Last week Sunday I woke up to the news on twitter about Toke Makinwa's cheating husband. I won't go into the insensitive trash people were posting. Social media has given opportunity for silly people to air their unintelligent opinions. We get it's our thing to joke about bad situations in the county but still, not everything should be taken as a joke or used to create memes. Some things are just too damn real to be joked about.
My heart goes out to Toke. I mean the hurt, betrayal and humiliation she'll be going through right now. Her's is a peculiar case, in that she is a celebrity and she has a vlog where she gives relationship advice, now it's all right in her face!
When I heard the news I was taken back to last December when I broke things off with my ex who cheated. Some people forgive and work through this kinda thing but truth is once a cheat, always a cheat. My principle is, once they cheat, please kick 'em out! It maybe hard 'cus you are still in love but save yourself the plenty drama that'll keep coming 'cus truly, once a cheat, always a cheat!
No one deserves to be cheated on. If you are tired why don't you just call it quits and go? Seriously!
The stages of knowing you've been cheated on - shock, disappointment, anger, betrayal, sadness, confusion, anger again, numbness then healing...Oh the healing process...you'll have to deal and process the hurt and anger. The effort you'll put in to actually move on. Back in the days when digital pics weren't popular, you'd tear pictures and trash everything that brings any memory of them. Now we just delete all pics from our phones and social media, may seem dramatic but it actually helps one heal. But the part I don't like (sadly I once did that when I was much younger) where people go on social media to trash talk the other. I get it helps release the pain but we really don't need to broadcast our business for the world to seat and eat popcorn while watching our lives like cinema and of course judging and giving unsolicited advice. We could send those words via private messages, infact write an epistle of all the anger you feel, let it out and hit them with it in their damn face, literally, and no! You don't have to be friends with your cheating ex!
I told Kelvin when he was going on and on about still saying hello to his ex, all to show he is matured. I was like, jor o. Some times to hell with maturity! I'd go crazy on you, say it as it hurts and damn you! I don't want to be a friend to you bloody cheat! I may eventually forgive you but for now we are not friends and you don't deserve, me neither am I under any obligation to be civil with you!
Really tho, sometimes you just gotta kick maturity out the door, whatever helps you heal...it's your right noni! Have you seen the movie diary of a mad black woman?
It's not an easy stuff dealing with being cheated on especially when you truly love the person. It takes a strong person to walk away.
"When you love someone but it goes to waste, what could be worst?" Fix you – Coldplay
It takes a really strong person to break their own heart, chose to walk away from a cheating partner they still love and move on. The pain, hurt, loneliness and so many things you'll have to go through even though you know it would have been much easier staying and trying to work things out. But you know better, they'll cheat again. Plus, once the trust is gone, you've got nothing. No one wants to be in a relationship where you can't trust your partner to be faithful. Life is hard enough, can't go living a life where you are always suspicious of their every move, phone call or sms beep...your sanity is key.
Sometimes we tend to love so much we begin to feel we are at fault, giving excuses that our flaws is the cheated. You know how love sometimes messes with your head? (sorry to say, especially the ladies) Kills your self esteem because you are scared of being alone or the fear of not finding another person makes you stay and endure the crap slammed in your face day in, day out meanwhile your life is just passing you by as you stay, becoming miserable, unhappy and sad when in truth you have the power to walk away and be happy. Being single is not a disease! I'd rather be single and happy than be in a relationship and be miserable. You deserve so much better. I remember the movie, 'For coloured women', how Janet Jackson's character had a cheating husband who after philandering would come home to sleep with his wife, at the end dude gave her HIV.
This thing called life is just once. Truth is no matter how good you are, or how much of your all you put in to make it work, sadly, some people just have cheating engrossed in their DNA makeup.
Its one thing when a boyfriend or girlfriend cheats but I don't need to be married to know it’s a whole new level of hurt when it's your wife or husband that cheats. This one hurts a million times over. The vows made and all...*sigh
The hardest part of walking away from a cheat is the pain and loneliness. So much pain but someday without you even realizing, you'd move on from all the pain and be happy again. I have been there, the whole you still being in love with 'em, you'll miss 'em and sometimes question your decision but it's just for a while, you'd get over it and appreciate the peace of mind and most especially it gives you the opportunity to meet someone better and start over.
As far as I am concerned, there is no excuse for cheating. That's why I keep saying know what you want, what you can handle and what works for you. Don't give the excuse of long distance or their not always being around as an excuse for cheating. It doesn't hold water. There really isn't any excuse. (I know situations are complicated and I don't know it all but cheating on someone who really loves you...if you have been cheated on by the one you gave your all; you'd know what I am talking about, heck! There's no excuse for cheating if you are not happy why not leave?)
Indiscipline and setting ourselves up for temptation lead to cheating. Those harmless chats and light flirting we say are not serious and just for fun or you know you are slowly getting into someone you shouldn't feel a thing for but yet you won't stay away...these little things, I call them temptations, are actually avoidable if we just decide to have self control and be disciplined. When you see it coming, when it's still early and the feelings haven't become strong, when you still have control to walk away please walk away.
I was discussing this with my friend, a married woman and she informed me of how her marriage almost ended the previous month. I had to admit that social media hasn't helped these days. It's not only about physical cheating, there's also emotional cheating. You are married or with someone but you spend your time chatting with whomever on social media, spending time and bonding with others instead of investing that in your relationship/marriage. Slowly you are building a disconnect. The only thing that can fuel a relationship is communication, the less communication you have the more you two become strangers. Why not share those intimate thoughts and feelings with your partner instead of having that online person you lean on and at the end start developing feelings for or start comparing your spouse to the person's ability to give you attention? These are little way we allow cracks into our relationships
This Toke experience is one of my biggest fears in a relationship. Giving someone your all then they make you look like the biggest fool. Loving someone and going into something with them is such a big risk, scares me most times and just gives me really huge cold feet about relationships. Naturally with friends and acquaintances, I have a hard time dealing with injustice and betrayal so imagine someone I chose to love and give my all hurting me that way?
Reminds me of what Meredith Grey said in the series Grey's anatomy -
"There's a reason I said I will be happy alone.
It wasn't because I thought I'd be happy alone.
It was because I thought if I loved someone and then it fell apart, I might not make it.
It's easier to be alone because what if you learned that you need love and then you don't have it.
What if you like it and lean on it?
What if you shape your life around it and then it falls apart?
Can you even survive that kind of pain?
Losing love is like organ damage, it's like dying.
The only difference is death ends.
This...it could go on forever"
I'd say it again, there's no excuse whatsoever for cheating. If you think there is, ask yourself if your partner cheated on you and gave that reason as justification; would you feel hurt? Would you feel betrayed? Would you be okay with their reason?
Well, what do I know?...I am but just a kid
