To Love You Is Not To Like You.

If you don’t believe this, ask an African Parent.

I’ve come to believe that most parents do not like their children. I mean, they might love them like a parent should love a child, but they most certainly do not like their children.

I know you are wondering what the difference between “like” and “love” is, but that’s for me to know and for you to find out.

---

All my life, I have never really doubted the capacity of a parent to love their child, but I have looked at some parents and wondered if they really liked their children, beyond loving them. Mind you, this has nothing to do with parental responsibilities or their behaviours towards their children. If it was about this, then they were actually great parents, because boy, they take good care of their children. But again, is that all there is to great parenting?

The first time I wondered if a parent liked the child was when Brother Gabriel was dedicating his twins in our church. Everything was going smoothly until it got to the part where he would call the names of his children. My dears, you could imagine the shock on everyone’s face when he said the name of his daughter was “Evidence of God's Goodness.” A complete phrase, you guys! And then I spent the rest of the service wondering how she was going to introduce herself to her peers in school and whatnot. I thought it was going to be the worst name to exist until I heard that there were people with names like Consider, Mountain, Abstinence, Undefiled, Onwubiko, and many more. And I wondered what it feels like to live your entire life with a name that sounds like a lifetime joke. It must be really tough, but guess who is tougher? You that is bearing a name that proves how much your parents do not like you, even though they love you enough to give you life.

The second time I wondered if a parent really liked their child was when my Mummy bought me a princess dress that made me almost despise being a princess. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t a bad dress. But I remember how I didn’t feel so good in it. I didn’t like it. I tried explaining to her how it didn’t fit my aesthetics, and she replied to me with “you don’t know fashion.” My heart broke. No, it tore—because the heart is made of flesh and not glass. Tor. If it had ended just there, maybe I would have had a change of mind. But it didn’t. In fact, with how people stared at me with so much amusement, I knew that I looked like Harley Quinn. Guess what? My Mummy still didn’t see what was funny about the dress. She must have thought they were fascinated by my display of clownery—sorry, royalty. Well, I reached my church and saw my friends dressed like clowns too. Oh well, misery can be good company, sometimes. It must be nice knowing that we all had parents who didn’t like us, although they loved us enough to get us Christmas clothes.

How about the part of talking about your embarrassing moments in public? I mean, I’ve seen parents share sensitive details about their children, for good reasons, even. And then I’d look at the child who is praying for the ground to open up and swallow him, red with embarrassment, and then to the parent who doesn’t stop talking, but goes on to say how they don’t flush the toilet after usage, but would be forming fine boy outside. Would they even stop there? How can they, when they’ve not added how they don’t bathe on Saturdays? Or how they bedwetted two nights ago? Even talk about how they don’t brush before they eat? How they litter food grains when they eat, too? They would say it all and end it with, “It is God that would help us with all these children.” The funny part? It is indeed God that would help you with dealing with the fact that your parents do not like you, but love you enough to want to see you become a better person.

I could go on and on with more instances, like when they forget how you do your chores diligently, but remember that you never lock the door properly? Or how pressing your phone all the time gives them a fever? Or should we talk about how they would complain that you don’t have enough sleep, but why the hell are you still in bed by 6 am? The weird hairstyles they chose for you when you were younger? The gaslighting when you ask for the money you lent to them? There’s indeed no winning for us. But the truth is, we see these people break their backs for us every single day. We’ve seen how they would refuse to sleep just because they want to give us the life we deserve. We’ve seen how they would rather lose everything than lose us—because to them, we are worth more than anything. We’ve seen them do so much, and even the ones that are little are still so much.

What do I have to say? You might not like your name or the clothes you were forced to wear to your school’s party. You may not like the fact that your parents’ friends weirdly look at you due to the embarrassing things they know about you, and you may not like that you cannot just have your peace, just as you want it. You might have to deal with the fact that you might never have it your way with them. But one thing is certain: they love you so much—maybe not how you want to be loved, but they really do love you. And that is much better than them liking you, in my opinion.

But you see that name that they gave to you? Better change it!

---

---