When divorce is the best option

Lilian Nduta. Photo/CHARLES KAMAU

What you need to know:

  • Leaving a marriage might seem like a permanent mark of failure for some people, but for two women, divorce was the start of living life positively.

Lilian Nduta is a confident, assured, 35-year-old businesswoman who makes no bones about walking into a stranger’s office and persuading them to let her graphic design company handle their marketing needs.

On the morning that we meet, she has just left the office after a night spent working on some caps for a political party, a job that she got by simply walking up to some party officials at a function, introducing herself and pitching for the job.

On the weekend, she changes her name to Lilian Young and takes on the mantle of gospel singer, visiting different churches and singing at concerts as part of her ministry.

You would never guess that this assured woman was once a timid girl who got married at 15 – and only discovered her ambitions, dreams and motivation after she left her marriage.

Lilian, who was raised by a single mother who sold chang’aa in the Mathare slums, got married early to escape the poverty she and her siblings suffered.

“My mother struggled to make ends meet, and I could not go to secondary school. So I got married when I was 15,” she says.

Lilian also felt that it was something she had to do: “He was a church prophet who told me that God said that we must get married or I would be punished.”

Concerned about this early marriage especially because this prophet was 15 years older than Lilian, her mother asked if she was sure.

Lilian said she was, not because she loved him, but because she didn’t want God to punish her if she didn’t do ‘His will’. But a few years later, after a conversation with a bishop whom she and her husband had gone to see, Lilian realised that this loveless, forced marriage was not what she wanted.

“The bishop told my husband that he had committed a great sin, lying to me by telling me that God had ordered our marriage. He said that according to the Government of Kenya, he had also committed a great crime marrying me at that tender age. That’s when I knew this was all wrong,” she says.

The bishop then turned to her and told her that she had been given the gift of gab and a singing voice, and that all she needed to do was make her relationship right with God, stop being resentful in her marriage and take responsibility for her life, and her name would be known all over the country. Six months later, she left her destructive marriage.

Taking a leap

Lilian was now 25 and a mother of young girl who she now had to take care of, with no income and an education that had stalled at Standard 8.

“It was hard,” she remembers. “I would ‘borrow’ accommodation from friends. Some of them would feel overburdened and kick me out, so my daughter and I moved from house to house.

Sometimes we stayed without food, and my daughter learned to sleep on an empty stomach. Sometimes I would ask her if she was hungry, and she would say, ‘no’ because she didn’t want me to suffer. It broke my heart. But God was faithful.”

Determined to feed, clothe and educate her child, Lilian persevered through the struggle and even found her true calling.

“It was hard for me to get a job because I had no papers, so I enrolled in an institute in Eastleigh to learn book binding.”

Once she had finished her course, she opened a book binding shop which she ran while she studied for her KCSE. After her exams, she decided to upgrade her skills with a graphic design course.

“Now that I had my papers, I could afford to join companies like Kul Graphics where I learnt more,” she says.

As she rose in the ranks, her life’s goals became clearer and she decided to give back to God by singing. In 2002, she wrote and produced a gospel album.

Lilian now has five gospel albums under her belt, and all of them have been commercial successes. She also runs a graphics design company which employs four and designs marketing materials for churches, musicians, some corporates and now, political parties.

Treading carefully

Lilian relishes her single life: “I can feed my child and pay her school fees. I run my businesses. I am much happier than I was when I was married.”

There are challenges to being single and divorced, though, such as dating in the presence of a now-15-year-old daughter.

“My experience with my husband made me very wary of men,” Lilian says. But there was a suitor thereafter who taught her an important lesson. “He proposed marriage and even paid bride price, but when I introduced him to a friend of mine, they started dating. Our relationship ended when I found out.”

The experience made her wary of the effects of her failed relationships on her daughter, and after some counselling from her pastor, she decided to tread carefully.

Lilian also gets lonely.

“There are times when you wish you had a man to talk to, someone to take your car to the mechanic or to take care of other ‘masculine’ jobs around the house.

And sometimes, if you don’t have a man in the house, you can forget your womanly duties. These days when my daughter is at boarding school, I can go a month without entering my kitchen,” she says.

Her daughter has a father figure, in the form of the family pastor, J J Gitahi of Priesthood Fellowship Tabernacle, who, together with his family, has been supportive even though divorced people – and more so women – are generally shunned by most church communities.

When she visits churches, Lilian mentors single mothers and young women on how to be good single parents.

