and texts to stay in touch. I was thankful that at least we were both still in the UK and T-mobile gives us free call allowance! We decided that we'll talk about visiting each other once we had settled in to our respective locations.
So in a few weeks, we started making plans. Mr accepted the job and went off to look for accommodation in the town. He set a date for moving out of his place. I emailed the uni and told them that I was accepting the place on the course. I handed in my notice at work and started making plans to move. The uni organised an accomodation event that I went to. There, I met a nice English girl. She was a fellow postgrad student who was also looking for a flat close to campus too. We found a lovely 2-bed flat close to campus and we signed the contract there and then.
Soon everything was arranged. Mr moved out of London first. I remember going to his flat to move his stuff out and thinking of the fun times we had shared in that flat. I was going to miss it. Then a week later, he moved into a flat in the new town. He still had some stuff to do in London for a while so I saw him quite often in that month. In the meantime, I quit my job and my colleagues gave me a lovely send-off! I also told my friends and ushering team in church that I was moving away. They all said they would miss me. Awwwww.... Before we left though, the senior pastor told me he wanted to see Mr and I, so we agreed to meet him at home one Sunday after church.
So here we were, stepping out in faith into unknown pastures...

Confused (2)

Continued from previous post -

After I hung up the phone call, I sat there thinking. "What this guy was up to? He was coming to England to see me? What do we have to talk about?"

I had thought we were good friends and that was it. Fine, we had a thing for each other, but it never developed so...? I contemplated telling Mr about it but I didn't. What would I even tell him? "Hey guess what, my old crush from Nigeria is coming to see me?" What would he think? So I decided against it.

I was also wondering if I should just ignore him and cut him off completely. But I thought, for the sake of our long friendship, I wouldn't be rude to him so I'll be nice. I would talk to him and make him realise that there was no way we could be together anymore. But there was no reason why we couldn't remain friends.

Sure enough, I got a call from him the next day. He said he would be around for three weeks. Men those three weeks were the most confusing time of my life! He wanted to see me, but I kept making excuses, giving him reason for us not to meet. I wasn't sure what I would say or do if I saw him face to face. I wasn't sure of myself, knowing that I was still attracted to him.

Nevertheless, we spoke to each other everyday. We talked and talked about everything that happened back in high school, we talked about our friendship and crushes. He told me about how he had really liked me from way back in high school. So one day we decided to retrace the events of the past years to see how or why we didn't get together. One conversation went like this:

Him: FG, you know I've always liked you, right from when we were friends in high school

Me: Really?

Him: Yes

Me: I guessed you liked me, but I also knew that you liked my friend (let's call her H)

Him: Yes I liked H for some time but in the end I still liked you more

Me: Well you see, I knew you liked H, so there was no way I was going to get involved in a love triangle. That would have been messy cos we are friends

Him: There was no triangle. I stopped liking her

Me: Ok, then why didn't you ever ask me out?

Him: I wasn't sure how you felt about me

Me: You could have taken the chance

Him: I know, but I didn't want to spoil our friendship if you had said no. I thought it would be better to have you as a friend than nothing at all.

Me: But I liked you, so I would not have said no

Him: I didn't know you liked me

Me: I did, but I was definitely not going to ask you out

Him: So you liked me all along?

Me: Yes, but I got tired of hoping you would notice, so I pushed you out of my mind and moved on with my life

Him: Awww

Me: Yep you had your chance but you didn't use it. Even after high school

Him: After high school you told me you had a boyfriend

Me: That's true, but I heard you had a girlfriend as well

Him: Who told you that?

Me: It doesn't matter anymore now, does it?

Him: Ok I had one, but I still wanted to be with you. But you left Nigeria not long after

Me: No, I left a whole year after high school

Him: And you were not sure when you would come back

Me: Yes but I saw you two years later

Him: And we both had partners but you promised that you were going to marry me

Me: Are you for real? I thought that was a joke

Him: No I was serious

Me: Well I'm sorry. Shortly after my holiday, I met my current boyfriend and now I'm engaged to him

Him: When I heard you were engaged, I cried

Me: You did what?!

