My name is Zainabu Musa. I am 38 years old. I am from Kano State. I was married for 14 years, and I am a mother of four children.
This is my divorce diary.
I met Sadiq when I was 21 years old. At that time, I believed marriage was the ultimate achievement for a woman. In our environment, once you finish secondary school or manage to enter university, the next expectation is simple: a good husband must find you.
Sadiq found me.
He was everything my parents wanted. Soft-spoken. Respectful. From a “good family.” He worked in a bank in Kano city. He dressed well, spoke good English, and most importantly, he knew how to make people feel comfortable.
When he came with his family for the first time, I remember how my mother couldn’t stop smiling. My father kept nodding his head like someone who had finally completed a lifelong project.
I didn’t love him then.
But I didn’t think love was necessary.
I believed love would come later.
Our marriage started peacefully.
Very peacefully.
Too peacefully, if I am being honest.
Sadiq was not the kind of man that shouted or fought. He never raised his hand on me. In fact, for the first two years, I used to thank God every night for giving me a “gentleman.”
But there is something I did not understand at that time:
Silence is not always peace.
Sometimes, silence is distance.
After our first child, things started to change—but not in a way I could explain.
Sadiq became… absent.
Not physically. He was still coming home. Still eating my food. Still sleeping on the same bed.
But emotionally, he was gone.
If I spoke, he would answer in one word.
If I asked questions, he would say, “It’s nothing.”
If I complained, he would say, “You worry too much.”
At first, I blamed myself.
Maybe I was talking too much.
Maybe I was expecting too much.
Maybe this is how marriage is.
By the time I had my third child, I was no longer a wife—I was just existing in the house.
Sadiq stopped touching me.
Not gradually. Just… stopped.
At first, I thought maybe he was stressed from work. Banking jobs in Kano are not easy. Targets, pressure, long hours.
But one year passed.
Then two.
Nothing changed.
I was too ashamed to talk to anyone.
How do you tell people that your husband does not touch you?
In our society, such a conversation would turn you into the problem.
They will say:
- “Are you respecting him?”
- “Are you taking care of yourself?”
- “Men don’t just behave like that for no reason.”
So I kept quiet.
One night, I gathered courage.
I asked him directly:
“Sadiq, have I offended you?”
He looked at me for a long time.
Then he said something I will never forget:
“Zainabu, not everything is a problem. Sometimes this is just life.”
That night, I cried silently so my children would not hear me.
Years passed.
We became strangers living under one roof.
He provided money. School fees were paid. Food was in the house.
From outside, we looked like a perfect family.
Inside, I was dying slowly.
The truth came out in the most unexpected way.
It was a Saturday afternoon. Sadiq had travelled to Abuja for a “training.” He left his second phone at home by mistake.
I had never checked his phone before in my life.
Never.
But something pushed me that day.
Something I cannot explain.
I opened it.
What I saw… changed everything.
Messages.
Hundreds of them.
From a man.
Not just any messages.
Intimate messages.
Emotional messages.
Messages that carried a kind of connection I had been begging for in my own marriage.
My hands were shaking.
At first, I told myself maybe I misunderstood.
But the more I read, the clearer it became.
My husband was living a completely different life.
When he came back, I didn’t shout.
I didn’t cry.
I just asked him one question:
“Who is Ibrahim?”
He froze.
That was the first time I saw fear in Sadiq’s eyes.
What followed was not drama.
It was silence.
Long, heavy silence.
Then he said:
“I didn’t want to hurt you.”
I laughed.
That was the first time I laughed like a mad person.
He explained everything.
How he had always felt different.
How he forced himself into marriage because of family expectations.
How he thought he could “change.”
How he believed having children would “correct” him.
But it didn’t.
I felt many things at once:
- Betrayal
- Confusion
- Anger
- Pity
But more than anything…
I felt cheated.
Fourteen years.
Four children.
A whole life built on something that was never real.
The hardest part was not even his truth.
It was mine.
I realized I had ignored my own pain for years just to maintain an image.
A “good marriage.”
A “stable home.”
A “respectable life.”
When I told my family, the reactions were exactly what I feared.
“Be patient.”
“At least he is not beating you.”
“He is taking care of the children.”
“Don’t destroy your home.”
Destroy?
I asked myself:
What home?
I stayed for one more year.
Not because I wanted to.
But because I was afraid.
Afraid of starting over.
Afraid of society.
Afraid of being labeled “divorced woman.”
But one day, my daughter asked me a question:
“Mama, why are you always sad?”
That day… I made my decision.
I left.
Quietly.
No drama.
No fighting.
Just… left.
Today, I am 38.
I am divorced.
I am raising my children.
And for the first time in many years…
I can breathe.
