upepo
Elder Lister
Sometime last month while strolling the streets of some small town, I bounced on an acquaintance from many years back. I had heard about his descent into despair but I never thought it was that bad. First, the man looked disheveled, dirty, and chronically drunk. That was not the shocking part. The shocking part was that he could not recognize me despite the fact that we gazed at each other from a very close distance for something close to a minute. A brief background about my friend. He used to be a bank clerk, married a teacher, got one child, and kicked out the wife after he suspected her of cheating. The marriage had lasted about 4 years. Shortly after the separation, the fellow descended into depression and alcohol, which led to his sacking, which pushed him deeper into alcoholism, the third-generation type. Today, he is a bottomed-out alcoholic. The kind who cannot keep anything that can be exchanged for money. Not even a pair of shoes.
Now, here is the interesting twist in this story, and which forms the theme of this piece. For a long time, those of us with a keen sense of smell knew that the wife had something going with a colleague at work. However, the suspicions that prompted my friend to kick out the wife involved someone different altogether. Someone whose relationship with my friend’s wife was largely platonic. My deep investigations later revealed that the wife had used the platonic friend to provoke the husband into kicking her out so that she could formalize her relationship with the work colleague. The good ending of this brief anecdotal script is that the wife’s new project collapsed before it was actualized. The bad ending is that the former husband is unsalvageable.
Now, let us go back to the main theme of this piece. In my research, I have discovered that there are many men living in guilt after kicking out their partners for one reason or the other. To cope with this guilt, many will descend into alcoholism and other fatalistic endeavors. Sadly, most of these men will never discover that the partner planned the exit purposely, and that they were manipulated into their actions. When a woman decides to leave you, she will always seek an exit path that will make you seem responsible for their leaving. They do this for several reasons. To start with, they do not want to carry the guilt of breaking up a family. This is what I call being guilty without being guilty (If you did something terrible, like altering the air composition in a lift, it is easier to explain yourself to yourself if nobody discovered you are the offender.) Second, they do not want to bear blame from friends, family, and society. Third, they want to know that they can access the former husband in future should the need arise. This is much easier if the man believed he was responsible for the breakup. It is the same guilt that will push the man into providing child support even when his parental rights are non-existent. Finally, the woman is afraid that if she walked out on her own volition, her man could react in ways that could ruin her new project.
I think it is the height of evil to kick a man’s ass out, make him pay for it, and force him to carry the guilt burden. One telltale sign that a woman is seeking a convenient way out is when she starts escalating small disagreements into full-scale conflicts. The second one is when she refuses to let minor altercations die. My advice to men is, if you see your woman in the process of leaving, find out the real reason by all means. This will protect you from feelings of guilt in future. For those who are already neck-deep in guilt, consider the possibility that you could be a victim of manipulation.
Now, here is the interesting twist in this story, and which forms the theme of this piece. For a long time, those of us with a keen sense of smell knew that the wife had something going with a colleague at work. However, the suspicions that prompted my friend to kick out the wife involved someone different altogether. Someone whose relationship with my friend’s wife was largely platonic. My deep investigations later revealed that the wife had used the platonic friend to provoke the husband into kicking her out so that she could formalize her relationship with the work colleague. The good ending of this brief anecdotal script is that the wife’s new project collapsed before it was actualized. The bad ending is that the former husband is unsalvageable.
Now, let us go back to the main theme of this piece. In my research, I have discovered that there are many men living in guilt after kicking out their partners for one reason or the other. To cope with this guilt, many will descend into alcoholism and other fatalistic endeavors. Sadly, most of these men will never discover that the partner planned the exit purposely, and that they were manipulated into their actions. When a woman decides to leave you, she will always seek an exit path that will make you seem responsible for their leaving. They do this for several reasons. To start with, they do not want to carry the guilt of breaking up a family. This is what I call being guilty without being guilty (If you did something terrible, like altering the air composition in a lift, it is easier to explain yourself to yourself if nobody discovered you are the offender.) Second, they do not want to bear blame from friends, family, and society. Third, they want to know that they can access the former husband in future should the need arise. This is much easier if the man believed he was responsible for the breakup. It is the same guilt that will push the man into providing child support even when his parental rights are non-existent. Finally, the woman is afraid that if she walked out on her own volition, her man could react in ways that could ruin her new project.
I think it is the height of evil to kick a man’s ass out, make him pay for it, and force him to carry the guilt burden. One telltale sign that a woman is seeking a convenient way out is when she starts escalating small disagreements into full-scale conflicts. The second one is when she refuses to let minor altercations die. My advice to men is, if you see your woman in the process of leaving, find out the real reason by all means. This will protect you from feelings of guilt in future. For those who are already neck-deep in guilt, consider the possibility that you could be a victim of manipulation.
