TOXIC 1

Shalewa Buknor

Have you been in that type of relationship you were warned about? Those kinds of relationship your family described to you as the worst thing on earth?

The chaos everyone tried to make you see, those kind of relationships that you have heard of some survival stories by leading figures that you know.



The type of relationship that you watched in movies, read in books, heard in songs and saw how it turned out,  the type that you do not wish for your most fiendish foe?

That is the type of relationship I am in, and every appalling maltreatment one can imagine feature strongly in my relationship except for the popular physical assault- I do not have bruises on my skin.

I do have them all over my heart which is worse, as I have all part of me taken by what and who I claim I love!

My somebodiness has been slain on the altar of the ego of my boyfriend; Goriola Fowler.

This is probably because I met him in the most naive stage of my life. Gori has taken all except my life from me.

He has on countless occasions threatened to even take my very last breathe from me.

I use to feel like I did all I did for him out of love but with my most recent revaluation; I have come to the knowledge that they were all snatched from me, my innocence was stolen.

My boyfriend is a description of the modern elite, and from a distance;  he is somebody to die for.

He has one of the best success stories for a young man his age as he was born from a struggling family.

His dad a thrift collector and his mother an auxiliary nurse, they were somewhere within the low-middle class if there is anything like that.

He rose and broke bars curative enough to send the poverty packing, as he is a force to reckon with in the world of finance.

He is an accountant, a chartered one at that, coming top in his class in his university days; limelight became his home.

He secured a scholarship by one of the foremost bank in the country, this was their way of harnessing the resources deposited in Gori.

He got his masters and did his chartered course subsequently. At 24, he was where he has always dreamt about and he was given a substantive position in the bank with a very reasonable pay.

All these happened with me by his side. More than his mother; I think I can tell Gori's story better.

From his stardom year till now, it been about ten years and I am already out of the bearing of my hey days.

I and Gori have lived together longer than some couples, and all there is to see in a woman have been seen!

But sadly, I feel he and I had the best of love when he was still struggling, and sometimes; I wish he was still broke.

Our relationship doesn't have a comprehensible definition, it has totally lost bearing.

His ego since his sunny day has totally intimidated my existence, and I am a shadow of myself, but I do not know how to explain it.

I am positive that I need a revival, as there is a lot of things missing, and I am so much in his world that I have forgotten about mine! I have lost my person. Identity. Being.

I have invested so much of myself into his life that aside him; nothing else is happening in my life, and the top of my frustration is that I LOVE GORIOLA!

It is not like I do not have any family because one would wonder why I went through all the trauma all alone; but the truth is, I have so defended our relationship and the glaring shortcomings of Gori that they are tired of interfering.

I have fought many of my sisters and even shut them out, my mother for one is totally frustrated about the coy that I have become, "you never cease to disgrace this family!" she would always say!

I am not an opportunist for sticking with my boyfriend as you all might be thinking, and infact, I was born into a capable family!

The Buknors is one of the biggest family in Lagos, my father when he was alive was a pilot and worked after his aeronautical retirement in various capacity with the government.

We had so much largesse from his hard work that we needed not to fight over wealth, my father was a polygamist with three wives in his bid to get a male child; sadly we were all girls, all eleven of us.

I am the third child of my mother and the sixth of the entire family, I studied international relations in the University of Lagos where I met Gori.

Though Gori is financially capable, his wealth is the type my family will still regard as mediocre.

Not to disdain Gori in anyway, but the breakthroughs he got in finance had a lot to do with my person, and when I told you I did a lot for him, I was not joking.

That my joy revolves around him is a pain for all of my folks, I on the other hand was of the belief that it is either Gori or nobody.

Gori is the most notorious flirt, first class! He was so good at it that he delivers the most apt lie for any situation, apologizes very quick, and on days when he is caught are days when i get the best sex.

He will make me quarrel with my own eyes after he had tricked my very stupid heart.

It became tedious for my friends to give me info whenever he is caught by them in the act because most times, I end up blaming them for meddling or vying to break my home- as if I had any.

They learnt how to just let go and left me to handle my business the way I know how.

Rummaging Gori's phone became my addiction, and I was loosing my mind!

I acknowledged that but could not just help myself, news reach me occasionally of the current headliner of his shagging tours.

I accepted things I swore on my life that I won't tolerate as a teenager!