Him: It's true. My mum saw me and asked what the matter was. And I told her all about you, how you were the one girl I really liked, how I was going to marry you but now you were engaged to someone else

Me: (shocked) Incredible

Him: That tells you how serious I was

Me: Awww, I see. I guess we just was never meant to be. You do know that I'll be getting married soon don't you?

Him: Yes, and I envy the guy so much. He's taken you away from me. You are the love of my life

Me: Stop saying that

Him: It's true

Me: Ok o. So will you attend the wedding if I invite you?

Him: I'm not sure. I might stand up if the minister asks if anyone has a reason why the couple may not be joined

Me: Eh, please don't do that o

Him: Or when the minister says "You may kiss the bride", I'll have to look outside the window instead. I can't watch another guy kiss you

Me: Sorry o, but he's about to become my husband

Him: That hurts

Me: :laughing:

Okay, I'll admit it. It was fun talking to him and it was very flattering too in a way because I knew that he liked me. Before long, all the old feelings came back and I felt drawn to him again. The thoughts of "if only I wasn't engaged to someone else" crept into my mind. (Now that's dangerous). Then I started feeling guilty. For one thing, I was spending more time talking to this guy than to my fiance. I was enjoying the trips down memory lane, his professions of love and the like. I wondered if this meant I was cheating, maybe not physically, but emotionally. But I was now more confused than ever before. I knew I had to stop it before things got out of control.

Around this time, it was Mr's birthday. I had been talking to this guy the night before when Mr tried to call me and I ignored his call. The next day I felt so guilty when I called him to wish him a happy birthday. We planned to meet in the evening after work. All day at work I was so restless and jumpy, even my manager noticed that something was wrong with me. After I left the office, the guy called me again and we talked throughout my journey to meet up with Mr. Eventually I had to tell him to get off my phone cos I was meeting my fiance. We went out for dinner and I gave Mr his birthday presents. To make me feel even worse, Mr was sooo happy and excited that evening. He was telling me how I was such a wonderful girlfriend and how he's been so happy since he met me etc. In my mind I was like "Oh no, why is this guy making me feel even more guilty now?"

At the end of the evening, I was so relieved when he dropped me off at home and I could do some thinking. I called my sister and told her what had been going on. She just laughed and said "How can you be confused? I thought you knew Mr was the man for you? How can you be drawn to another guy? Fair enough, you liked him before, but that's in the past now. Forget about him. Okay if you are really confused, pray that God should remove the feelings for this guy that is disturbing you".


I thought, well here's an idea! I could pray about it. Why didn't I do that before now? So first thing the next morning, I prayed to God to help me sort my emotions out. And God answered! It seemed like God was telling me some things:

1) Anything that takes away my peace is not God's desire for me.
2) I had more control over my emotions that I thought - if I stop encouraging the feelings for this guy, they would go away.
3) He did not allow me to date this guy because he would have been a big distraction for me
4) God's plan for my future was linked to my fiance and no one else.
5) It is not everyone I meet or feel attracted to that is meant to be in my life.
6) Of course I would get tempted sometimes, but it's what I do that determines the outcome.


Immediately I finished praying, I felt at peace again. All the clouds of confusion seemed to have been miraculously lifted. So God was still in control after all! I pondered everything for a long time. Sometimes I don't understand God's love for me. God loves me so much that He can prevent me from dating someone so that I would not miss the blessings in store for me. It made sense to me now.

Later that evening, I met up with Mr and I told him everything. At first I was worried about how he might react, but he just shrugged. It wasn't even a big deal to him. He said it was natural thing, and what matters is how I handled it. I loved him even more for that.

In the final week before my old crush left, I'm sure he noticed that my behaviour towards him had changed. I was now calmly telling him to forget about anything happening between us. I explained to him that we can be friends but nothing more. Knowing what I now knew, I agreed to meet up with him on the day before he left. It was nice seeing him, we talked for a while and I bade him farewell.

