[b][I]Five years was lost. Five years 41-year-old Efosa Ehiosu would never get back in his life.[/I]
The discussion about that dark phase of Ehiosu’s life that nearly drove him over the rocks, took place over an internet video chat but there was no doubt that part of his life still hurts him.
Ehiosu, a businessman based in Dublin, Ireland, explained in the chat with our correspondent, how he met his now ex-wife during a visit to Nigeria early in 2008.
He said, “It was not long after I settled in Dublin. I just decided that it would be good if I could settle down and allow my wife to handle my business in Nigeria till she would come and join me here. I came down to Nigeria and I met my wife and we got married almost immediately.
“We had tried to have a child for about two years. Between that 2008, when we did a hurried traditional marriage, and 2010, I was constantly in Nigeria almost every two months to ensure she conceive and also because of my business.
“We tried as much as we could. For more than a year, there was nothing. But she later conceived in late 2010. I am an educated person so I knew some things about conception.
“When she told me, I tried to double-check by calculating the time of our last sexual contact and the number of weeks she said she was pregnant. It correlated and I praised God that I would soon become a father.”
But did he already have a suspicion for him to double-check? Ehiosu said no. According to him, he only did the cross-checking out of excitement and just because he wanted to be sure.
In 2011, Ehiosu’s wife put to bed.
Soon, he travelled back to Nigeria for the pomp and ceremony that came with the christening of his son, spending many weeks afterwards just to be with the newborn baby.
He said even after that, his visits to Nigeria became more frequent.
“My wife is Yoruba while I am Edo. There was no indication that she was getting any ‘action’ behind the scene. She did not come across as a sex-starved young woman, who could not hold herself for a few weeks before my next visit to Nigeria. I took great care of her and the baby and lavished them with gifts,” he said.
His family developed in love. He felt great because he had become a father. Or so he thought.
Fast-forward to 2015, things started heading downhill.
With his baritone voice, which he said was one of the features that his ex-wife fell in love with, Ehiosu said, “I noticed that as the child grew up, I was increasingly becoming a stranger. I called him ‘mummy’s boy’ because anytime I carried him, he was always crying. That was initially. But later, I started becoming concerned because almost every time I held him, he would scream and kick.[/b]