It’s a long story but I will try to keep it brief.
About 6 years ago I dated a lady from Delta State from the Urhobo tribe. Along the line she got pregnant.
Although the relationship did not end in marriage I did not at any time deny responsibility for her pregnancy and I went with my mother to see her father when he requested a meeting
Due to a serious medical condition she had the pregnancy was a very difficult one but she eventually had a beautiful healthy baby girl. She spent a total of 32 days in the hospital and run up a bill of over N1 million which was eventually paid with some help from her family.
Due to her prolonged stay in hospital she was forced to resign from her job but she was lucky to get another job several months later.
After the baby was born she continued living with her parents cos I was still adamant I was not going to marry her however, I was seriously willing to give it serious reconsideration.
What made me suspend the decision to formalize our relationship was that I noticed that she was becoming unnecessarily rude and insultive to me.
I will give an instance, there was this one time she called me on a Wednesday while I was at the library preparing for a professional exam to tell me that the baby’s provisions had finished and that I should send some money and I said I wasn’t going to send any money cos I had previously sent money about 2 or 3 days before; the next thing she did was to start raining insults on me on the phone.
Later that weekend on Saturday I went to visit her and our baby at her parents house and after I had sat down in the living room her mother accosted me and said “I no like the way way you dey talk to my daughter” and just as I was getting ready to defend myself this lady flared up and started shouting “you’re crazy, You’re crazy, stupid man” etc.
I immediately stood up and made to take my leave and much to my surprise this lady followed me out of the house into the compound raining insults on me.
While all this was going on her mother was present but she did not make any effort to ask her to stop. I found this very intriguing and shocking at the same time cos I am from the eastern part of Nigeria, Anambra state and where I come from no woman will stand by and watch her daughter insult her husband or father of her child.
This happened about 6 months after our daughter was born and she was lying on the sofa in the living room when it happened.
I should emphasize here the lady in question is a well spoken and relatively well exposed graduate and not some lay about but it just so happens that for some reason pigin English is the lingua franca in most Niger Delta homes.
I stayed away for over 3 months after this incident happened but I was surprised when I eventually went back and her father did not bother to ask me why I stayed away for so long.
Things continued this way until our daughter was a little over 2 years old and was about to start school.
We had a discussion and agreed that she should start school in September of that year, however, I was surprised when all of a sudden my baby mama’s mother came out of the blues and said that our daughter should be enrolled to start school in April and I kicked against it since it was not the original plan and I was not ready to let her dictate to me how to run my affairs.
They enrolled her in April and paid the fees since I said I would stick with the original plan.
From then on our relationship soured further and I stopped visiting altogether but my mother who incidentally is quite fond of the lady continued to visit them until eventually she too stopped cos they made her feel unwelcome through subtle body language.
Please note that prior to the breakdown in our relationship I had always been involved in my daughter’s life, I went to the hospital the day she was born, I participated at her christening, then her first and second birthday parties.
One of my mother’s complaints was that whenever she visits they will be making comments in their language while she’s seated there with them.
Much later after our daughter started school I sent some money for the payment of my daughter’s school fees and my baby mama sent the money back to my account and as a result I just ignored and left her to her own devices.
Much later after I had stayed away for a while I decided to open an education fund account for our daughter and I was told to bring her passport photograph and a copy of her birth certificate.
I asked her mother to send me a copy of her birth certificate and she refused and as a result I could not open the account.
About 2 or 3 months after this incident when schools were on a long holiday she decided to take our daughter on holidays to the United Arab Emirates and part of the requirements was that the father must sign a Consent Form cos our daughter bears my surname; when she called and told me about it I agreed to sign it on the condition that she would give me a copy of our daughter’s birth certificate.
I went to their house, gave them a copy of the bio data page of my international passport and signed the forms on the assumption that I was dealing with someone with integrity.
After about 1 week she still had not sent me a copy of the birth certificate as agreed so I sent her a reminder on WhatsApp and she blocked my number immediately.
As a result of this I suspended all communication with her until I was about to leave Lagos for an engagement which lasted about 2 years.
Before I left I bought some cartons of biscuits and packs of Ribena fruits drinks which our daughter would take to school as refreshments.
When I got there her parents were very hostile and almost refused accepting the stuff but I left them in their compound after they had been offloaded from the car.
There are some other incidences which I have omitted for brevity.
Now the issues is that want to see my daughter but I have no desire to visit them at home.
I sent a text message to my baby mama to request to see my daughter in a public place of her choice and she ignored it.
I want to further pursue this matter legally but I want to know if there are further remedial actions I can take before I resort to this.
I am willing to explore other means first cos if I go the legal route then there is no turning back for me no matter the cost or inconvenience.
Once I start legal process on the matter I will not look back until we get to the logical conclusion of this matter.
I want people who are experienced in child custody cases to give me their opinion.
Please move this to front page:-
Lalasticlala
Mynd44
Dominique Via Nairaland http://bit.ly/2EGOhmN
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