And that was it really. I went back to my fiance and appreciated him more.

Confused (1)

This is the story of how Favoured Girl got confused.

For this post to make sense, I'm going to dig up some historical archives. Where do I begin?

Right, let's go all the way back to senior secondary school. I had just started in a new school and I was quite shy so I didn't make friends with many people at first. But after a while I started to come out of my shell. Then I was introduced to one guy who was in my set and we became friends. We clicked well, we hung out and talked and walked together and stuff. Our friendship was nothing extraordinary at first although some of our mates thought we were going out at the time.

After a while though, I started liking him more and more, but I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to risk telling him that I had feelings for him. Sometimes I felt he liked me too, and sometimes I wasn't sure, so we remained just friends for a long time.

Then after a while I started noticing that he was getting close to one of my best girl friends and she seemed to like him too! Now I was stuck in the middle. Should I go for the guy seeing as I liked him? Would I lose the friendship with my best friend? In the end, I decided that my friendship with my girl friend was not worth losing over the guy (see, I'm so loyal! ....lol) so I left it. All of us remained good friends until we left secondary school.

My girl friend and I ended up going to college together. Both of us still kept in touch with this guy. He even came to see us in college on Valentine's day to take us out. One day in college we were talking about secondary school with another friend of ours and she asked us about this guy that was our friend. As we started talking about it, I asked my girl friend if she was aware of the triangle back in secondary school. She said she liked the guy, he seemed to like her too but he never made a move and she was aware that I liked him too! We laughed about it seeing that both of us had been thinking the exact same thing all along and we hadn't brought it up before.

After we were done with college, I left Nigeria for England. Before I left though, I visited the guy and we hung out and promised to keep in touch and all that. After I left Nigeria, I didn't really keep in touch with him anymore. Between adjusting to a new environment, starting a University course, making new friends and so on, I had too many other distractions. Besides I thought there was no point keeping my crush on him alive, seeing as neither of us could do anything about it. So I pushed all thoughts and emotions of this guy out of my mind.

Two years later, I went home for a holiday and saw him. Everything just came flooding back. This time I couldn't deny there was still chemistry between us. Unfortunately (or not), we were both in relationships at the time. How funny is that! I knew I liked him but there was no way I would break up with my boyfriend in England to do long-distance with him. He also didn't want to break up with his girlfriend. So what could we do? Nevertheless, we spent a lot of time together during my stay in Lagos. By the time I was leaving, his girlfriend absolutely hated me. Apparently he had been talking about me non-stop and she was tired of hearing my name. She had even found my photo in his car!

The day before my flight back to England, we met up for the last time. He asked me if I had plans to come back to Nigeria after my degree. I told him I wasn't sure. He said that if I came back, would I marry him? I didn't know if he was serious or not, so I just said yeah sure I would. So we parted and I returned to London. A few weeks of phone calls back and forth and I was feeling so conflicted. I liked him, but I couldn't see him, I couldn't date him. I was frustrated with liking someone I couldn't have, so I pushed him out of my mind again.

Then my current boyfriend at the time disappeared, and you know the rest of the story. I stayed single for a while until Mr came along. I was finally in a happy and wonderful relationship so I had no reason to think of anyone else.

After I got engaged, I received a funny phone call one day from this old crush. He said he had heard I was engaged through some friends of mine and he was very sad. He was calling to confirm if it was true that I had dumped him for someone else. I thought, "What is this guy on about, we were never in a relationship". I told him, yes it is true I'm now engaged and I'm sorry for not telling you earlier, but I didn't dump you". Then he reminded me that I had promised to come back to marry him. I was like, "Wait, I thought we were both kidding that day, you have never asked me out, you had a girlfriend, in fact you still do, so did you expect me to put my life on hold waiting for you?" Fortunately I was on a bus and I told him we really couldn't discuss it, so he should call me back some other time. He didn't call back that day so I forgot about that conversation.

