By: Bashirat durojaye
At an early age, Aminah witnessed verbal insults, physical abuse, and various forms of violence in her parents’ relationship, leaving indelible, heartbreaking memories. Born into a once-gleaming family of five, she was the third child. Initially, their home was filled with love and affection, but happiness dwindled as her parents’ issues escalated, ultimately leading to divorce when she was in nursery school.
Aminah and her four siblings ended up with their single mother, deprived of paternal care or guidance. She developed resentment towards her father, expressing her discontent in a primary four composition, condemning him for abandoning their mother to bear the family’s burdens alone.
She endured the challenges of a fatherless home, facing taunts from friends and adversaries who, whether in jest or cruelty, assigned various names to her mother since her father remained an enigma. Many instances brought her to tears, especially when someone heartlessly claimed her mother’s flaws as the reason for her father’s departure. These words haunted her, causing sleepless nights and, at such a tender age, triggering both a sleeping disorder and crippling self-doubt.
Growing up she envied people who had both parents living with them happily, she competed within herself, and she grew up with a wound her parents’ divorce inflicted on her heart. With the mentality of not allowing any man to see her vulnerability and she hardly had a good relationship with the opposite gender.
If there is anything Aminah could ever wish for, it will always be a happy family that pictures her parents and siblings together.
Narrator’s Note: Say no to divorce because the children will always bear the unhealing scars.