My Love Story: A Soothing Balm For A Wounded Soul

Never one to be one of the weak ones, I chose to wield the weapon rather than fall for it. After all I am my father’s daughter. And the apple does not fall far from the tree. So I did not fall in anybody’s love, rather I played it like a game of chess. I ran around, leaving scars and collecting broken hearts. Who did I think I was?

My mother loved my father, she adored him. I saw it as a child and an adult. She is the epitome of Genesis 3:16 “Thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.” She did love him, she worshipped him. And my father, he basked in the power and rule over her he did. Love should be a healing balm, a soothing balm that remedies and restores. But for my poor Mama, the love she craved was a demon, it tormented her.

I very well remember my father taking me along on his devious activities. He would tell my mother he was going for a stroll or a drive, and to make it appear innocent, he’d take me along. Our walks and drives always ended in the home of one of three women. Even as a child, I saw how my father related differently with his concubines. He was jovial, open and approachable.

He wasn’t cheeky and short with them as he was with my mother. I noticed he didn’t demand they serve his every whim and caprice as he did my mother. One of the women must have had a good corporate job because, whenever we visited her on the weekend, my father ironed her clothes, while my mother ironed his at home. I loved tagging along because I got to watch hours of television in these women’s living rooms whiles my father disappeared with them. And then he’d bribe me with ice cream and sweets. “Don’t tell your mother else I won’t bring you again,” he’d tell me.

I formed my ideas about love at that tender age from those interactions with my father and his women. I wanted to be one of those women, not like my mother. My subconscious mind soaked this up and shaped me in many, many ways.Without consciously making the decision to, I became a stone cold little girl, who grew up an ice queen.

Never one to show emotion or any kind of vulnerability, I came off aloof and uncaring. Even on the playground while I was still little, I’d belittle my peers when they cried or ran to their parents. My mother noticed my behavior and would always say, “Don’t be like you father, you’re female, it will hurt you in future.”

But I always scoffed at her. She was the one allowing herself to be hurt by her feelings and emotions not me.

Imagine my surprise and utmost pleasure when in my young adulthood I realized I had something men wanted. They chased me, courted me, paid for expensive dinners, invited me to exotic trips and bought me gifts. They did things my father never did for my mother, just to get me to be with them. It appears the meaner and more unavailable I was to them, the harder they tried. I always wondered if my mother ever knew or understood she had any power over my father at all.

I dated fast and often. Never called myself anyone’s girlfriend. I left a string of shocked young and older men on my trail. One guy once asked me what my favorite poem was, I said, “Do not give too much of your love to me, by Kofi Anyidoho,” he laughed, but he shouldn’t have, he found out the hard way. He was a good guy and didn’t deserve the heartbreak, but that was the ice queen a work.

I met Amewusika in the courtroom. We were on opposing sides of a divorce case, and I was ripped her client, the husband into shreds. We eventually agreed on an out of court settlement. During negotiations I pushed the soon-to-be ex-wife to make outrageous demands. Amewusika watched me closely, and eventually asked for a one-on-one with me. I remember that meeting like yesterday, she said, “I know you’re all for women empowerment and you’re looking out for your client, but there are children involved in this divorce, let’s not make it messy. They will still have to be a family after you and I are have collected our lawyer fees and left.”

The case settled amicably and Amewusika and I became good friends. She was a decade older than me, thirty-five to my twenty-five, a divorcee and wise beyond her age. Amewu is the kind and empathetic, the kind of friend you know you can spill your gut to. She roped me into her life, took me under her wing the way a big sister would a little sister. She invited me to the clubs she was part of, professional meet-ups and many social events. And then she would come to my office every evening at six o’clock on the dot and take me to the gym with her.

We began talking about our lives. She told me about her divorce from a domineering husband who tried to diminish her in every way possible. And for the first time in my life, I told someone about my father taking me along to cheat on my mother. I think with time she begun to understand me more than I understood myself. There were never any self-righteousness and judgements between us, just friendship and support. Amewu always told me, “Love is patient, love is kind, love doesn’t hurt, and it surely isn’t a power play. Love is a soothing balm that can heal your hurt. All you need is the right kind of love.”

I didn’t think I was hurt or needed a soothing balm or any healing. I always thought her counsel about my love life was one of her ‘old lady’ reasoning, just like my Mama.

We met Mawuena at the gym. He would always come around and assist us if we needed any help; the first time I went to that gym with Amewu, he greeted us with the warmest smile and asked what my fitness goal was. “I’m just here to shut this my friend up,” I said pointing to Amewu. He laughed and said he’d figure out a way to help me with that.

He pointed out to me which machines did what, “This one will help you build your glutes, this is for your chest, this will strengthen your quads, that one is for the lower abdomen, upper abdomen …”. We were invited to partake in an aerobics class he taught on Tuesdays and Saturdays. I began to notice that Mawuena found every excuse to spend time with us at the gym, and he’d spend a lot of that time speaking Ewe with Amewu. I didn’t understand a word they said past “how are you,” and “I’m fine.’ I decided he liked my friend, and yet I found myself looking forward to his aerobics classes and going to the gym in general. Even on days Amewu couldn’t make it, I went.

I was thrown when Amewu told me one day that Mawuena liked me.

“No he doesn’t, he likes you. He spends all the time chatting with you, he definitely likes you,” was my response.

“He talks to me because you aren’t exactly a very approachable person, and ninety percent of the time he talks to me about you,” she told me.

So basically these two Ewe people had been gossiping about me in my presence and my clueless self had no idea.