Fast forward to three months later. I saw a missed call on my phone one morning from a Nigerian mobile number. I didn't know who it was, and I thought - if the call is important the person would call me back. Later that evening, my phone rang again. This time I picked up and the conversation went like this:

Favoured Girl: Hello?

Caller: Hi, Favoured Girl, it's me (it was him)

Favoured Girl: Oh hi, how are you?

Caller: I'm good. Guess what, I'll be coming to England tomorrow

Favoured Girl: Oh, erm, that's nice.

Caller: I need to see you, we need to talk. I decided that we can't talk over the phone so I'm coming over to see you in person.

Favoured Girl: Why?

Caller: Can't talk right now. I'll call you when I arrive. We need to talk about us.

WHAT!!!!

To be continued...

Mentors

One thing I have touched on before, is the idea of having mentors. I think I should write a bit more about it, since it is so important. The idea of having a mentor might seem weird at first. Nobody wants to feel like their relationship or their decisions are influenced by some external party. Then there is the issue of confidentiality - how do you trust that the person (s) will keep your gist confidential? Or how about trusting that they won't later use that information against you. And how can you guarantee that they will not be partial in their advice to you and your partner? All these are valid concerns. I still believe though, that for any young person in a Christian dating relationship, having Christian mentors is really important.

In my case, when I first started dating Mr, I realised that going to my friends for advice was not helping, in fact it was making things worse. My friends were well meaning people, but at the time, they were just as unwise and as immature as I was. I soon realised a few things: my friends couldn't give me better advice than I could give myself, most times they only said what I wanted to hear, they always took my side even when I was wrong, and at the time none of them had been in a long-term committed relationship so their knowledge was severely limited. After Mr and I had had two arguments early in the relationship and advice from friends was getting me nowhere, I decided to go somewhere else.

I started speaking to my aunt instead. I was quite close to her so she was the easiest person (in the absence of my mum) that I could discuss with. I thought, since she has been happily married for more than 20 years, she must know a thing or two about making relationships work! I found out that when I talked to her, she always made me see things from a point of view I would never have thought about. Even though she was my aunt, she was very impartial. Unlike my friends, she was not afraid to tell me bluntly if I was in the wrong. She taught me so many things: keeping myself from losing my temper during an argument, putting my issues into prayers, expressing to Mr that I love him, how to practice submission, avoiding sexual temptations and so on. Sometimes when I just wanted to get a load of stuff off my chest, she would sit down and listen to me. Afterwards she would advice me and we would pray together. As time went on, I became wiser and started recognising what I had been doing wrong. Now I'll always be grateful for her guidance.

Later on, I got close to a couple in my church and they became my official mentors. I used to admire their relationship so much. They were always smiling at each other and I could tell that they were very good friends. I became close to them after we were put on the same table at a wedding reception. They were teasing me that I was next. Thereafter, they asked about my relationship and how it was going and we started gisting. I liked the fact that even though they were older than me, they were still young at heart and they could come down to my level.

Over time, I learnt so much from them as well. They were very honest and open, there was no topic that we didn't discuss. We talked about everything: from facing sexual temptations to dealing with in-laws to managing finances and their funny experience on their wedding night. Some of the stories they told me about their courtship were hilarious. Mr got to know them too and he liked them at once. Whenever I saw them we always had fun talking. I still try to keep in touch with them now cos they helped me so much.

I think mentors have a role to play in helping young people with relationships. Having mentors really helped me and that's why I think they are so important. They can fulfil the role of giving you practical advice. They can speak from their own experience. They can correct you if they think you are making a mistake. They will look out for you and pray with you. I also think it is the best way of passing down wisdom from one generation to the other.

Choosing a mentor can be quite difficult though. Ideally you should choose a couple, so that you can hear from both points of view. They should be people you look up to and admire. They should be happily married, who have successfully gone through all the stages you are currently going through and have stayed together. Choose people you can see or speak to on a regular basis so that you can keep in touch easily. And choose people who are not biased so they can be impartial in their opinions.

