My siblings are trying to ruin my marriage.

My immediate family is posing a huge threat to my marriage now and I find it difficult to handle it. When we were growing up, our parents were not in good terms, they were always fighting each other and quarreling. No week will pass without my parents quarrelling. It got to a point that neighbors constantly come to separate them. After some time, neighbors got used to their fight and stopped coming to separate them. It affected my siblings and I because people made fun of us. Other children will use it to spite us and parents used my family as a bad example but one thing was certain, my siblings and I were so close.

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We were four children and I was the first. When I was 19, my parents separated. My father married another woman but my mom did not remarry. She toiled day and night to feed us. I was even thinking I wouldn’t further my education because of how poor we were. My siblings began to hawk for us to feed but my mom insisted I go to the University and I did. Since I graduated, I have been working and sending money home. It gets very overwhelming for me sometimes because my mom cannot make enough to take care of my siblings and my father has never contacted us since they separated. All my siblings are in the University now and I shoulder almost 70 percent of their bills.

I am married now and I still find myself heavily invested in my siblings. The annoying thing is that they have also become very relaxed and dependent on me so much that it frustrates me. Before I got married, I took out a loan to pay their fees. It was 1 million naira and even after I got married, I was paying the loan. When my husband found out, he paid off the loan and now, I still take care of my siblings even when I already have a child. They keep coming back even after I told them that I do not have the capacity to foot all these bills. I told them to get a side job to meet their needs because I have family responsibility too and I don’t want my husband to carry it alone.

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They didn’t listen. They have become entitled and it’s affecting me. One of them came the other day and said so many terrible things to my husband and I about how we are stingy and wicked. He insulted my husband so much and my husband has been very angry since then. He said he didn’t want to see any of my family members again except my mom. I love my siblings but I can’t continue like this. My husband has warned me never to give them his money and what I earn is not enough to send to them. All I have been sending to them is from my husband. I am tired. Even my mom is not helping matters. I am not saying I won’t help them but I can no longer carry the burden entirely. It’s causing huge strife now.