Till death do us part

"Are certain women shackled in marriage by the vows they made?"

A few weeks ago, I met up with a friend I attended university with. We met at a nice swanky wine bar in the town centre. We had not seen each other for a few years since I moved out of London. We had however kept in touch. So when she informed me she was visiting my home town on a business trip, I knew I had to clear my calendar and meet up with her. We are both at a similar stage in life. She is also married and has a young daughter. Our chats often involve how our toddlers drive us insane, and the pressures of managing a career and a household.

When the day to meet up came, I arrived well ahead of time at the wine bar I had booked a table. It is a popular wine bar in town, so a reservation is always needed if one does not want to be disappointed. While waiting for her, I thought it best to order our drinks in advance so we could dive straight into our chit chat the moment she arrived, as this was one of those rare face to face meet ups we would have for a while. We do of course have our mid week chit chats, but they are usually short due to time constraints and busy schedules. So this time round, our natter would be free of child interruptions, work calls and other everyday demands.

My friend arrived as our drinks were brought to the table. Talk about great timing. We immediately embraced in what seemed like a never ending hug. And now in light of our conversation, we both needed that hug. The hug told a story of it’s own, and let me tell you why. My friend and I have the kind of relationship which requires no words. I always know how she is feeling just by her demeanour. Or maybe it could just be that I am very intuitive. But I am sure it is also due to our a special bond that enables us to be vulnerable without uttering a word.

I first met her in my law class while studying for my undergraduate business degree. We sat next to each other in one of our lectures. On the day we met, the lecturer gave the class a task which required working in pairs. So I naturally turned to the person next to me, which happened to be her. As we tackled the assignment, we both found that we had similar views on the subject matter, and were surprised at the rapport we had. It was as if we had known each other for a long time. And from that moment on, we became inseparable. We spent most of our days together. And if we were not able to see each other, we spoke on the phone at least once a day. She became a confidant, someone I could let my guard down with. She was truly God sent in a season I truly needed someone to be a shoulder to lean on.

We were both brought up in strict religious households, that were conservative in nature. The topics of dating or sex were rarely brought up while growing up. We practically learnt much about them from our peers and the internet. So when we got to university, we both found ourselves in what we like to call our “hoe phase”. We finally had the freedom to date and have sexual relations without our parents prying. We didn’t particularly sleep around, but we definitely enjoyed a few romantic and sexual dalliances. We made a pact to never divulge our sexual escapades to anyone in our family, not even a sibling. We didn’t want word travelling to our parents that we were fraternising with men. That would be discussed later when we were deemed old enough to have boyfriends. So yeah, that was us in a nutshell.

We finally let go of each other from our embrace and sat down. As we delicately sipped our expensive Bordeaux wine, I sensed that we each were waiting on the other to break the ice. And funny enough, we both sighed at the same time. I told her to go first. She looked down at the table, took a deep breathe, raised her head and said; “I want to leave my husband, but I feel trapped”. Wow, all I can is that her statement hit me like a ton of bricks. I had not seen it coming. Although she had confided in me about a difficult phase in her marriage, I did not think she had/was contemplating to leave her husband. I thought it was more like a difficult phase they had to navigate just like most couples do. So I asked her to elaborate.

She started by saying she still loved her husband, but that emotionally she had checked out of their marriage due to reasons that kept bobbing their heads. I recalled some of the reasons, but there were some that caught me by surprise. After she told me all she needed me to know, I asked her why she felt she was trapped in the marriage. He response was because she made vows that said till death do us part, not only in front of her friends and family, but God too. Her religious upbringing had come back to bite her in her behind. Just like me, she was brought to respect the sanctity of her vows. Her nana and mama had drilled it into her not to break them because God was watching. And furthermore, He hates divorce.

Her vows, together with the strong traditional values and customs she was brought up with, made her hesitant to call time on her marriage. She did not want to shame her family. She thought this would reflect more on her parents than herself because they were the ones who brought her up with strong religious values. She could not face the prospect of letting their hard work of teaching her the ways of God and her tradition down. The vows made in front of God, friends and family were to be abided by till death. Unfortunately, she was not the only one in this position.

I come from not only a religious background, but from a country that is deeply rooted in Christianity. I am originally from Malawi. Marriage in my country is an institution that is highly regarded by many. Once a young woman reaches a certain age, there is an expectation to settle down, or you start to attract suspicious looks and whispers. And once you are married, there is another added expectation for you to keep your marriage intact. It is as if the onus is on the wife to make sure her husband is forever happy or satisfied. There is actually a song that is sang at most bridal showers, which eludes to the wife doing everything she can to persevere in her marriage. Lo and behold, this song is only directed to the woman, not the man.

I too have at one point felt the pressure to keep my marriage going when I had felt like throwing in the towel. It was not only the love I had for my husband that kept me in the marriage, but also the vows I made, mostly in the eyes of God because I got married in a church. I am forever reminded of the passage in the Bible that says God hates divorce. And breaking those vows by filing for a divorce would mean I would be breaking the promises I made in front of God. To put it simply, I think the fear of the wrath of God on my soul for breaking those vows was much stronger than I imagined. And this was exactly how my friend felt.

And as we got deeper into our conversation, we both realised that the western world, and it’s ways had started to take a hold on us when it came to our outlook on divorce. So I encouraged my friend to do what was in her best interest after careful consideration. I reminded her that God was a loving entity who wouldn’t damn her to hell for simply choosing better for herself. Plus, she now had the financial freedom that her mother and nana did not previously have. She needed not to put up with the bare minimum, which according to her, had exhausted her soul.

It saddens my heart to know that there are countless of women around the world who are afraid to leave their marriages because of the vows they made, which are sometimes steeped knee deep in cultural values, beliefs and customs. And by the way, some of these marriages might be/are riddled with abuse or neglect, or both. From my research, this seems to be prevalent in countries, or among groups of people that have strong religious and cultural beliefs and customs i.e. Philippines and Vatican city, which are the two countries were divorce is not allowed, and Arab and certain African countries. Compare that to secular western countries such as the US where 70% of divorces, and 69% in the UK are initiated by women.

But on the flip side, the tide is slowly turning in countries that have strong religious and cultural beliefs and values such as; African and Arab countries. Although urbanisation, modernisation and the western way of life is seeping into these regions and transforming their marital landscape, the rate at which divorce is occurring is still not at the level in the western world. But I bet you my ten dollars that as more women become financially independent, and have more rights in these regions, the cultural and religious shackles that seem to take a hold will start to weaken.