Last-Minute Cancellation Of Wedding -– A Corporate Lady's Nasty Experience

Objective

This article aims at publishing the painful and often irreversible experiences some young ladies go through in their lives while desperately looking for husbands. Some of the ladies are educated carrier women who have spent substantial part of their lives upgrading themselves through education. Some of them are holders of master’s degree in various fields and are now looking for husbands.

In their desperation they often fall into the hands of equally educated males who are out there to sample ladies and have no serious plans to get married.

The article also aims at cautioning young Christian ladies looking for husbands to be careful about dating men and look for some basic qualities before getting trapped and become a mere statistics for men.

The article is Christian biased but could apply to all categories of ladies especially young career women or corporate ladies.

The Story

A young beautiful, well-dressed lady was introduced to me by a friend to help her overcome what I will describe as a psychological trauma after l had listened to her story.

It was about 8 o’clock in the morning. Immediately she4 entered my office, I gave her a seat and she started crying uncontrollably. I allowed her to cry and gave her some tissue paper to wipe her tears. I then asked her to tell me what brought her to my office and why she was crying.

According to her story, her boyfriend she had courted with for two years has canceled a wedding plan that was to take place in two months.

Giving details, she said she suspected the boyfriend of chasing other girls. She searched through telephone conversations on the boyfriend’s phone and tracked down the house of one of the girls whom she confronted. The boyfriend became furious about the confrontation, beat her, and told her that the wedding could not come on as planned. He went further to sack her from his house and warned her never to come there again.

I took her through a question and answer session as follows:

Question: How old are you and how old is the young man?

Answer: I am 29, he is 31.

Question: What are your professions?

Answer: I am a corporate lady; he is a civil engineer with a major construction firm.

Question: Have you been married before? Do you have a child?

Answer: I have never been married before and don’t have a child.

Question: What about the young man?

Answer: As far as I know, he is not married and has no child.

Question: Where do you stay?

Answer: I have moved in to stay with my boyfriend because he is currently on transfer to another city and there is nobody around to take care of the flat in his absence.

Question: What about your previous relationships?

Answer: I have had two previous relationships within three years. All ended abruptly.

Question: Are you a Christian?

Answer: Yes, I am a member of ……… Church.

Question: Are you a virgin? She started crying again

Answer: No.

Question: Which of the three guys have you had sexual intercourse with?

Answer: All the three.

Question: But you say you are a Christian, why did you get sexually involved with everyone you dated?

Answer: No answer but crying resumed.

Question: Is your pastor aware of your relationship with the young man and your wedding plans.

Answer: He is aware.

Question: Have you reported the threat to cancel the wedding to him?

Answer: When my pastor called my boyfriend he sent him an unpleasant reply.

Question: What about your parents?

Answer: He has refused to answer their request to meet them.

Question: Has he performed any traditional marriage rites such as knocking?

Answer: No.

Question Has he ever beaten you before?

Answer: Yes.

Question: How many times?

Answer: About six times.

Question: On a scale from 0 to 10, how much do you love the young man?

Answer: Six.

Question: How do you account for the missing four on the scale?

Answer: No answer.

Question: Do you still want to marry a man who does not respect your pastor, your parents, a girlfriend beater, as well as a womanizer?

Answer: No answer, but her face changes from sadness to a bit of cheerfulness.

The lady left my office laughing after I chipped in a joke. Even though she did not come back to my office for a follow-up meeting, I will be surprised if the planned and canceled marriage ever came on and I have not heard from her again. In fact I might not be able to recognize her whenever we meet.

What was the purpose of the counseling sessions?

• To identify problems that the young lady was going through.
• Help the distressed lady come out of her predicament.

Identified problems

• There was impatience on the part of the lady to get married. She dated three men in four years. She moved in to stay with the man before the proposed traditional marriage and wedding.
• The lady gave in to sex easily even though she professes to be a Christian and got messed up by the young men.

Agreed possible solution to the problem

• The lady, a Christian, needed professional Christian counseling. Unfortunately, she never came back to me again.
• She has to confess the situation to her pastor for proper pastoral care. The situation does not call for church discipline.
• The lady's parents must be involved before the lady out of frustration becomes prey to marauding male sexual predators, especially the rich and powerful men in society. Her work as a corporate lady and her beauty might work against her future.

5. Progress made

• The only progress made was that she came to my office crying but left laughing.
• Follow-up visits could have helped her more.

Challenges experienced by client

• Having to date three unsuccessful times for a beautiful, Christian, graduate corporate lady can be a nightmare.

Challenge experience by me as a counselor

• I was touched as a parent because it can happen to my daughter who has been brought up as a Christian. Successful child upbringing at the end of the day is by grace despite all our efforts.

Way forward

I wished the lady had returned for further counseling.

Lessons to be learned

• A Christian lady being rejected by a man after getting sexually involved is like being raped.
• Fornication will take the shine out of a young Christian and often be followed by regrets.
• Young ladies should avoid moving in to stay with their boyfriends before they get married.
• Christian ladies can apply the following criteria to know if they are in the right relationship.
  1. Is he a Christian?
  2. Is he gainfully employed to take up the responsibility of caring for a future wife and children?
  3. Is he demanding to have sex with you before marriage?
  4. Is he independent of his family members especially mother and sisters?
  5. Is he showing signs of violent behavior?

If the answer to any of the above question is yes, you are advised to advise yourself. Always remember that the worse that can happen to anybody is to get involved in a bad marriage.

By Joseph Sankah

The writer holds MCILT, Dip. Stats, Dip Psychosocial Counselling