What will make a mother hate her own child?

We married for four years before we finally had a son. Those four years before my wife got pregnant weren’t easy for us as a couple. My wife could wake up at dawn and cry just because she had married for four years without a child. She became overly sensitive to everything around her.

Two people would be laughing in a corner and she will think they were laughing at her. My dad would call me on the phone and she would like to know what my dad told me. A colleague of hers would give birth just after a year of marriage and she would be home crying thinking other people are questioning why she hadn’t given birth.

Finally, she got pregnant. The joy was boundless. The praises were endless. The singing never stopped in our house. She was overly happy just as she was overly sensitive when she lacked a child of her own. As a husband, all I could do was be her support and also share in the joy that had come to our home. 

Our baby was born at one dawn in a hospital nearby. For once, our happiness had a form. We could touch it. Our happiness had a voice. It could smile and cry. He became our everything and even pushed me to the side as a husband. My place in the bed was taken from me. My place in her bosom was also stolen from me. I couldn’t complain. It was better than having a wife who woke up at night and cried.

For a long time, we were fulfilled until when our child was two years. A lot of things didn’t add up in his behaviors. At his age, he couldn’t talk and do some basic things that kids his age would do. In the night he wouldn’t sleep and he wouldn’t cry. He’ll just lie there looking at the ceiling and not even turning. His eating style took a dip. He won’t eat. You force the food down his throat and he would vomit it out. The biggest of our worries came when our child couldn’t maintain eye contact. He had an unusual way of looking at things.

At that point, doctors told us that they suspect autism in our child but nothing was conclusive until series of tests were ran. He was three when doctors confirmed that he had autism. I’m a man but the day I went online to read about autism and what it entails, I cried. It’s not the present that scared me. The future got me very terrified. My wife got back to crying at night again. Our son slept in the middle of our bed, so all night we could see him and hear him talking to himself and making funny sounds. My wife couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t sleep too.

She started looking back at all the places she went with the child, trying to figure out the possible place that someone touched our child and gave him the sickness. She believed strongly that it was the work of someone evil. Someone who didn’t like the kind of happiness we were enjoying since the birth of our child. “Or it’s from our hometown? Do you remember when went there for Christmas? Someone might have given it to him while there.” I said, “It’s not important now. What’s important is how we are going to raise this child.”

At some point, my wife withdrew a little. She didn’t care what happened to him. He would be crying and she would be sitting there unconcerned. If I’m around, I had to go and cater for him. We had a lot of fights because of this behavior. I told her, “You can’t run from this situation. Do you remember when you didn’t have a child? You have one now so why run from him?” She said, “Childlessness is better than this. Now I’ve become a laughing stock. They say I went to a fetish priest for the child when I wasn’t giving birth. It’s the reason I’m having the child of a water god.” I told her, “You can’t pay attention to what people say. Bring that attention to the boy and let’s help him grow.”

We were introduced to groups of parents who are raising autistic children. We went to meetings and learned a lot. At some point, my wife stopped attending the meetings. She said, “I’m tired already. I can’t do this for the rest of my life. There should be a point where I get to rest. I can’t live this way all my life.” I asked, “So what do we do?” She said, “I don’t know.” I said, “Then let’s keep going until we figure something out.”

Currently, she’s totally withdrawn from the life of our child. I’m the one doing everything—teaching him, playing with him, feeding him and all. We don’t have a lot of money to hire a nanny so we go to the village and bring people to help. They stay for weeks and disappear. The last one we had lasted for only two weeks. She told us her mother was sick in the village and wanted to go and visit her. She went and never came back. The existence of this child has taken away everything from us. People don’t even want to associate with us because they believe we are bad luck.

This is the time I and my wife have to come together and fight but she had withdrawn. The worse part is, we no longer live as a husband and wife. Sometimes she blames my genes for the situation of our child. “It’s your blood that’s weak. See how we suffered before giving birth to this.” She calls him ‘this’ because she thinks our son is not human enough.

Our son is five. We should be having more children but my wife had closed up her legs. She told me one night when I was trying to get her to sleep with me, “Don’t come and give me another problem child. I’m not ready to die young.” I married early. I wanted to have all my kids at a young age in life so I and my wife could live a life of fun while still young. As it stands now, I’m stuck at a place where I can’t go forward and can’t go backward. Everything is at a standstill for me. I should be somewhere in life by now but I’m here spending everything on the healthcare of my child while the woman I call wife lives as though she is not part of us.

My mom comes for the child sometimes. She would stay with him for weeks and I will later go for him. One day my wife said, “Why do you bother bringing him back every now and then. If your mother wants him, let her keep him? She’s more experienced and can take care of him better than we can.” I only looked at her twisted lips that she used to say that and walked away. She would do everything not to see that boy again. It may sound crazy but sometimes when I’m not around, I get the fear that my wife could do something horrible to our child. So when I’m out, I’m always in a rush to be home. I’ve lost all my social life because I have a son who needs me every day. 

Sometimes I want to give up on the marriage and know that I’m in this alone but being alone in this scares the hell out of me. I’ve had a conversation with her on several occasions. I’ve asked her what the future looks like for both of us. I’ve reported her to her parents and they had called her home on different occasions but she comes back with the same attitude toward our boy. 

It gets tiring and I wish there’s a way through it or around it. I’ve spoken to a lot of people and don’t know what to do again. All that’s left for me is to get a place to rant and that’s exactly what I’m doing here. Apart from that. I don’t know why I’m sharing this story here.