And above all, trust God to lead you because human beings can only say what they know, but God knows everything.

Submission

Here's one prickly topic with today's modern woman, including me. When I first heard a message on women respecting and submitting to their husbands, I thought to myself, "What?! I hope I don't have to deal with this anytime soon" and I promptly pushed it out of my mind. Well you know what, I got into a relationship and got engaged. Sooner or later, the topic came up again one Sunday in church. This time it was the pastor's wife preaching. She used herself as an example, and told us a story. When she and her husband were engaged, they visited an older friend who was advising them. He then asked her some questions: Do you love this man? She said yes. Do you trust this man? She said yes. Will you obey this man? She frowned. Their friend said to her, "No matter how much you trust and love someone, you are not ready for marriage until you can learn to submit and obey your husband".

Now as she was preaching, she said it took her almost 10 years, but her marriage became much better once she learned to submit to her husband. Someone asked, why did it take you so long? She said it is because submission is not a natural thing to do. We all want to feel like we are in control of our decisions. As a child growing up, we learn to rebel against authority. Imagine now, as you are finally an adult capable of handling your affairs, you are now being told that you have to submit to your husband's authority over you. Of course, your natural instinct is to rebel and disobey. So it took a lot of time, hard work and prayers before she learnt to tame her rebellious nature.

This time, the message hit home for me. At the time Mr and I were now serious about the future of our relationship. We had also just had an argument and I hadn't been willing to back down. Now I realised that I couldn't ignore the matter of submission anymore if I wanted a happy, peaceful relationship. But I wasn't comfortable with the idea that I would have to submit to someone. I thought to myself and came up with some difficult questions. How do you submit to someone without becoming a doormat? How do you submit while still having a say in matters that come up? How are you sure that the guy won't use submission as an excuse to bully you? And how do I know when to submit and when to stick to my argument when I'm convinced that I'm correct?

I remember having a discussion with my christian friends over this topic. It seemed that they were even more resistant to the word than I was. One of them said that it is lazy women who don't want to take responsibility for their lives that hide under the umbrella of submission. Another one said that she doesn't believe that her man should have a say in her affairs at all, such as her finances. I was quite surprised actually. Yes before marriage your boyfriend has no business controlling your finances. But then won't it be important after marriage and he has become the husband? When do you start practicing submission?

There are no simple answers. So I went back to my bible. I saw that it was not really optional. The command was for husbands to LOVE their wives, and wives should RESPECT and SUBMIT to their husbands. I found some books and teachings on the subject and read them thoughtfully. Slowly I began to comprehend the subject. I understood that it did not mean 1) a violation of my rights as a human person; 2) it does not mean for me to submit to my husband’s desires blindly, totally, and completely because his desires may be unreasonable 3) it does not mean I'm to be treated like someone unable to make mature judgment. Actually the scripture talked about mutual submission. That meant both of us had to bestow equal amount of love and respect to each other. That meant that we both had to be completely unselfish when we want to get our point across. What it meant was that being a woman did not mean that I was incapable of making my own decisions, but I should recognise that I had someone who was capable of making selfless decisions for my welfare on my behalf. If I trust him to be a God-fearing, sensible, caring, and loving man, then I can safely submit to him, knowing that he will put my best interests before his own. I asked my happily married aunt for advice. She also told me that it was when she was most submissive to her husband that he was most loving to her. So those commandments of Paul in Ephesians must go together. You cannot submit to someone who doesn't show you love. Of course that meant that my choice of husband must be the right man. He must be the kind of man that I have confidence in. He must be the kind of man that I can trust completely. He must be a reasonable, selfless man. Who wants to submit to a loser or a creep? So if I can't imagine myself submitting to my boyfriend, perhaps it's best not to marry him. If my husband was being selfish and unreasonable, he cannot expect me to submit to him. I would be more willing to submit if I knew his motives were for our mutual benefit.

