What Grows When Nothing Is Watered

For every girl surviving Nigeria

No one tells you

that being born here

isn’t just birth—

it’s initiation

into silence,

into swallowing yourself

so small,

you vanish

between expectations and shame.

You learn early

that love sometimes

comes wearing a raised hand.

That discipline can mean bruises,

and tenderness is a language

your parents never learned.

You grow up

with your voice stuck

behind your ribs,

watching boys become men

and girls become

either too much,

or nothing at all.

They ask if you’re pregnant

before they ask if you’re okay.

They ask if you’re promiscuous

before they ask if you’re tired.

They don’t ask—

they assume,

loudly,

publicly,

as if your body

is theirs to narrate.

You become your own shelter,

building strength from the ruins.

You rise—

not because it’s easy,

but because you have no choice.

And even then,

they say

it must be a man,

must be shame,

must be sin.

But you—

you are evidence

of what grows

when nothing is watered.

You are the bloom

that chose to live anyway.

And that is not weakness.

That is war.

So if no one tells you today:

you are not a failure.

You are not a problem.

You are not imagining this pain.

You are a woman—

and still,

somehow,

a miracle.

SUPPORT THIS