Pregnant for unemployed ganja smoker

Dear Pastor,

I am 30 years old and I am married. I have a four-year-old child. My husband asked me whether I would agree to take one of his sisters to live with us. He said she would stay with our child during the day and attend evening classes. I agreed.

We paid her minimum wage, she had her own room, and she ate what she wanted. My husband and I have good jobs. We took care of this girl. I treated her as my younger sister. I bought nice clothes for her. I told her that she can go home every two weeks. Sometimes she said she would rather stay. We told her that the only thing we did not want her to do was to invite any man to the house.

My husband does not smoke, but he told me that he suspected that his sister had someone visit her because he came home and he smelt ganja. He asked her about it and she denied that anybody was there who smoked. It wasn't long after we found out that she became friends with a young man living on the avenue. He was a ganja smoker. It is possible that he is the one who visited her. When we asked her if he came to the house, she said yes, but she did not let him inside. We reminded her that we didn't want anybody like that in our house, or around our child.

I had a bigger problem with her because everything we discussed in the house, she told her mother about it. Once, I spoke to my husband about his friendship with another woman and my husband was very upset with me. This girl told her mother that her brother had another woman with me and the girl is prettier than me. How did her mother hear that? It was his sister who told her mother.

We used to let her sleep in the same room with our daughter, but we stopped doing so when we realise that she is taking news to her mother. We moved her to a little room that we have for a helper, so that she will not hear anything that her brother and I were discussing. The girl got upset and told her brother that I don't like her, so she is going home. Her brother told her she was ungrateful. He did not beg her to stay. We paid her and told her that she can go on the weekend.

To our surprise, after two months, her mother told us that she is pregnant. The same guy on the road, who was a ganja smoker, got her pregnant. We gave this girl an opportunity to help herself while she was helping us with our child and she allowed this unemployed young man to get her pregnant. Now, she has added a burden on her parents. My husband says he is not prepared to give her a cent to help her prepare for the baby, because giving her money would be helping the child's father, who does not have any ambition. I have forgiven her for her behaviour, I thought she was more intelligent. I have sent some help for her, but my husband is not aware of it.

I spoke to the young man and he said he is not sure that he is responsible for the pregnancy. I asked him if he knew of any other young man who was seeing her, he said no, but he couldn't tell what she was doing when she went home to visit her parents. My husband says that he is not helping her any more. She has not got any money from the young man who got her pregnant. Her mother is calling all the time and telling us how things are hard with them.

What do you think we should do for her?

L.

Dear L.,

Your young sister-in-law allowed this young man to have his way with her. You and your husband were hoping that she would make something good of herself, but she did not embrace the opportunity. The young man used her. He did not protect her from pregnancy. It is possible that he did not even used a condom. Now he is saying he is not sure that he got her pregnant because she could have had a man in her community.

What he was saying by the answer he gave to you, is that he did not trust your sister-in-law. He found her easy to get, so to speak, so another man could have found her easy to get, too.

Dont give up on her. You may not want her to return to your house, but if you can help her from time to time with baby stuff, and even with food, the good Lord will bless you. She is young, and she made a mistake.

Pastor