3 Lovebirds Recount Miles They Had to Go for Their Partners 

They say that the butterflies you get when you fall in love are just sense leaving your body. They also say that you can never advise someone who is in love. 

On this episode of Real Life Yarns, these lovebirds confirm that, indeed, with love comes an impulse to go the extra mile for your partner even though that extra mile could wear off your shoes and bleed your feet. 

What do you think of their experiences? Do you think they were wrong to do what they did?

Read their stories below:

Ebuka

When I was in my 5th year at the university, my babe had just graduated but had failed a course. She kept crying to me that she was afraid that she would never pass the course. I felt so bad for her, and love was also “shacking” me. So I decided to study the course and write the exams for her. She had a unisex name, so it was easy for me to impersonate her.

Another good thing was that there would be no classmates to identify her since they had graduated. On the day of the exam, I confidently walked to the lecture hall, believing that I’d go in undetected. But my village people had organised a town hall meeting for me that day. 

The first bad sign was that, for some reason, the exam invigilator decided to call the students’ names to figure out who came with their departmental fee receipts. When it was my turn, I told him that I was a carry-over student, but he insisted I go to the department’s secretariat and pay the fee. I rushed over to the secretariat, paid the fee, got the receipt, and ran back. I showed him the receipt, and he let me in. Just before the exam was about to start, the course instructor came in and asked all the carryover students to stand. Sweats started running down my back as he began asking us our names. 

When I told him mine, he said he remembered that the Chinonso I mentioned was female. Ah! I started shaking. We locked eyes for a second, and then he asked me to move out of the hall. The next thing, he announced to the hall that I was an impersonator. Come and see the pandemonium! My babe never mentioned that she knew the lecturer personally. To cut the long story short, I had to call my dad to come to my rescue. He used his position as a professor to pull some strings to get me out of the situation. If not for him, I would have done some “cooling” in the cell for a few days. 

Kemi

I was once in a relationship with an Igbo guy who promised me marriage. I was so in love with him and was ready to do anything for him. He noticed this and took advantage of it. He’d tell me that his family loved girls who knew how to cook his native soup, and I’d start learning how to cook Egusi, Oha, Onugbu, and the rest. He even told me his family would love me more if I could speak his dialect. I started learning how to speak the Nsukka dialect. Do you know how hard that was?! 

We dated for almost 2 years without him popping the question. I kept bugging him until he decided to finally introduce me to his family. When I got there, after their so-called reception, these people told me that, in their culture, they usually give their wives-to-be some tests to know if they are worthy of their sons. They asked if I was ready to take the tests, and I stupidly accepted. They presented me with ingredients to cook one of their local dishes, gave me cleaning equipment to clean their house and wash his parents’ clothes. My God, I was so naive! 

After I finished, visibly exhausted, they told me I didn’t pass the test. I burst into tears, not because I didn’t pass, but because it had just dawned on me that I had been stupid all along. How could I fall for something like that in the 21st century? My man just stood there. He didn’t stop them, and I knew he was also in on it. I just took my bags and started heading back to Owerri. I cried all the way back. The other passengers on the bus must have thought that I lost a loved one.

Austin

My own was that I refused to cut my coat according to my cloth and went to date a slay queen. I was a salary earner who was footing bills that covered bone-straight hair, expensive bags, clothes, shoes, and jewellery, among other things. She was gorgeous, and whenever I went out with her, I always got great compliments that fanned my already big ego, so I wasn’t complaining about the expenses involved with keeping her. Eventually, I went crazy and decided to propose to her. I don’t know where that idea came from, but I was hell-bent on getting her the perfect -and, by perfect, I mean most expensive- engagement ring. 

I saved up for almost a year to get the ring and finally got enough to buy the one I wanted. The day I got the ring, my excitement was over the roof. I wanted to propose to her the next day and started planning for the perfect, most romantic proposal. I was on a call with the photographer, and I wanted to catch the moment when this girl called me. I had to hang up to attend to her. I never expected what she was calling to say. She said she had been managing with me in the previous months because I cut back on the expenses I made on her. Expenses I cut back to get her an expensive ring! 

She said she was breaking up with me because she realised I couldn’t maintain her. I was speechless for seconds. I got instant migraines, and my mouth was dry. I just hung up and sat down on the floor. I was like that for hours, staring into space, before I decided to call her back and unleashed all my anger and frustration on her. I’ve never been the same since then.