“It is important not to take your anger or frustration out on your child,” she says, “because some women do that.”

And her daughter is reaping the benefits: “She is so much happier now. I am glad I have been able to give her a good education, and she is doing well. She gave me courage, and strength. For her, I had to make it.”

Would she get married again? “Only if I met a man who was serious, and I was sure. But in the meantime, I trust that God will see me through.”

Finding strength

Kamal Kaur is a confident, gorgeous 40-year-old woman who was married for 14 years before she decided to leave her husband.

“I wanted the happily ever after, but it was not working,” she says. The problem was baggage. “My ex had a lot of baggage from his past and he couldn’t deal with it, so he turned to alcoholism.”

Everyone has a final straw when it comes to relationships. For some, it is immediately obvious and for others, it is a culmination of events.

For Kamal, it was when he hit her daughter while he was taking her to school in the morning.

“I got a call from the head-teacher, who had witnessed it. That day I decided enough was enough, packed my bags and walked out with my children. I left him standing in the doorway yelling threats in a drunken stupor.”

Kamal is very happy now, and glad she made the decision to leave: “It was one of the best things I ever did. I am in a much better place now. I have a great job with such supportive, wonderful people. I have two amazing children whom I love dearly. I am blessed to have come through something so awful, and moved on.”

On the day that we meet, she is celebrating the sixth anniversary of the day she left her husband.

“I’m treating myself! I’ve bought a new dress, and heels, and my friends – the true ones, who stuck by me – and I are going to have a celebratory dinner and make a toast to the woman I am today. I love my life,” she says.
How did she move on?

“It’s a choice I make every single day. I can sit around and wallow in self-pity and asking ‘Why me?’ or I can get on with it and make life work for me. I always choose the latter. For the sake of my beautiful children, I make the choice to be happy. My daughter was quite affected, but I’m very proud that my baby is learning to blossom again. My son was very little when the separation happened, so he doesn’t remember anything at all!”
Like Lilian, Kamal has grown and been strengthened by her tribulations.

“I was blessed to get a wonderful job at East FM. My family at work supported me through thick and thin and I will never forget that. My family, especially my dad, is my backbone. In fact, he will buy 76 copies of this paper as soon as the interview comes out!”

Kamal says sharing her story has helped other people to speak out and share theirs as well. “Every now and then I get an email or a Facebook inbox message asking me how to go about getting out of an abusive marriage. But you have to do what you have to do.”

The law in Kenya does not necessarily favour couples who want to divorce. It is a long and lengthy process, assumed to give the couple a chance to really decide whether they want to divorce. In most cases, it takes years for the papers to be finalised, and people live as separated instead.

However, as you have seen, divorce is definitely not the end – and can, in the right instances and for the right reasons, be the first step in journey to finding your best life.

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What does society think about divorce these days?

Views from a married woman: Leave if you feel unsafe

“If my child came to me and said she wanted to get a divorce, I would be concerned. I would try to teach her how to try to avoid a divorce because I believe a lot of divorces happen nowadays because people have forgotten or simply do not know how to live as a couple. I would try to teach my child how to make marriage work in the first place.

Then, I would try to find out why she wants a divorce. If the marriage is going to be detrimental to her mental health and safety, I would tell her to go ahead. I know it is supposed to be ‘til death do you part, but you do not have to die because of it!”

Caroline Odongo, 43,

married mother of two girls

Views from a religious leader: Marriage is for life

“Divorce is the most traumatic event in a person’s life. Death may be final, but the effect of divorce lingers for a lifetime, so many consider it more traumatic than death. No one can honestly say that divorce is a breeze, that it doesn’t bother them at all, or that the kids are fine and are handling it very well.

The scars remain even if a person remarries. God intended marriage to be permanent, so married couples having problems should get professional counselling, and understand God’s plan for and timing in their lives, through prayer, as well as learning to manage their problems.”

Pastor Kennedy Karanja,
Church on the Rock, Kikuyu.

Views from a professional counsellor: Prevention is better than divorce

“Divorce seems to be more rampant in the middle class and the upper classes. A form of prevention would be to get married for the right reasons, as opposed to a reason like pooling resources or fear of loneliness. Go for pre-marital counselling to manage expectations such as finances (which is the most common of disagreements), children, etc.

People need to nurture their marriages, ie keep the flame alive, and constantly rekindle the romance. Use communication to learn about your partner over and over again as the marriage progresses and interests change.”
Suzanne Kidenda, Counsellor, Childline Kenya.