error of commission

“My home is hot right now as my wife has served me an ultimatum”. he cradled his coffee cup and leaned back into his seat

We all turned towards him.

“Why is that?” Alan one of the coordinators, an elderly man with kind eyes asked.

“She insists my friend has to leave” Ovie replied with a rueful smile.

“Your friend?” Alan prodded

I bit down at the smile tugging on my lips. I did not want anyone to miscontrue the smile. I was smiling because in front of me was an African male caught in a conundrum. Pressed enough yet weighing his masculinity vs vulnerability. I knew what it meant for him to even broach this topic here.

“Yes. My friend has been staying with us for about a month now” Ovie replied

“His wife sent him out of the house and he had no place to go so I offered”

The room was pin-drop silent.

This is one of the things I like about this group. Anyone vulnerable enough to share was allowed to pace themselves.

“They had some challenges which escalated. It led to him leaving the house”

“Must have been serious” stated Asya, an Afghan woman also a member of the team

“what type of issues?” another man sitting across enquired

“He has been job hunting since they came in for about 9 months now. He refused to do the Care job insisting it is beneath him. Also at home he does not help out with the chores or child care”

His wife, a nurse, is the primary provider. When she is at work, he finds it hard to cope with the kids. He pushes her to send the kids to her friends who can look after them while she is at work

“So what does he do then if he is not working?”

“He stays home and sleeps. Some days he buys a day ticket then gets on the bus and simply keeps going round the city. Other times, Parks, beach and City Centre”

“The load became so much for his wife. A few of us even had to come in and intervene yet he refuses to work claiming he is looking for a befitting job”

“He was a big boy back home. Had a very good job and business. That business was sustaining them for sometime though since they came in until it stopped”

“So how did this man end up in your house?”

“He is my childhood friend. Moreso, when we newly arrived, they housed my family – the four of us. It was not convenient yet they sheltered us for about two months”

“And now you are repaying his kindness?”

” Or enabling his poor choices?”

“The thing is I understand him. He is a proud person and even back home, he did not get involved in running the home. He had the money and paid for everything” Ovie waved his hand

“His anger stems from the fact that he feels disrespected by the wife. As his girlfriend, he put her through the University where she studied nursing. He did everything for her including helping her to secure this job before they came over. He made her life so comfortable with all the domestic help she wanted back then and she has not really paid any bills before now”

“Are you for your friend or your wife?”

“What about the inconvenience to your family?”

“What inconvenience? asked Amin a Pakistani “They can all live in peace”.

“Why does your wife want him out then?” Alan raised his hands, taking charge of the meeting as many people began to speak at once

“She claims he is a bad influence. And she resents the fact that he is willing to move out of his home. He does this instead of bending to the realities of this new environment. Besides, it is affecting her friendship with his wife”. Ovie admitted like he was begging us to help

“We are seeing lots of these issues recently. We have also heard that it is a cultural shock of …… and as Alan spoke, my mind drifted. I thought about all the unsavoury stories of struggle coming out of the ethnic minorities group all around.

The Mental Toll of Relocation: A Child’s Struggle and Emotional Impact

“My young son shat on himself because someone was in the toilet and he could no longer hold it in” I quipped in a low voice laced with pain as I recalled that incident.

I saw curious surprise on some of the faces in the room. It was a session where the topic was how to help new arrivals integrate into the community. The large divide in the room was so wide. Some of the attendants has never had any interaction with a black person outside of the office. And seemed clueless on anything to do with the BAME community.

“He was filled with so much shame as he stood by the doorway and did not know how to tell me.  It turned out he was trying very hard to contain the remaining poop in his system pending when the bathroom opened up. The stool was loose anyway so I simply made him do it on the floor in the garden, then thereafter washed out the cemented floor with water myself”

This was weeks after we moved out of the hotel into a shared house. I guessed his system was likely in shock of the transition because he had not done Number 2 for a while now. That is usually his system’s response to any unfamiliar environment – shut down from doing Number 2.”

“I know what it took to manage our emotions afterwards. Yes, our emotions. He was sober throughout the day and I realised it was a combination of various emotions – top of which was shame and probably not knowing how I would react”

“Here was a child who had lived a comfortable life so far. Always had his own bathroom and toilet ensuite. Although, we constantly had people live with us, at least he knew it was his own home”.

“Now, he was the one moving into a stranger’s house in a foreign land. Sharing space and facilities alongside sharing a room with his ma. A room smaller than the one he left behind back home. Kid was constantly being reminded to ‘keep it down’ as a simple thing like descending the staircase was termed noisy. .

“In addition to that, it was the onset of winter. Consider that for a child who had transited from the hot weather of Nigeria. See it as plucking you out from the oven and plopping you straight into the freezer with no time to adapt to the room temperature”.

“Anyone here being to Nigeria or the tropics?” I asked the room.

A woman had been to Ghana.

“So you get the idea a bit” I said to the room

“I simply had to sit him down and talk through it. Apologised to him for putting him in such a situation while assuaging him that it was not his fault and it would get better”

“Nevertheless, the only emotion I felt was anger. I was angry with the man in the bathroom. A laid-back man whose attitude carried through even in the way he talked. That man would get into the bathroom and lounge there like it was his living room. A bathroom shared by four people!”

“Several times, we have had to knock on that door while he was in there. I mean we were all in this relocation thing together and putting ourselves through this temporary inconvenience. Emotional intelligence required him to not go into a bathroom which also contained the only toilet in the house and start having a party there”.

“It took quite some effort on my part to calm down and not have a word with him. I knew my circle of control was myself and my son. I had to manage our reactions and that was what I did”

Afterwards, both whites and the #BAME people would come up to thank me for having the gumption to broach that enlightening subject in such a setting. If only I knew the tap I had turned on. More stories coming………

Why Emotional Intelligence can sabotage you

“You seem to be very high on managing your emotions” “yes, I have a very high emotional quotient” “and I see it is helping you a lot on this journey” “somehow” I whispered across the lines “care to explain?” he prodded “Well, I choose to see the pluses in my situation because there are a … Read more