“I think he’s a good guy, give him a chance, and don’t make him another conquest, don’t break his heart,” she said.

“That will be for me to decide,” I said

“No it isn’t for you to decide, I’m deciding for you right now that you will not be toying with him,” she pressed.

“Well how about I don’t date him at all?” I asked.

“No. You will date him. And you will behave yourself,” Amewu replied.

“Well see,” I said.

Looking back, it’s interesting how despite my stubborn resolve not to be told what to do, I found myself agreeing to go on a fitness retreat to Sogakope with him when he asked me. I mean how could I not when this Adonis was taking me away from the heat and traffic in Accra to a paradise? It was going to be a long weekend because there was a holiday in there.

I packed my most provocative yet tasteful clothes. I bought pink trainers. Pink. I painted my nails and shaved my legs. The giddy feeling wouldn’t leave me the entire work week leading to the trip. In my mind, this was going to be another fleeting, electric thing, and I was going to enjoy for however long it lasted.

He picked me up Friday evening. I had never seen him out of his gym clothes before, in a pair of blue jeans, a white v-neck t-shirt and loafers, he looked amazing! I had chosen a long yellow satin dress with side cutouts. He looked me up and down and said, “Dufie, you are beautiful.”

I smiled and offered a “Thank you.” And in my head, I added, “And I’m about to make you limp this weekend.” Girl was I wrong.

Traffic was heavy and inched forward really, painfully slow. It took us almost two hours to exit Accra.

The moment he picked me from my apartment, he began to tell me about his life He had been married before, but before he could get a chance to start a family, an aggressive breast cancer had claimed his wife. On her death bed she had asked him to life his life well, the best way he could so he’d have no regrets when death came. It had taken him years to properly grieve her and heal, because he had not been a good husband to her. He had cheated and lied to her, done all the things he’d grown up seeing his father and older brothers do to their wives. After her death he went on a journey to better his spirit and soul. He spent a year in a monastery in Thailand, learning to meditate, forgive himself and appreciate life.

He was an entrepreneur with many businesses and part owned the gym. At that stage in his life, he was ready to live a full life and was looking for someone to share it with.

I listened in part awe and part discomfort. Awe because I had never met any man who was so aware of himself, and discomfort because, I was not ready for the kind of deep interaction and introspection he was bringing. I was looking forward to having some drinks, some light conversation, lots of hanky-panky, rinse and repeat.

“So what about you?” he asked the dreaded question.

I was not ready for that dreaded question, not today, not ever. I was not about to get vulnerable with him. No way.

So I gave him my rehearsed answer, “I’m an only child. I am an Ashanti. Went to St. Louis Secondary and then to law school in London and now I’m a lawyer.”

He laughed, a hearty deep laughter. And said, “No tell me who you are, what drives you, what has shaped you and where you are on life’s journey.”

For the first time in a long time, I wasn’t in control, did not know what to say so I closed my eyes and pretended to be sleeping. He let me be, and held my left hand with his right hand and drove in silence the rest of the journey.

He helped me check in. Helped me settle in my room and left. I waited for the knock on my door or the invite to his room, none happened. The hanky-panky did not happen. The weekend progressed uneventfully, we climbed mount Afadjato, did lots of yoga on the waterfront, mingled with other participants of the retreat and had an over all good time. Mawuena was attentive and sweet, he never came to my hotel room but he was always waiting for me in the lobby when I came out. He took me on walks on the beach and did his usual talking while I listened. And as usual he respectfully saw me safely to my room and left.

On our last night at the resort, while walking on the beach, I said, ” Spend the night in my room tonight.”

His answer was a flat, emphatical, “No.”

“Why? I thought you liked me,” I said. His refusal was another new. No one had ever said no to me like that.

“Beneath all that hard exterior you put up, I see a little girl pleading, “please don’t hurt me, don’t leave me, love me.” I want your heart before I take your body, so tell me what’s in there.” He said pointing to my chest, indicating my heart.

I hung my head. Lost for words, confused and ashamed. This man just refused my advances and yet, he still wanted to know me. He inched closer and held me to him. “Talk to me Dufie, I want to know you,” he said in that impossible voice of his.

On a beach in Sogakope, under a moonlit sky, listening to crashing waves, in the arms of the most beautiful man I ever knew, I let my vulnerability show. I let my heart break. I told of a marriage I had had a front seat to observe, of a woman who tried and a man who took her for granted. And I told of a little girl who had to keep her father’s sordid affairs secret, and watch her mother bend over backwards to save her family.

“I don’t want to be that weak, or needy, I don’t want to be my Mama and let my need of a man become an albatross around my neck. And I don’t want to be controlled like that,” I said amid sobs.

“I won’t control you, I’ll lead you. Love heals, it doesn’t hurt.I want to lead you. Can you accept that?” he asked.

I nodded. Me, the self proclaimed ice queen. I was melting.

He led me into the boiling sea. I held on to him for dear life, my Ashanti self couldn’t swim. The waves crashed around and into us. He let me hold on to him, this soothing balm, my Mawuena the Adonis. I came to think of that moonlit night in the ocean as his demonstration of how he would lead and protect me, of how it was okay to step into the unknown and have faith.

Misskorang, my love story is a healing journey. It is a story of faith and a love that soothes and heals. It has been a long, long journey with many growing pains, and yet my soothing balm, my love, the man who promised to lead and protect me has been there with me every step of the way.

That weekend, I didn’t get the hanky-panky, I got something more.

Story Continues Here.