🤫 Confess💰 Money Matters
I Lied to My Family About My Salary for Four Years. They Still Think I Earn 120k.
W
Wild Stallion from Awka
13 days ago
I was 29, working as a mid-level accountant in Ilorin, and my actual salary was 380,000 naira a month. But for four years, I told my people I was earning 120k. The lie started small. When I got the job in 2019, my father had just retired from the civil service, and my mother's shop was barely moving. I knew if I told them the truth, every problem in the extended family would become my problem. So I sent 40k monthly and complained about how Lagos was choking me. My younger brother needed school fees, I sent 30k and said it was all I had. My mother's sister had surgery, I contributed 50k and told them I borrowed it. Each time, they thanked me and said God would bless me. And I would feel something cold in my chest. The lie almost came out last December. My cousin was getting married in Ilorin, and my mother asked me to contribute 100k for the aso-ebi and food. I said I did not have it. She said, "But you just changed your car." I had bought a fairly used Camry, and I told her it was a loan from my office cooperative. She looked at me for a long time and said nothing. That silence was worse than any accusation. I knew she knew something was off, but she did not push. And I did not confess. I just kept sending my 40k and pretending. Now, four years later, the lie has become my life. My father still calls me "the one who is managing." My brother thinks I am struggling. And I have saved enough to buy a small plot in Ilorin, but I cannot even celebrate it because nobody knows. What I have learned is that lying to protect yourself from family pressure is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. The money is there, but the trust is not. And I am not sure I can ever tell them the truth without them feeling like I have been cheating them for years. So I just keep quiet and let them think I am poor. It is a strange kind of prison, but it is my own.
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