Living with a mean, big belly man

Dear Pastor,

I am having a problem. I am 30 years old and I am living with a man. We have been together for two years. He does his own business, but I am not working. I tried to tell him that instead of employing a woman to work with him, I can do the job and he would not have to pay me as much as he pays her. He said that she has been working with him for five years, so it would be unfair to ask her to leave. She is a big woman.

Pastor, when I met this man I was working and one of the workers told a lie on me, and the boss believed her, so I walked off the job. This man I am living with is very mean. Everything I want, I have to ask him for. He doesn't know how to treat a woman. He was never married, but he was living with a woman and she accused him of having other women with her, so she left him.

I suspect that he is having a relationship with the woman who is working with him. She can never do anything wrong for him. She is always right. Sometimes he brings things home and when I asked him where he got them from, he said she gave them to him. I don't eat anything from her because she might be giving him these things to tie him. He already has a big belly before him as if he is pregnant. He is a very bright man, but he is a mean man. Every week he gives me $10,000 to buy groceries, but that money can't stretch and he likes to eat big breakfast and big dinner.

He has a seven-year-old son who sometimes comes over on weekends. He has a habit of taking things out of the refrigerator without asking, and the father does nothing about it. I told his father that we should not allow him to do that. He said that is what he is accustomed to at his home, so he doesn't want to stop him. The little boy heard him calling me by my first name, so he started to do that. I told him to call me Auntie, but he told me I am not his aunt, and his father does not insist on him calling me aunty. The little boy goes to a prominent prep school. When I asked him why he is sending him to such an expensive school, when he could go to a cheaper one, he said he does not want to change his school. I know that I shouldn't tell him how much to spend on his son, but I see him wasting a lot of money on the boy while he is not giving me much.

I don't see any future with this man. I asked him to buy me a car and he asked me what would I be doing with it. Sometimes when I want to go and look for my mother, I have to call a taxi or ride on the bus. On occasions that I call him to pick me up from my mother's, he said I should take a taxi home. One day the taxi driver asked me why my man doesn't pick me up. I told him that I do not know. He said that kind of a man will always get bun.

I rather leave him than give him bun. When I go to the supermarket and he comes home, he opens the cupboard and look at what I bought. It's only a mean man does that.

Once I wanted to go out with my girlfriends and I ask this man for some money and he told me I should go and earn that money for myself at Back Road. I was so shocked, but I am not that type of woman. I rather leave him than cheat on him. I am hoping I will get a job after the holidays. If he sees this letter and ask me if I wrote to you, I will deny that I did.

Initial withheld.

Dear ........,

This man is indeed very mean. He might be forcing you to get yourself a job. Perhaps the reason why he does not want you to work at his office is because there is no reason to fire someone who has been working with him for years.

Perhaps he believes that you will make trouble for him. Already you are saying that he is having an intimate relationship with his worker. That might not be so at all. Perhaps you are chatting too much.

I am going to say that you are not a good woman. This man has a big tummy; if you don't like it, you should try to get that tummy reduced. But you should not accuse his female employee of trying to tie him, which has caused him to have a big tummy.

Kibba yuh mouth!

As it relates to the money he gives you to buy groceries, $10,000 is not a lot. This man should give you more because that amount of money these days cannot stretch far to feed two adults. However, I think you have the wrong attitude. You don't have to demand money from him, but you can show him why he ought to give you more.

It does not appear as if you love this man or he loves you. His son should not be allowed to just go into the refrigerator and take out what he wants. You are right in correcting him. However, he is not going to change because his father does not see what he is doing to be wrong. A man who loves his woman would not tell her to go to Back Road to earn money whether he is joking or serious, that is not something good to say. Get yourself a job, woman.

You made a mistake by leaving the job that you held. Get another one and support yourself.

Pastor