Marriage and the courage to say no to desperate in-laws demands

Getting married to a hardworking, and successful young man is the dream of every young lady. In the same way, every hardworking and successful young man also dreams of getting married to a young, vibrant, beautiful, and well-mannered young lady. When these two things are combined together in marriage, it is expected that such marriage will be the epitome of success and honor.

Unfortunately, most of the marriages that are supposed to be a good reflection of both young man and young lady fail, because most of them do not possess the skills and the courage to say "NO". to desperate in-laws and their demands. What am trying to talk about in this article is the exploitative nature of some tribes and families when giving their daughters away in marriage.

In most cases, the in-laws have a field day in the marriage of their daughter to the man she want to marry, and they allow their exploitative nature to drive the process of marriage, while the lady who is getting married is left to deal with the challenges that come with those greedy acts afterwards in the marriage. There are times when the in-laws will make the marriage a living hell for the new son-in-law with their uncontrollable and oppressive demands.

One of the characteristics of some tribes and families in some places, is that they take the marriage of their daughters as a business venture. As a result of this, the boy and his families get to spend all the time trying to satisfy the requests of the in-laws, while the woman's life becomes a living hell after she is married to the man she wants to marry. Even though the boy love the girl he married, but deep down in him, it is as if the girl's family have sold their daughters or wouldn't have anything to do with the boy after the marriage is done.

There are several cases of men who denied helping their wives relatives or support their wives families because of how they were treated by their in-laws when they married their wives. I have heard about a story of a man who told the wife openly that the money he would've used to help her family was taken from him when he paid her bride price. Such cases are many in society because of desperate in-laws and their demands. After a family have exploited a son-in-law by demanding more than enough for a bride price you can guess how the man would feel. The man would feel he is being raped by his in-laws, and he will do everything to avoid them and be away from them as much as possible.

Recently there was a case of a man who went to pay the dairy for the woman he want to marry. The guy was ordered by his in-laws to pay 1.5 million Naira, about $3,000 for the bridal materials, and another $3,000 as dowry to his wife. He resisted the demand but eventually agreed to pay. Moreover, he was also asked to pay $500 for keeping the woman family waiting which he also paid after preading for forgiveness for keeping them waiting. Then came the painful demand the man couldn't take. The man was also ordered to pay $5000 for all that the family has spent in training and feeding their daughter until that day of marriage.

As if that was not enough, the man was asked to pay another $500 for making the lady pregnant before paying her bride price. At this point the man excused himself as though he wanted to urinate outside the compound and from there took to his heels and left the woman behind with her relatives. This story was circulated on social media like wild fire and news went round the world about this unfortunate incident.

That case wasn't an isolated one and it's all over the internet because of desperation in-laws and their exploitation of the situation of marriage of their daughters. It would be completely wrong to describe such situation as uncommon and weird. Such behaviors and demands from in-laws put their daughter's life at risk. Because if the woman in anyway have a reason to live that marriage, then her life would be endangered.

Tradition or culture where these kind of things are being practice do not help civilization but instead they stunt it and weaken the progress of the society. I will advise men to be bold and courageous enough to say no to desperate in-laws demand that goes beyond modesty. No man would want to get married and start servicing debts. And before a man says I do to a woman, he should make sure that he knows the woman's family tradition so well and what they want from him.

I think a man who wants to get married should take time to do some research on the background of his in-laws and they should make sure they can relate well with the bride's family before taking a wife. This should be because some families have a tendency to exploit men into giving them life support all in the name of marrying their daughter.