Humpty Dumpty

They met when he was twenty

He and his family had just moved into the estate but she and her folks had been in the estate for several years

The estate was a small, close-knit, community, everyone knew everyone else

Everyone knew who was dating who, and everyone knew which school whose children were attending

News was scarce, and whatever came was considered entertainment for the day

She was the first of five daughters, her parents were poor

Her father was a cook at one of the multinationals before he got the sack

Her mum was a typist who worked with one of the parastatals of the state government

Getting the five girls an education was a herculean task

Their secondary school education was free but college education was quite pricey She wanted desperately to have a first degree, do better than her parents, and lay the foundation for a better future

She and her parents had a talk

They told her she would have to settle for learning a skill before getting married

That was the destiny she was fighting against when she met him

He met her on the road and took a liking to her

She knew he was one of the new folks who moved into the neighborhood recently

They got talking and became friends, she was 18 years old at the time

She really didn't want to have a relationship as she wanted to meet her first boyfriend at the university

She wanted to build romance into the future

She had read about those who did it and had both at the end of the day- a degree in the right hand and a husband in the left

She wanted that desperately

He was from an average family, a brainiac, he was already in the University and he oozed confidence

She liked him but she knew his family would most likely not approve of her

Classism was a thing in their society and she was the one climbing up the social ladder by being with him

She had seen how such a union ended for other ladies

She would prefer to marry from her class or even a little bit down the ladder so that her husband can appreciate her

She was not an over-reacher, she liked to face reality

They became fast friends and then lovers

At first, she saw him as an escape, a way out of her painful reality, a place to run to when she wanted to escape the weight of her situation

One day he noticed that she was crying as she lay on the bed beside him

He was going off to school the next day and he felt she was missing him

She was not the sentimental type and the tears caught him off guard

She told him about her desire to get an education

He decided he would do everything to get it for her

He got her a lesson teacher, bought the exam forms, and ensured she passed both her WAEC and JAMB

She got admitted into the university and he footed the bill by inflating his own fees to his parents who were too busy to check things out

When she got to her final year, she decided to break up with him

She had met a person who didn't know her as a poor girl from a poor background

Another guy whose eyes twinkled whenever he saw her

She started seeing the guy deliberately when her boyfriend went off to NYSC

She didn't delude herself that she would marry him even though they often talked about it and joked about it while their relationship lasted

By the time he returned home from his service station, she had moved in with the new guy

His world came crashing down

How could she do that? Move on so coldly and without any thought for his feelings

He requested a meeting and she granted him an audience

He wanted to know what was going and she didn't mince words

She said she had never seen herself as his wife, never seen herself coping with the social demands of marrying upward on the social ladder

She didn't like the history between them in which she and her family took and took without having much to give back

There was no balance and as such she felt she would feel too indebted to him to cope with the relationship

She wanted to start afresh with someone else

She wanted a clean slate

She had met the guy and they fitted perfectly together

She didn't want to delay the inevitable, so she moved on

She ended it by saying she was sorry, then she walked calmly out of the restaurant

She didn't even look back

Six years of investment had gone down the drain just like that

The days after she broke up with him were terrible

For weeks he was lost in an abyss of sorrow

He cried all day and sorrowed all night

His friends and family members did the best they could

Everyone expected him to snap out of it, he did but with a very bitter heart against women

She was his first love and he had poured everything he had into her In their six years together, he had been responsible for her education, accommodation, clothing, feeding, everything

He had their picture as a couple hanging on the walls of his room in every house and city he had lived

He told his friends and family members all about her

He was in love with her and she was nothing but a leech

He felt used and a deep sense of bitterness welled up in him

At first, he kept away from women generally

After a while, he began to sleep with any skirt available

He stopped feeling anything, for anyone

Days became weeks and weeks became months

His mother noticed the disdain with which he treated ladies- the condescending manner and bitterness

His mother decided he needed to be helped

One day his mother visited him and begged to have a discussion with him

His mother told him he had to let go of the pain

He said, "Mummy, I keep seeing someone else sleeping with her in my mind and it hurts my heart. I kept myself for her. I was faithful and good to her and see how she rewarded me. I am hurt. When I am having sex with any other lady, I don’t see the lady, I see her, I see only her in my mind and I hurt, I bleed out and end up lashing out at the lady or hating her" He lamented

This was five years after she had left him

In those five years, she had gone for NYSC, broke up with the guy she left him for, and started dating someone else

She got married just a few days before his mother decided to have a discussion with him

He didn't even know all that, his mother told him

She had done her due diligence and she had social media pictures and updates with her to help him see

He assumed she was still with the person she dumped him for

His mother admonished him to move on

“Love can be cruel sometimes

Most people didn't really get what they deserved in love

It is like riding a wounded tiger, you can be lucky and end up in its stomach or lucky enough that it ends up in your tummy

Love either sees the end of its riders or its riders will see their end

It is the only way love between human folk works

The same holds true for some animals

Love for people is an intricate part of the fight for survival and natural selection principles

At the end of the day, the instinct for survival trumps all

Man does what he does mostly for the preservation of himself and his race; innately Love, relationships, marriage, etc. are just part of that process

It has nothing to do with God or heaven

This is why the Bible stated clearly that there is no marriage in heaven

Heaven does not need copulation to populate

On the earth, copulation is primarily for populating

It has very little to do with feelings and emotional investment but much to do with what works for me

The lady that dumped you knew that, you didn't

She might seem cold and heartless to you but imagine she married you to make you happy while she felt nothing for you but gratitude or pity, you would have been even more miserable”

So, please forgive her and let go
It might hurt but she did you a huge favour!"

He thought about it and agreed with his mother

Slowly, he began the process of healing

He kept away from relationships for a while, worked on himself and began working on his relationship with God again

He had lost his bearing in his pain but God is never truly lost to any man

PS: He healed and met the love of his life two years later

They met at a gala event he had no business attending

His company was in the middle of a merger and acquisition deal and he had to go see one of the chief characters in the deal at a social event

He found this babe, his babe talking to this chief character at the cocktail party He was introduced to her and he understood the way bread must have felt the moment it was introduced to butter…Awesome!

We must learn to let go after our heart has been hurt or broken

Some of us deal with the hurt by trying to hurt the person that we felt had hurt us by talking trash about them

Some of us even try to self-harm

Some of us will curse and cry and try to cause harm or damage to the person

It is always much ado about nothing

The story of Humpty-Dumpty is the story of love and its attending breakups which are almost always inevitable

An analogy of how to cope with love from the stage of "hump to dump"

The moment love falls off its lofty height and breaks into pieces, all the individuals in it can do is pick up the pieces and walk away

Some try to patch things up as much as they can but it truly is never the same again