How my wife became my enemy 

I never imagined I would one day refer to the woman I once loved more than life itself as my enemy.

When I look back to how it all began, it feels like a distant memory—one filled with hope, passion, and dreams. But life has a way of revealing uncomfortable truths that we’re not always ready to face.

We met like characters in a romance novel. It was at a cousin’s wedding, during the rainy season. She wore a simple green dress—nothing extravagant—but there was something about the way she carried herself, graceful and warm, effortlessly elegant. I was captivated. We spent the evening talking over jollof rice and suya, and it felt like we’d known each other forever. From that moment, we were inseparable.

Our courtship was bliss. She was my peace, my muse. She would call me during work breaks, send messages like, “I believe in you,” whenever I was struggling. I thought I had found the woman who would build with me, not just enjoy the finished mansion.

We got married after two years of dating. The wedding was modest but joyful. At the time, I had just started a small-scale electronics distribution business, and she worked at a bank, doing well. Together, we began to build our life—renting a small flat, budgeting carefully, supporting each other’s dreams. Or so I thought.

Things began to change, albeit subtly. At first, I ignored the signs. Her tone became colder, the messages less frequent, and her patience with my struggles seemed to fade.

When my business hit a rough patch, I didn’t get the encouragement I had once relied on. Instead, I began hearing things like, “Why did I even marry a man without a stable job?” The woman who had once cheered me on now mocked my ambitions.

Then came the secrecy. She would step outside to take calls, her phone, once casually left on the table, now always locked and face-down. I confronted her a few times, but she twisted it around, calling me insecure, controlling, paranoid. And, foolishly, I believed her. I started to doubt my own instincts.

But the truth has a way of surfacing, no matter how much we try to bury it.

One evening, I returned home early from a cancelled business meeting. Her car was in the driveway, yet she didn’t respond to my calls. I walked into our home and found her on the couch, laughing, a glass of wine in hand, with another man. The look on her face when she saw me wasn’t guilt—it was annoyance, as though I was the one invading her space.

They didn’t even try to hide it. She looked me in the eye and said, “I’m tired of pretending. He gives me what you can’t.”

That was the day my heart broke.

But it didn’t stop there. She used every legal tool at her disposal to destroy me—filing for divorce on the grounds of emotional abuse, seeking full custody of our child, even dragging my name through the mud on social media. Mutual friends vanished. My family was confused and heartbroken. I was painted as the villain in a story where, in reality, I was the one left bleeding.

She knew my weaknesses, my secrets, my dreams, and she used them against me like weapons. The woman who once wiped away my tears now seemed to find pleasure in watching me suffer.

It took years to rebuild my life—and my sense of self. I had to rediscover who I was without her. Therapy, prayer, and the support of good friends helped, but the scars remain. And sometimes, late at night, I still ask myself: How did love turn into war?

Today, I’m not bitter. I’ve made peace with what happened. I’ve learned to forgive—not for her sake, but for mine. Because holding on to hatred is like being trapped in a prison, and I refuse to let her lock me in it again.

But I’ll never deny the truth:

The woman I once called “my everything” became the greatest threat to my peace.

She became my enemy.