Sometimes I wonder what exactly people want with all the numbers. To get a decent job you are asked for your age and then you cannot be given some jobs if you don’t have some years of experience. The question people find themselves asking is: How am I supposed to gain experience without getting a job?

Another thing that makes numbers especially age annoying is that it is brought again into personal decisions in life such as relationships.

Things happen that make you wonder what exactly should matter in a relationship. I’ll take a little time to tell of something that happened recently that left a friend devastated all in the name of age.

It all started when she was in year 1 in the University; Bimpe met her boyfriend in school, he was in 200level reading Economics while she was in 100level studying accounting. Their case was not as some cases of ‘love at first sight’. These love birds took time to build their love on God and trust. They had their good and bad times but in all they were the envy of a lot of people. After a year of assuming each other’s age since Bimpe looked too young for age to be a problem, it was Chidi’s birthday, which was when it dawned on her to ask his age; lo and behold, she found out that her lovely matured Chidi is actually a year and 3 months younger than her. At first she said nothing until she began to see every little thing as immature. Then she started seeking advice from her friends who told her not to give up her relationship because of their age difference. Things went well from then. Chidi was able to handle things well and life went on fine for them.

Bimpe got to 400level and decided to introduce Chidi to her folks and vice versa and that was the beginning of their problems. Chidi’s parents were wondering if there was nobody in the school younger than their son. They started putting pressure on him telling him that Bimpe will soon start hurrying him up for marriage. They went on and on with different reasons why he shouldn’t marry someone older than he is. They told him she would not be submissive, that he would not be able to control her, e.t.c. As Chidi is the first born in his family, they were sure to make an issue out of it. At first, Chidi turned deaf ears to all the advice but after Bimpe finished school and wanted to go for service, he started having a rethink on his relationship. Left alone, he started seeing reason into what his family had been saying, he counted the number of years he had before he would be ready for marriage and decided he wouldn’t be able to take the pressure and as he said, he didn’t want to be the cause of Bimpe’s ‘late marriage’.

Bimpe’s family had a different story to tell when they found out that age difference was not her problem, they started on ethnic differences but to all of these, she turned deaf ears.

During service one day she just got a letter from Chidi saying he was sorry he had realized late how so unrealistic their relationship was and that though painful, he had to put an end to it and allow her to find someone else who would want to settle down with her on time as he is not ready for marriage in the next 5years.

Eventually, they broke up after much thought but to say they didn’t love each other would have been a lie. It was more of family influence on both sides just because of that simple thing called age.

So many questions to ask, so many other troubling things age difference has caused for relationships. I would love from here to hear from my readers’ successes and failures that they know of with issues like this and to please help me answer some of these questions my people ask.

What the big deal is marring an older woman?

How am I supposed to handle a situation like this when am being pressured at home?

Should age be a determining factor just like blood type is?

What are the things I should look out for when I find myself dating a younger man or an older lady as the case may be if I will end up having a blissful home?

All these are questions going through the minds of people all over the world facing situations like these and sincerely, I don’t want to be the only one answering these questions that is why I am putting it out to all my readers to help solve this age long problem of marring an older man being a tradition. The other issue of ethnic differences will be addressed in other editions.

Is it a taboo’? Please send your answers as comments on this blog, you will be helping more than a life. Thank you.