My Husband Drove My Ex Away While Building a Family With His Own Ex

Before I married Ebo, I had a daughter, a beautiful, innocent, cheerful little girl who was just five when Ebo entered my life. Her father and I weren’t together anymore, but he was still very involved in her life. He called to talk to her. He sent money. He bought gifts. He picked her up for weekends. He was simply being a father. But Ebo didn’t like that. He questioned everything my ex did even the little things involving my daughter;

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“Why is he calling you at night?”
“Why must you meet him to collect things?”
“Why is he still coming around?”

He asked and asked until I felt guilty for allowing my own child’s father to be present. We argued about it so many times that finally, for peace, I said, “Okay. Let me set boundaries.” I spoke to my ex, and luckily, he understood. He agreed to reduce the calls. He sent money through bank transfers. He sent items through dispatch riders. When he wanted to pick our daughter, I would send her to my mother’s house so he would collect her from there, just so Ebo wouldn’t feel threatened.

I changed my entire co-parenting structure for Ebo and that was when he finally said yes to marrying me. Sometimes I look back and wonder if that was the first warning sign.

Our wedding was beautiful or at least, it looked beautiful in photos. I walked into that marriage believing I had chosen a good man. A man who wanted me. A man who wanted my daughter and a man who wanted peace. But it didn’t take long to realize something painful: Ebo wanted control and not partnership. The moment we got married, everything changed. I started seeing things I never saw when we were dating or maybe I saw them, but I didn’t understand them then.

Ebo had two children with another woman, Mavis. Before we married, he acted like he wasn’t close to her. He made me believe his kids were the only connection and that he understood boundaries. He acted like he wanted the same peace he demanded from me. But after marriage, he threw every boundary out of the window. He called Mavis anytime he wanted; morning, afternoon, night. She called him anytime she wanted, even at midnight, even when we were lying in bed and I was beside him.

I would ask, “Why is she calling this late?” He would reply coldly, “She’s the mother of my kids. Are you jealous?” Meanwhile, I had cut ties with my ex just to make him feel secure. He would sleep out because “the kids needed him.” He would spend whole weekends away because “the kids wanted time.” Sometimes he even took the kids and Mavis to the pool, to events, to outings together. A whole family outing with me replaced.

I asked, gently, respectfully, “Ebo, you made rules for me. Why aren’t you following the same rules for yourself?”

His response was a slap to my heart. “You are a woman; I am a man. It is easier for your ex to sleep with you than it is for me to sleep with Mavis.” I stood there wondering if marriage had two sets of commandments, one for the husband and one for the wife. The night everything broke was the night that still haunts me till today.

We were in bed. It was around 8pm. Mavis called. She said one of the kids wasn’t feeling well. It wasn’t an emergency. No fever. No crisis. Just “not feeling well.” Before I could even ask what was wrong, Ebo had jumped up, worn his shirt, and was heading to the door.

“Ebo, is it serious?”
“We’ll see,” he replied.

He left. He didn’t come back that night and didn’t answer my calls and also didn’t reply to my messages. My heart was pounding, my mind spinning. I didn’t sleep. I stayed awake wondering what kind of marriage I had entered. The next morning, he returned claiming they had taken the child to the hospital. I asked for the hospital name. He couldn’t give it. I asked for the medical receipt. He couldn’t provide it. I reminded him that his company reimburses hospital fees so he would have collected it. Still, nothing.

Eventually, with pressure, he confessed that he spent the night in Mavis’ house. He said he slept in the same room as the children. “The child slept on me and wouldn’t allow me to leave,” he said, “I didn’t even remove my clothes all night. I slept in my jeans and T-shirt.”

The lies were too many, too thick, too insulting. In that moment, I felt myself break in places I didn’t know were breakable. Part of me wanted to be angry. Another part wanted to scream but a bigger part of me felt something worse: I felt foolish. Foolish for believing him. Foolish for bending over backwards for a man who refused to bend an inch for me. Foolish for sacrificing my daughter’s connection with her father because he felt threatened only for him to do worse with his ex.

I confronted Mavis, woman to woman, something I shouldn’t have done but I was desperate for change. She looked me in the face and said, “I’m not the one you should talk to. Talk to your husband.” And she was right. The betrayal wasn’t hers. It was Ebo’s. His insecurity and double standards, his need to control me while giving himself full freedom. His dishonesty and disrespect. All of it was sitting on my chest like a heavy stone.

We’ve been married just a little over a year. Everyone says it’s too early to leave. Everyone says marriage requires endurance. My family says I should pray, beg, adjust, shrink, do something, anything, to keep the home. Nobody talks about me or my peace or my child. Marrying him feels like slow emotional suicide. Sometimes when he’s away and I call and hear the voices of the kids in the background, I cry quietly asking God: Is this all there is in this marriage for me? Is this what marriage is supposed to feel like?”

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I want the marriage to work. I want to raise a family that looks at the sun and smile and dream. I want peace and stability. I want my husband to be my husband and not feel like I’m sharing him. But Ebo’s actions are telling me something his words never will: He is not willing to choose me and every day when I stay I’m choosing pain. So I sit here now, asking, not out of anger, but out of exhaustion, is it too early to leave? Will staying only break me deeper than I already am?

Because right now, my heart is torn between saving a marriage and saving myself.

—Cynthia

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