New Telegraph

Women: Staying calm in the face of stormy pandemic

Life usually becomes hard for everyone during a pandemic since the casualties mostly are women and children who carry the extra burdens of seeing to wellness of the family. According to Raquel Lagunas, director of the gender team at the United Nations Development Programme: “Because of their reproductive roles in society, they are the ones taking care of the children, house, food, and survival of families.” OLUWATOSIN OMONIYI x-rays the lives of a few women, how they are coping and surviving the terrible times

Living with a man who lost his job and three children to cater for, Olawunmi Hakeeb, 42 and mother of three, had no option but to take off the expenses from where the expenses were hanging. She took up, by reviewing the family’s expenses, first by stepping down the children from an expensive private school to a more affordable school around the house where she wouldn’t spend on transportation at all. She said they were able paying about N270,000 for the children.

Already, she said they were gradually adjusting when her husband got salary cut during the first wave of the pandemic. “I didn’t know that salary cut would eventually lead to sack when his company was doing restructuring. Mrs. Hakeeb said she was doing fruits and snacks packages to supply to companies but with the sack, she has added hair making to her skill so as to be able to support her family.

“I also encouraged my husband to turn his car into cab, to join bolt taxi system,” she said. Gladzy Mordi, mother of two is not sure how long she can hold forth for her husband who is becoming depressed by the day. She told New Telegraph that coping with the stress of the burden factored by the pandemic wouldn’t have been a problem for her if her husband had been supportive morally and understandingly.

“My loving husband has changed totally, no more the amiable and cool headed man I used to know. He now nags and complains just too much almost about nothing. He nags me and the children to crazy, sometimes, the children would rather prefer to stay outside the house while their father is inside till he enters the bedroom to sleep because they are afraid they might irritate him,” she stated.

Mordi lamented that the pandemic has not only stolen her home, it has also taken her husband and away from her. According to her, the family survives on her merger salary of N85,000 as against N145,00 from her net income.

In addition to that, she said had to rush to acquire a skill alongside her eldest child who is 17. While the 17-year-old boy is acquiring skill in auto engineering, with a specialty in auto electrical commonly called Rewire.

While she acquired skill in food packaging and service giving jobs. She explained that people clean their houses and compounds, she is prepared to give those services and or go to markets, help prepare foods where some are too busy to do that.

“I tell you that I have not been in shortage of demands for my services. In a way, thanks to this terrible times, otherwise I wouldn’t have realised I can joggle my corporate job with decent menial jobs as well,” she said. As for her husband, James, she hope that he would soon come to terms with the reality that times have changed, hence, necessary adjustment.

For Stella Adesuyi, a 34-year-old hair stylist and mother of three, this period means working longer hours and spending less especially on frivolities. “Already, I am used to working hard and long hours, taking charge and managing well. What I did is just to diversify on business, I have added to my salon business, interior decorator, curtains, rugs, carpet and house cleaning. I have also cut down my pride by now agreeing to do home service for customers,” she said. Although, Stella’s husband is still in employment, a customer service officer with one of the new generation banks, she said she just has to augment his income to be able to support the family.

“The spirit is accepting the fact of the reality, brace with determination to beat the hard times. After all, they say, tough times never last but tough people do, I will surely survive this period too,” she believes.

It’s a different story for Pauline Adejoke, a teacher and expectant mother of four children. She told New Telegraph that her husband ran away from home leaving a note behind instructing her and his grown up children not to bother to look for him. She said her husband who was working with a marine firm lost his job during the company restructuring.

“Not knowing how to fend for four children, also has extended family to cater for and still expecting a child, my husband ran away leaving me to sort it out. We can’t even reach him on the phone but he is well and alive,” she said. However, Adejoke has taken to petty trading of provision, kerosene and fruits. She has added doing private lessons for children on the street for N50 per week.

“If I don’t do the lesson at such ridiculous low price, parents will not encourage their children to come out and I have myself and children to fend for. I believe this terrible period shall pass by someday,” she said. For Jade Ezinne, a Human Resources manager, it feels different to be in the driver’s seat for once. “I now understand better what my husband passes through quietly. It is now me who shout manage, manage in the house because I support largely my husband’s income.

He has turned to a night taxi driver,” she said. She added that she used to feel distress but it has faded. “As long as my husband is also in the struggle, we are both doing something on a daily routine, I can bear it. The confusion and prayer is to be able to resist the temptation o push the children to the street to do something.

We really want to save them from being on the streets and wish to give them the best,” she said. The global pandemic is a blessing in disguise for Grace Yakubu, a writer and mother of two. Acording to her, the toll it takes on her is for her to wake up earlier than normal, 4:am to fry doughnut, prepare coffee tea, cook local rice known as Ofada rice with its stew for early corporate workers who are on the rush to their offices. “I must confess that I smile to the bank on weekly basis.

I don’t feel that my husband left me either for another woman or to a place I don’t know. That is his headache. What matters mostly is that I can now provide the basic for the children and myself, I don’t have to beg anyone to stand on my feet.

I am also going back to school for my masters degree and that I will be able to cater for, with proceed from my writing profession. Covid-19 will also pass away, then every one of us will be faced with what is left of humanity,” she said.

What we found is that despite the new stresses, women are drawing upon their inner strength to survive and even thrive. “Women are responding in the ways that they often do: with an incredible display of resilience,” says Loyce Pace, president of International based Global Health Council, a coalition of academic institutions, think tanks and groups. “However heavy the burdens, women are stepping up and saying, ‘OK, now what? Let’s unpack this, let’s get it done, and then let’s convert that feeling into action.’ “

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