I’d been celibate for most of my life. My close friends who knew about this thought it was for religious reasons, it wasn’t.
The reason was an indirect consequence of my grandmother’s advice to me on men.
Growing up, my grandmother — God bless her soul made it her responsibility to school me on the affairs of men.
She started doing so from when I was as young as 7 years old.
Even though her intentions were noble, the impact of her advice didn’t bring me the benefits she had intended. As it kind of ruined my dating life.
‘Things You Must Know About Men’ According to My Grandma
Men are Out to Destroy Women
Grandma told me, ‘men know that a woman would go through hell and break all the rules, just to impress the man she loves’.
According to her, that’s how they destroy women.
She even referenced the story of Adam and Eve in the bible to prove her point.
According to her, even the bible recorded how ‘Adam caused the downfall of Eve. But most people would argue it was the other way round’.
Eve did not cause Adam to sin against God. Rather, Eve wanted to please Adam so much that she tried to impress him with the Apple. And Adam let her even though it meant disobeying God. — Granny
All Men are Liars
Growing up, Grandma would always say, “My child, If a man tells you ‘good morning’, double-check the time, it might just be evening”.
According to her, “a man would tell you he loves you but he’s also telling 20 other girls the same thing”.
Apparently, this was the mistake she had done with my grandpa.
She said she had believed every word he said to her and it turned out, they were all lies.
Men Would Only Use and Dump You
I can’t count how many times I’ve heard this statement; ‘Never Trust a Man With Your Body, He’d Only Use and Dump You’. As she constantly sang it to me.
She told me that ‘all men want is ‘the thing between my legs’ and nothing else. According to her, “the moment they get that, they’d disappear”.
All Men Cheat
By the time I was 16, my granny started telling me about ‘how men are never satisfied with just one woman’.
She said, “No matter how much a man loves you, he’d eventually get bored and leave you for someone else”.
Also, she told me an interesting story about her and my grandpa.
I was told, my grandpa was a handsome man in his days. Girls were constantly drooling over him. But granny said he used to have eyes for only her. Then an incident happened that changed everything.
According to her, it all started when he accompanied her to buy food items at the market.
They entered the shop of a young lady who sold seafood. Grandma said that she could tell from the way the seller stared at grandpa, the lady was smitten.
Though granny didn’t mind the attention grandpa usually got from other women, that particular one got to her.
She said grandpa seemed to be into the seller as well, as he kept looking at her ‘lustfully’
So granny immediately reacted and yelled at the seller to stop drooling over her man. Then, she pulled grandpa out of the store.
On their way out, granny said, she and grandpa got into a heated argument about the whole thing.
She accused grandpa of being attracted to the seller but he denied it.
“Your Grandpa looked me in the eyes and assured me it was all in my imagination”.
She said to me with so much pain in her voice.
True to her suspicion, a few weeks later, she began to hear rumors about grandpa and the seafood seller.
Apparently, he’d been frequenting the market and had been spending time with the seller.
When granny confronted him about it, he denied the rumors and assured her he was faithful to her.
Then one afternoon, grandpa came home with that same seller. Introducing her as his new wife.
Granny admitted that was the greatest shock of her life.
Sadly, it didn’t end there. Granny said she was later chased out of her matrimonial home by grandpa and his new wife
That was the moment she concluded that Men are the Devil.
How My Grandma’s Advice Affected Me
Judging from her story, it was clear that granny’s cynicism of men was a result of her experience with my grandpa.
That was the reason why she constantly warned me against trusting men. She feared if she didn’t, what happened to her could happen to me as well.
Even when I was asleep at night, she’d wake me up in the middle of the night. just to repeat the same warnings to me.
In as much as her words of advice helped me live a pretty decent life, it also messed me up a bit. As I grew up being cynical of men just like she was.
Whenever a guy told me he liked me, I immediately assumed he was telling the same thing to 20 other girls.
Also, because granny said men are only interested in sex, I became extremely guarded. To the point where even when I liked a guy, I wouldn’t let him know.
I was too scared that he would try to ruin my life the moment he knew, so I kept my feelings to myself.
It took me 28 years to finally let myself love and be loved in return but somehow, my guards were still up. I just couldn’t let myself trust a guy no matter how much I loved him.
I can’t even count how many times I’ve ended my relationship over the slightest reasons. Reasons that had very little to do with him and everything to do with my insecurities.
At some point, I even started snooping through his phone in search of anything that could suggest he was up to no good.
I guess I was just looking for an escape.
Whenever I wasn’t getting much attention from him, I’d immediately start thinking ‘oh he must be getting tired of me, maybe he’s thinking of leaving’.
So I’d often threaten to end the relationship just to see if he was going to fight for me. That was the only way I believed he wasn’t fed up with me.
Part of the reason I did this was that I could no longer take the fear of having to constantly question myself If I did the right thing by letting my guards down and whether or not my partner was going to leave me like grandpa left my granny. Sincerely, this was getting exhausting.
I would love to say that I have successfully overcome those insecurities but that would be a lie. Instead, I’d say that I’m learning to manage them.
I’m Still Managing The Effects of My Grandmother’s Advice
After a good self-reflection, I got to understand that I did not only fear being left by my partner, I also feared having to start over again with someone new or worse, never having anyone else for that matter.
If only I knew earlier that I was actually worth everything that I ever wanted. It took me reading the book “You are A Prize To Be Won” By Wendy Griffith to finally see myself for what I really am. A Prize!
Now instead of worrying about my relationship and dreading the possibilities of being left by my partner, I decided to improve on myself esteem.
I decided to read more books and get more materials on personal development. I didn’t stop there, I began to take practical steps towards achieving my life’s goal.
Every now and then I still get those silly little thoughts that suggest, that my partner is going to fall out of love with me and leave, but now I remind myself that I am not defined by who loves and appreciates me, I am defined by how much I love and appreciate myself.
You see that mindset right there was what my granny missed. She failed to realize that she didn’t have to spend all her life being bitter over a thing one man did to her.
If only she knew her worth and decided to move on with an open heart, she just might of lived a more optimistic and happy life.
A woman is not something you could just pick up and trash whenever you feel like it. A woman is a pride, she is the prize.
Even the bible says:
‘He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the LORD”. — Proverbs 18:22
Meaning until a man finds you and keeps you as his partner, he lacks a good thing, and not only that, he lacks favor too. Isn’t that amazing?
Take Away
One way to get over your insecurities is to know your worth as a woman, without anyone else — just you. Get to know how important you are.
You’re not just another face in the world, you are unique and you have great potential.
You just haven’t discovered how amazing you truly are. That’s probably the reason why you keep having those self-doubts.
The reason for your insecurities isn’t half as important as what you chose to do with it.
The moment you start to concentrate more on yourself by reading self-improvement books and making conscious and practical decisions every day to better your life and expand your potentials, you’d find that you’d gradually develop your self-worth.
Know this, you don’t need to make anyone to appreciate you or stay with you. The right person would eventually find you and love you the way you ought to be loved but for the main time, learn to love and appreciate yourself. Give yourself a break from worrying about things you can’t control.
You deserve to be happy and you deserve to be secure.
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Previously published on medium
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Photo credit: by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash