I have been reading this debate online about early marriage versus late marriage and the early marriage people praising themselves and condemning those they think married late.

The first question is, what is early marriage and late marriage? How do we define these things?

One thing I have seen is that many people are not honest with themselves, especially some Nigerian women. They are the same persons who put up lovely pictures of themselves and their spouse, and after some weeks, you see their obituary photos. Yet they were happy with those men ( in quote). This is the reason I struggle to believe what women write about their men. 90 per cent of the time, they are sugar-coated.

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I have a few points to make on this debate:

1. Many women who married early, by early, I mean those who married shortly after graduation or while in school; there was a high chance that most of them ended up marrying the wrong men. I use the word wrong because at the time they took those decisions, they had very little knowledge about what to look out for in a man simply because they had little knowledge about themselves or what they really wanted out of life. In fact, what do they know about themselves, talk less about what to look out for in a man? Most of them were influenced maybe by the fact that those men who came for them had the finances to take care of them, but finances are not the only thing to look out for in a man when it comes to making a marital decision. Permit me to also say that those men who go to “catch them young” are primarily men who are driven by control; these are men who want a wife to submit to their ego, and that is the problem with those ladies who ended up with those kinds of men. Many years ago, I heard a man’s advice to a young man trying to decide who to marry. The man was telling the young man to go for the lady that he could mould into what he wanted. This is witchcraft; you have no right to mould anyone into your image; you are not their parents. You can only mould yourself and your children if you decide to have any, not another adult.

To close out on this point, these early marriage people are the “mama endurance wives”; they are the ones that have the energy to endure all the side chick men and multiple partners men because the men know that they cannot do anything about whatever comes their way. The men who marry them are intentional about their choice because they only want who they can control.

2. In my view, most of those women you think married late are the smarter ones. The married at the time, they had become self-aware, and they were sure of what they wanted. Most importantly, they had their own finances. You see, this thing called money is truly a defence. Your money as a woman is your defence. Never go into marriage without it, or you will be sorry. Many women have to deal with or contend with a lot because they are poor; it is only about what their husband says because they do not have the finances to back up their words or decisions. I will digress a bit on this – Many years ago, my father made a promise to me and later chickened out of it. It was actually to train me for future study after my first degree. We had a misunderstanding, and he told me he wouldn’t do what he had promised. Guess what? My mom stepped in and covered the fees, to his shame then ( I love my dad o he is an excellent fellow, but I love that challenge he got then). That made a statement to me to date. It taught me that every woman needs her OWN money, if not, you are a pawn in the hands of a man. That message has guided me to date even in my current home.

You can’t make decisions as a woman if you do not have money.

Whenever I hear “my husband says this and that”, I know that I am talking to a woman who is limited by her ability to make decisions because she is also limited financially. The challenge with this position is that if that man dies any day, your problems will be multiplied. In my assessment, I also realized that those women you think married late are valued more by the men who are courageous enough to marry them. This is because they bring more value to the marriage relationship, come with ideas and have a lot of experience from life compared to those who married so early at the time they could barely make essential decisions even for themselves.

In conclusion, early marriage or late marriage means nothing. There is no award even for the married. In my opinion, those who are married are dealing with more problems, and marriage has its issues that those who are single do not face. So, let’s stop glorifying marriage as if it is gold. Some persons are happier with the single self and do not have to bother with what all you married folks bother with. I am married, and I am happy in it ( not because marriage in itself gives anyone happiness, but this has to do with what the two persons in it bring), but not all days are happy days; there are some days of stress, children falling sick, parenting difficult kids, etc., are all days of stress and anxiety that married folks deal with, and no one talks about these things.

My final words – If you are married, stay happy; if you are single, stay happy; if you think you married late, stay happy; if you think you married early, stay happy; happiness is your choice and decision, and no one will give it to not even marriage.