Growing up, I was never the serious child, or at least that’s what everyone thought. I spent most of my childhood away from home, living with extended family. I left my parents when I was four because I wanted to be with my grandpa in Benin while they were in Osun.
Grandpa died in 2002, and my care was handed over to my aunt. They said it was because of schooling and relocation, but it felt more like life just happened that way.
My aunt got married in 2004, the same year I finished primary school and started secondary school. I stayed with her even after she married. I became her firstborn in every sense.
Those days were wild. I wasn’t a bad child, but I was always in trouble. No week passed without the two of us swinging between deep affection and fierce discipline.
I wanted to be good, but I never seemed to get it right. The things I wanted to do, I didn’t. The things I didn’t want to do, I somehow found myself doing.
Eventually, I learned to keep myself company. I would cut papers into WHOT cards and play alone in my room. I had no friends and wasn’t allowed to have any, especially not boys. My life was a neat triangle of school, church, and home. My aunt wasn’t a bad person; she was just new to raising a child.
She thought the best way to keep me safe was to cut off every possible distraction. When I finished primary school, I received scholarships to two boarding schools. She rejected both, saying if I was that stubborn under her roof, boarding house would only make me worse.
But here’s the part that truly shaped me, the reason I left my first university without a certificate.
When I was younger, I wanted to be a pilot. The sky felt mysterious. I wanted to know what happened up there. Then someone mentioned that flight school was expensive, and just like that, the dream faded. In secondary school, I decided I wanted to be a scientist, even though I had no idea what kind.
Nobody ever explained that scientist wasn’t a course. When I registered for JAMB in 2009 and flipped through that thick brochure, I couldn’t find scientist listed anywhere. I found Biochemistry instead, and I thought, I like chemistry and biology, so this should work.
That’s another thing I’ve learned. Students in Nigeria don’t get proper career guidance. Nobody tells you the difference between what you want to be and what you can actually study to get there.
So, I chose Biochemistry at Osun State University because I wanted to return to my roots. But that year, my WAEC result was a disaster.
I failed Mathematics. Out of the whole set, I was one of the two who failed only Maths. I came back the next year to rewrite it. My Chemistry teacher encouraged me to pick Chemical Engineering for JAMB, but I ended up admitted for Industrial Chemistry at the University of Benin in 2011.
Life in Uniben wasn’t easy. My aunt worked as a teacher at the university’s primary school, so I lived at home, not in the hostel. When I came back late from the lab, she accused me of lying about my classes. Those accusations hurt deeply.
In 200 level, after a long strike, I got a scholarship opportunity and my first laptop. A coursemate sent me ebooks, mostly novels, and that’s how my obsession with reading began. I would spend entire days in the library, lost in stories.
Then a friend on Facebook asked me to help her write a short story. I didn’t know how, so I researched storytelling and practiced. That was the beginning of everything. But it also marked the start of my academic downfall.
I didn’t tell anyone my results. Nobody asked.
By 300 level, I had stopped attending most classes. I was writing stories, reading novels, and telling myself that the scholarship would save me. On the day I was meant to write the final scholarship exam, there was no electricity anywhere, not at home or in school.
Every business centre was closed. I knew right then it was over. But who could I tell? My parents were in Lagos, my aunt would never understand, and I couldn’t face the shame.
When it was time to return home after final year, I quietly boarded a bus to Bayelsa instead of Lagos. I texted my mum that I was sorry for failing her, then I disappeared.
I knew no one in Bayelsa. The first night, a stranger offered me his room. He asked me to pay for the meat and the keke we took there. I left by morning. That evening, I sat at a popular joint where women line up to sell themselves, just thinking of where to sleep.
A lady walked up to me and said, “You look so lost.” I thought she was trying to recruit me, but then she said something that still rings in my head: “No be everything be fuck.”
That sentence saved me. She told me who I could ask for help, but she couldn’t take me home. I didn’t do what she suggested because I was scared. That night, I slept on an abandoned bus at a mechanic village.
Policemen woke me up at midnight, threatened to arrest me, and took my last money. I cried myself to sleep in that same bus.
The next morning, I found a construction site and begged for work. The site owner agreed to let me pack sand with the labourers. That small chance changed everything.
From there, I got accommodation and eventually met my boss, a man who remains one of my biggest supporters to this day.
I left Bayelsa in 2018 after reconciling with my family. I stayed in Lagos for a year, then moved to Mowe, Ogun State, where I started teaching.
That same year, my church offered me a scholarship for having the highest JAMB score among members, 313. Now, I’m studying in Akure. People see my white hair and call me “old man,” wondering why someone my age is back in school.
I still make mistakes, but I keep going. I’m in 400 level now, still chasing that first-class dream. Everyone thinks I’m brilliant.
The truth is, I’m just determined. I want to teach Mathematics and Further Mathematics in secondary schools. I want to help students make better career choices, to guide them the way I wish someone had guided me.
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