I met him two Decembers ago, a few days to Christmas. The streets were alive with music and hawkers shouting “Christmas is coming!” I was tired after work, standing by a roadside kiosk when he offered to pay for my roasted corn. He smiled like someone who had nothing to hide. Soft-spoken and Intentional(well from what I saw). He told me his name, what he wanted from life, and how tired he was of chaos.
I’m a woman in my early thirties, Independent and very Hardworking. I’ve always believed love should feel like peace, not suspense. He said he admired that about me. Said I felt like home.
When things weren’t going well for him, I stayed. I supported him both emotionally and financially. When I opened my small food joint, he sat there every evening like a proud husband, telling customers, “This is my woman.” I believed we were building something real.
Then in June, I found out I was pregnant. He held my hands and told me not to be scared. He said God had blessed us. He said we would face everything together. I didn’t know those words would expire so quickly. But…
From that moment, he began to disappear. He started going out every night. Sometimes he came home at 3am. Sometimes at dawn. My shop had to close in November because of the pregnancy, I stopped smiling and I hadn’t even started antenatal. Christmas decorations began to go up, but joy never entered our room.
Then one night out of exhaustion, not suspicion I checked his phone…..
That’s when my entire world collapsed!!
I discovered he had another family. Not a past. Not a mistake. A whole other life. A woman. Two children. Photos. School fees receipts. Conversations about Christmas clothes for his other kids. I sat on the floor till morning, shaking.
This is where it hurts the most:
He didn’t deny it. At all. He said he hid it to “protect my peace.”
He said if I hadn’t gone through his phone, I would still be happy.
He said he had the means to take care of multiple homes, so what was the problem?
I was pregnant. Carrying a child for a man who already had a family he never told me about.
This Christmas, he’s planning visits. Gifts. Smiles. A full house somewhere else while I sit alone wondering how love turned into a lie this big. I look at my age. I look at my womb. I look at the little money I have saved. I’m torn between keeping my child and walking away… or making a decision that could haunt me forever.
Christmas is supposed to be about truth, light, and family.
But this Christmas, I’ve learned that some people unwrap lies with the neatest bows.
I don’t want pity.
I want wisdom.
Should I deny my child a father or should I be the obedient African woman whose culture accepts multiple marriages
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