IF ONLY I KNEW: REFLECTIONS OF A LOVE LOST FOREVER

Every day, I tell myself I would get over this feeling. But deep down I know I will nurse this guilt for the rest of my life. Why did God bring you into my life, when he knew he will need you so soon? If only I knew it was for a short time, I would have loved you harder. You were so good that even heaven couldn’t wait to have you? Now my loss is heaven’s gain.

I remember when I first learnt of your demise. That moment I knew my world will never be the same. The next three hours were probably the hardest of my adult life. I don’t remember the last time I cried but that night I wept all through. A thousand tears will not bring you back. I realized this, because I have shed enough.

HOLD ON, PAIN ENDS

This is for everyone who woke up with their head aching and their heart hurting.

This is for those who have lost someone they truly loved and miss them so much that they don’t know how to survive alone.

This is for those who put on a smile and pretend they are fine when they are actually shattered and hopeless inside.

This is for the girl who feels worthless and too scared to fall in love again.

FIFTY SHADES OF INSPIRATION

1. Take kindness with you everywhere you go and deposit it at every stop you make. Never expect to get it back.

2. If you expect people to be kind to you because you are kind to them, you are like the man who expects the lion not to eat him because he doesn’t eat lions.

3. Forgive others not because they deserve forgiveness but because you deserve your peace of mind.

4. As much as you want the best for others, you cannot force people to grow. At the end of the day, it is their choice and their life.

5. Don't waste your energy on things that are outside of your control. Only focus on the things that you can control.

6. Define success on your own terms, achieve it by your own rules and build a life that you are proud of.

7. In life, you will rise and fall so many times but never rise up by pulling others down. On your way up take people up with you. On your way down don’t let them down.

8. Tell everyone around you to be strong, even though deep down you know you are the weakest person in the world. It might not be convenient but therein lies greatness.

9. At your absolute best, you still won’t be good enough for the wrong person. At your worst, you will still be worth everything to the right person.

10. Whatever you do, never run back to the things that broke you in the past. Some things will never change and you have to accept that.

STRAIGHT FROM THE HEART

You,

Ever since you walked into my life with a ray of sun that has never stopped shinning. I have thought about you all day and dreamt about you all night. You had this mystery about you but I chose to call it divine.

I have never loved someone so much. I can't find the right words to express how I truly feel? I feel like I can be my true self around you. That part of me that nobody else can see.

They say that true love is like a ghost, everyone talks about it but very few have seen it. That is what you have given me, the purest of love.

FOR FIRST LOVES ONLY

Let us take a moment today to remember your first love.

The first love that split you open and made you blossom. The one that carefully unwrapped the secret desires that were buried inside of you and stayed with you until your heart found a home.

He was like your safe, where you hid all your treasures because you thought he would love you forever.‎

You laughed at all his jokes and made him feel like the funniest man in the world. It didn’t matter to you if anyone else found him hilarious.

THE SEXOLOGY X-RAYS: MEN ARE VICTIMS TOO

It will seem strange that in the year 2016, our society has not come to terms with the reality that boys and men are sexually molested and abused every single day. All we hear in the media are cases of women and girls who are victims of extreme sexism. So because men are more likely to rape women, they should be ignored when they fall victims?

As a particular gender, our perception of issues concerning the opposite gender is often skewed or selfish. Women are used to believing that sexual abuse affects boys and girls in different ways. That girls suffer more long term emotional damage than boys. Are we not all human beings?

How many times have the social or mainstream media reported a case of a boy or a man that was sexually molested by a girl or a woman? Let’s face it, men face sexual assaults everyday just like the women. But they are often regarded as the stronger gender, so they have to swallow the assault with pride or take it as a man.

THE SEXOLOGY X-RAYS: DEAR MEN, WOMEN ARE NOT PREYS

As someone who grew up without a sister, it took a while for me to understand women. My mother was more of a man than a woman. The tough job of nurturing 6 boys and her husband was enough to dilute her feminism to its barest minimum. She was the commander-in-chief of her army and I still hear her orders n my head many years after. 

The first time my mother spoke to me about girls was the day I was about to leave for college. Her words were firm and straightforward ''When you get to school, you have to be very careful with girls. If you get any girl pregnant, you are in soup''. Knowing my mother very well, I reckoned the soup would be hot enough to decolorize my future. So I stayed away from the girls but not for too long. 

Over the years, I have interacted with various shades ‎of women that have greatly shaped my orientation of the female folk. No two women I have met are the same but they all share one thing in common. The desire to be loved and protected. Unfortunately, men often take advantage of this for their own selfish gain. I have grown to respect women, even the ones that have lost it. It takes a man to deprive a woman of her pride and it takes another man to restore it.

HELLO SANTA! I WANT ABUBAKAR SHEKAU’S HEAD FOR CHRISTMAS

Photo Credit - Pulse.ng

“Where is Abubakar Shekau?” they asked me time after time, with the barrels of their rusty AK-47 pointing directly to my head. “Where is your leader hiding?” a more senior officer who had been quiet for most part of the interrogation thundered; to probably suggest to me that he was gradually losing his cool. With tears and blood rolling down my eyes I turned to the officer who evidently had a little pity in his eyes out of the rest “I am not a member of Boko Haram sir. Am not even a Muslim (Shiite or Sunni), in fact I am nobody” I implored inaudibly, as I gasped for more air.

This grueling examination has been going on for the most part of nine hours and I was totally exhausted. My whole face swollen from the repeated jabs from either the butt of their guns or their big fists. I was captured along Buduwa area in Bama Local Government Area of Borno State. I was a freelance journalist who had gone to the terror-torn area to confirm the reports from government sources that Boko Haram will finally be defeated by the end of December 2015.

I was on the verge of transitioning from a freelance journalist to the cat that was killed because of his curiosity. “If you don’t tell us the truth, walahi I am sorry for you and your generation” the fierce looking officer who had been smoking what looked like hemp warned. My generation? I thought. 

NIGERIAN FEMALE SCIENTISTS WIN L'OREAL, UNESCO AWARDS

L’Oréal and The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has announced the recipients of the 2015 L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Sub-Saharan Africa Regional Fellowships. Among the 12 outstanding female scientists are four Nigerians. They were honoured for their work and impact in the scientific field.

The recipients of the Post-Doctoral Fellowships of 10 000 Euros each are:

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO SUGABELLY

Photo:Sugarbellyrocks.com

I first heard about this story from a colleague over lunch on Friday and we just talked about it casually and went about our normal duties. It was only on Saturday evening when the wife of my very good friend mentioned it again that I decided to pay more attention to the story. I can understand why most women empathize with Lotanna Odunze a.k.a Sugabelly and believe she was savagely raped by Mustapha Audu and his brigade of rapists as she alleged but there are a lot of inconsistencies with her Super-story.

According to Wikipedia, rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse or other forms of sexual penetration perpetrated against a person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or against a person who is incapable of valid consent, such as one who is unconscious, incapacitated, or below the legal age of consent.