Women of my generation and older often say that our mothers hardly ever spoke to us about sex. They said enough to put the fear of God in us, to the point where some believed that just speaking to a man was enough to get you pregnant. They also mentioned marriage a lot, because all the cooking and cleaning and good manners that we were taught, was preparing us to be suitable ‘marriage material’. My father had a penchant for deliberately pissing my mother off. He knew she did not like it when he encouraged me to debate with him, and sometimes we would speak at the top of our voices. She would huff, puff and hiss, then declare that no one would marry me because I was too talkative. My father would grin and respond that any man who felt that way was not worthy of me anyway. In the words of the young people today, my father was an original ‘Odogwu’ (a man with character, depth, charisma and achievements) and it is no surprise that I married an ‘Odogwu’ like him. So, while my mother was keen on upholding her own end of nurturing patriarchal norms and values, my father was busy unraveling her efforts. However, buried somewhere in the many conservative lessons that my mother taught me, I received a timeless education about the importance of self-reliance. Listening to a number of young people today, I think it is time to revisit such lessons.

There was a wealthy neighbour of ours who lived on our street in Lagos, let me call him Daddy London. Like my father, he studied in England and came back home as part of the ‘post-colonial inheritance elite’ in the 1960s.  He had a wife and five children. The more wealth he acquired from his legal practice and businesses, his appetite for adventures outside of the home increased. The wife of his youth, Mummy London, left him and took the children. They came to stay with him during school holidays, partly because it was his right to see them, but also to ensure they would return to their mother with their school fees. Mummy London was a civil servant and she worked all the years that we knew her.

There was a vacuum, so Daddy London took steps to replace Mummy London. The first replacement was Auntie Spotless. I will call her that because she had very fair skin. She was tall, pretty and soft spoken. She did not go to work or have any business, she just stayed home and looked after Daddy London. Two years after she had a child for Daddy London, we had Auntie Nurse. Auntie Nurse was working in one of the clinics in Lagos, where she caught Daddy’s eye. Like Auntie Spotless, Auntie Nurse was light skinned, a bit rounder, but quite pretty. Afterall, Daddy London liked the good things of life and he had specific standards. When Daddy London ‘married’ Auntie Nurse, her nursing career came to an end. She joined Auntie Spotless, as they enjoyed Daddy’s money. The next one was Auntie India. Why India? That name came from one of my mum’s sisters who was living with us. My Aunt saw Auntie India from behind, and with her long hair and very fair skin, according to my Auntie, she looked like an Indian lady, so that is why I will call her Auntie India. These three beautiful, light-skinned ladies, all without a personal means of livelihood, made up Daddy London’s harem. During the summer holidays, there would be noise and chaos in the household, because Mummy London would drop her five children off and the three co-wives would have to manage them alongside their own kids, till it was time for the children to go back to school. 

One day, I asked permission from my mum to run an errand for one of the Aunties and she said, ‘Awon Alabodo’. I asked her what ‘Alabodo’ meant, and my mum said it is a woman who is kept at home to do nothing but eat, sleep and please her husband. It took me a few more years to realise that my mother had given me the sanitized translation of ‘Alabodo’. The literal translation of an ‘Alabodo’ is a woman who is fed and ‘f……d’. The term is uncouth and vulgar, but it is meant to embody the contempt the community had for women who chose comfort over hard work.

I liked the three Aunties, I tried to come to their defence, but my mum told me that she did not hate them, she just disliked their laziness. According to her, it does not matter if your husband is rich or poor, a woman needs a livelihood of her own. What if, God forbid, something happens to the husband? What will become of her and her children? Then her children will be farmed out to family members who will use them as servants. The closest the three Aunties came to having a business was when Daddy London started a poultry somewhere in Lagos, and Auntie Spotless would have some of the eggs brought home to sell.

Then, life happened. Daddy London had become a politician, and that had helped his businesses and finances. There was a military coup, so Daddy London had to lie low. Money became tight. In less than two years, the three ‘Alabodos’ had dispersed. Auntie Spotless went to university to continue her interrupted education.  Auntie Nurse went back to work as a Nurse and Auntie India started selling fabrics in Balogun market. My mum said, ‘What did I tell you? They are lucky the man didn’t die, it would have been worse for them’. Daddy London was left all by himself for a while. Then it was the turn of Auntie Teacher, who firmly stayed with her teaching job, not that she had much choice in the matter anyway. We also noticed that she did not look like the three Aunties, she was older and her skin was a few shades darker. Daddy’s tastes were now aligned with his circumstances.

Times are hard. Paid jobs are difficult to find. Yet, there are people struggling to learn a skill, improve themselves and start small businesses. Let us encourage them if we are in a position to do so. No one becomes a mogul overnight, they start from somewhere. If you are the parent of an unmarried young woman, insist that your daughter has a means of livelihood before she gets married. Don’t be one of those people who say no man will marry you if they see you are self-sufficient. I am not talking about women who choose to look after young families and suspend their careers till they are able to return, or those who are simply not able to find work or lack the means to start a business.  I am talking about the ‘my husband does not allow me to work’ or ‘I want the baby girl life’ lot. If you are the parent of an unmarried young man, ask him what his bride to be does or intends to do for a living. Don’t encourage your son to marry a woman and deprive her of an opportunity to fend for herself. If you are a single man, why do you want to saddle yourself with a potential liability? And for the single young women, one of the worst things you can do to yourself is to become an ‘Alabodo’. It never ends well. Never.

Bisi Adeleye-Fayemi is a Gender Specialist, Leadership Coach, Policy Advocate and Writer. She is the Founder of Abovewhispers.com, an online community for women. She can be reached at BAF@abovewhispers.com