Still it is very hard. Knowing something in your head is very different from putting it into practice. My pride sometimes gets in the way. There are so many examples of times when my fiance has suggested something and I did not listen. Only for me to reaslise much later that he was right all along and I was wrong. Then I would feel bad for not listening right from the beginning. And I would ask God to help me again and again. It's not easy but I'm learning.

To read an article on submission, click HERE

To be continued....

Meeting Dad

By this time, most of my family knew I was in a serious relationship. Except my dad. (A little background info: My dad and I have always had a close relationship. He's such a cool guy. Even when my friends meet him, they go "your dad is so cool" and I agree. He has always treated me like an adult and he respects my opinions. We talk and argue about anything. I remember my dad telling me when I was younger not to have a boyfriend until I was 20! LOL, I guess he was just trying to protect his little girl)
I was not in a hurry to introduce any guy to him until I was sure he was the right one. I was a bit nervous. Funny enough, my dad never seemed to mind when he met my guy friends. But I was worried about how he would react to my boyfriend. I knew it was now time though. After Mr proposed and I was now engaged, I asked my mum for advise on how to break the news to dad. She suggested that it was better face-to-face rather than over the phone. So I should wait until he was around, and he could meet the boyfriend. As God would have it, dad was coming for my graduation ceremony in December that year. Since I wanted Mr to be part of the ceremony, he was going to have to meet dad then. The day my parents arrived, I told my dad I wanted him to meet someone. The conversation went like this:

Me: Daddy there's someone I'd like you to meet.
Dad: Who?
Me: My boyfriend
Dad: Your what?
Me: Dad, he's not just any boyfreind
Dad: I see, what kind of boyfriend?
Me: He's my serious boyfriend
Dad: How serious?
Me: Serious enough for me to want to introduce him to you
Dad: How long have you known him?
Me: Almost two years
Dad: Two years!
Me: Well he's been my boyfriend for just over a year now
Dad: But you've only just graduated. Has he been distracting you from your studies?
Me: Not at all Daddy. He's actually been very supportive
Dad: I see
Me: Dad, just meet him first and give him a chance. I'm sure you'll like him
Dad: I'm not sure.
Me: Ok if you don't like him I'll take that on board. But you have to meet him first
Dad: He's trying to take my baby girl from me.
Me: Nooooo he's not! I'll always be your baby girl
Dad: Okay so when am I meeting him?
Me: Well I want him to be at my graduation ceremony so can you meet him before then?
Dad: This is serious. Ok tell him to come on Thursday.
Me: (hugs dad) Thanks dad! I'll tell him right away.

I ran to tell Mr that my dad wanted to meet him. The guy was a bit nervous. Just a bit... lol. I told him to be himself and he'll be fine. Thursday came and Mr came round to meet my parents. I was glad my mum had met him before this, otherwise it would have been even more nerve-wracking for the poor guy. As they settled down to talk, I left the room and left Mr on his own. After a while my dad called me and said I should see him out. On the way back to his car, I asked Mr what he and my dad had talked about. He said it was 'man-talk' so I wasn't meant to hear. I ran back inside to hear the verdict. Mum was smiling ear to ear. Dad looked thoughtful. I asked dad what he thought. He just said "He's a nice, responsible young man". I said "I'll take that to mean you liked him then." And that was it.

Some days later, it was my graduation ceremony. I remember turning round to wave to my parents in the auditorium and seeing Mr sitting beside them talking to my mum. And that was it, just like that he had been accepted as a member of the family. I was sooo pleased. Later on when we were taking photographs, my dad jokingly asked Mr if it was okay for him to hold my hand. My friends could not believe their eyes when they saw Mr sitting confidently with my dad. They came to ask me how I did it. I remember one of them telling me that she was dreading the day she would introduce her boyfriend to her dad too. I told her to get her mum on her side, that seemed to help. I'm just glad that the meeting went well and my dad liked him at once. So that major hurdle was over.