Toothpaste row in Marriage Breakup

by Eromose Ileso

It is no longer news that marriages in Nigeria are collapsing like a pack of cards. The ratio of divorce has increased like the regular storms finding expression in the Pacific. 

A couple of years ago, you would seldom find matrimonial cases on cause list of matters in States High Court, but with the changing times, our High Courts and Customary Courts have a bevy of matrimonial cases at their disposal. 

While the reason(s) for the collapse of most marriages vary according to the parties on a case by case basis, in most instance, an inability to tolerate the other party is a prominent factor in most breakup. 

The culture where would be couples spend so much time, energy and resources preparing for a wedding, while neglecting the most important aspect which is the marriage has become prevalent.

Yet, you cannot rule out the fact that most of the things that have caused the breakup of marriages are at best trivial issues borne out of the inability of one or two of the parties to exercise restraint. 

Though what is trivial varies according to the character of an individual.

Ordinarily, it is virtually impossible for something as trivial as an inanimate object, toothpaste to end a living institution of a marriage. While on the other hand, cases abound where it has indeed led to the breakup of a marriage, and at other times, it has almost led to the breakup of a marriage.

This was how a row over toothpaste led to the breakup of a marriage.

There are people that prefer to press the rear of a tube when putting a paste on their toothbrush, while other people prefer to press the tube of the paste from anywhere, whether it’s the rear, middle or at the top.

In this particular case, the husband prefers to press his from the rear of the tube, while his wife does hers from anywhere in the tube. So on this fateful day, he complained that his wife was always fond of pressing the tube anywhere as it makes the tube undulant, her reply was that whether there was anything wrong with it, the response of the man's wife seem to exacerbate the situation which led the man to slap his wife, and the woman retaliated by slapping her husband back. 

The man's response was to beat his wife black and blue, which led to a swollen face and several bruises all over her body.

She packed her baggages and went to her parent's house. Her father's response was that a wife should not leave her husband's house just like that, he sent her back, but the woman's mother did not take the assault on her daughter likely, so he got her daughter's husband arrested. 

When he eventually got out of jail, he simply told his wife that since his mother-in-law arrested him, his wife should leave his house, and go and stay with her mother. Just like that, the simple act of how to use a toothpaste led to the breakup of their marriage, and to this day they are still separated.

There are people that would have reacted differently to such a situation. Obviously, no parent would take the assault on their daughter likely, especially when you take into consideration that one hit could lead to the demise of a person, cases abound where this has happened. So it is understandable that the mother-in-law got her son-in-law arrested, and the response of the man was to send his wife away after he got bail.

It is out of place for a man to hit his wife no matter what, the man obviously should have exercised restraint instead of beating up his wife over the use of a toothpaste, when just buying another one for himself would have solved the situation of whether pressing the tube of the paste from a particular position is acceptable to him or not.

It was this solution that a clergy proffered when he preached on a particular Sunday morning in church. In his congregation there was a couple that was going through the same situation of a where and where not to press the tube of a toothpaste, they were having the same issues that the couple above have had, the clergy simply said, instead of arguing over such a thing, while not you (the man) buy another one for yourself, 'is it not just a toothpaste' he said.

Certainly the easy way out in such situation would be to simply buy another toothpaste to avoid arguments, as there are habits which some persons exhibit inadvertently that you cannot change. It just sticks, there are some that leaves the lid of a toothpaste open after using it, and they also press it from anywhere, it is not as if it is deliberate or an act met to offend the other party, it just an act that has become innate in them that you cannot be changed.

Bishop (Mrs.) Peace Okonkwo of TREM, mentioned at the 2015 National Women's Conference of New Covenant Gospel Church that though, she has been married for almost 40 years, she is the kind of person that likes to press the tube of a toothpaste from anywhere, but her husband has learnt to live with it, though he was initially at variance with it. Yet it is little things as this that has led to the breakup of marriages and heated arguments amongst young couples.

On the issue of one of the couples getting their own toothpaste to use, some would say since an husband and wife are one, majority of the things they use should be one, that they should use the same toothpaste. 

In hindsight, it is better to toll the path of wisdom to avoid a larger problem, and get another toothpaste in such a scenario, if any of the couple cannot cope with such a situation, as "Through wisdom is an house builded; and by understanding it is established:" (Proverbs 24:3).