Adaeze isn't one woman. Her story is a composite of the experiences so many Nigerian women carry quietly. Maybe some of it is yours.
It was 2am, and I was making my fourth pros-and-cons list.
Tunde had sent "goodnight, my love" three hours earlier. Everything was fine. He's kind. He goes to church without being dragged. He calls his mother every Sunday. Everybody said I was lucky.
So why was my chest tight every single night?
I grew up in Surulere watching my mother serve my father's food, clear the plates, and sit on the edge of the bed with the light off. The Fridays he came home at 1am. The phone call I overheard when I was twelve: "Where will I go with four children? I will endure."
I promised myself I would never become her.
And now a good man was talking about introduction, and all I could think was: what if this is how it started for Mummy? What if I'm ignoring the small things too? Or worse, what if I push away the best thing that ever happened to me because of a fear that was never about him?
By morning I'd feel silly. By Sunday, an aunty would squeeze my arm and ask, "Ehen, when are we eating rice?" And by night, the doubt was back, louder.
I was tired of praying for a sign I couldn't recognise. Tired of asking friends who were all sure, in opposite directions. Tired of not sleeping.
Then I found something that changed everything.