Huffington Post Archives – Herina Ayot

Huffington Post

I Fell In Love Carrying Another Man’s Child

Huffington Post /

I fell in love across the Atlantic in a coun­try more beau­ti­ful than God him­self while four months preg­nant with anoth­er man’s child. The first time I saw him, it was night­time in late August, the moon a per­fect sick­le. My plane land­ed in Accra, Ghana, and the air smelled like cur­ry spices, yam and dry heat. A van was wait­ing to retrieve us from the air­port, the dri­ver dressed in slacks stand­ing on the out­side with a sign that read “NYU in Ghana.” I rolled my lug­gage over and was greet­ed by anoth­er man, Seth. Seth was a CRA: Com­mu­ni­ty Res­i­dent Assis­tant. He was 26 years old, a native of Ghana and an employ­ee of the uni­ver­si­ty. They put him in the house to guide us stu­dents along, show us the ropes and answer the mil­lions of ques­tions we had liv­ing in a for­eign nation, like how to guard against being cheat­ed out of our mon­ey and how much a taxi should cost. Ori­en­ta­tion last­ed six hours the day after my arrival. We were told to avoid long walks at night for fear of rapists, to avoid car­ry­ing a bag for fear of mug­gers, to avoid drink­ing tap water for fear of cholera and to avoid mos­qui­toes for fear of malar­ia. “Symp­toms of malar­ia include but are not lim­it­ed to nau­sea, headache, loss of appetite and vom­it­ing,” Dr. Ako­sua Per­bi told us. If we expe­ri­ence any of these symp­toms, we were told we should alert a doc­tor right away. The hous­ing com­plex was beau­ti­ful, sur­round­ed on all sides by a barbed wire gate and guard­ed by a 24-hour secu­ri­ty guard. The brick cob­ble­stones inside were some­thing out of the Wiz­ard of Oz. I lived in a house full of six men… and anoth­er girl, an over­load of per­son­al­i­ty. Seth, how­ev­er, was my favorite. I watched him a lot. The uneasy way he saun­tered around. He’d come in… Read more at Huff­in­g­ton Post 

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5 Ways We Lose the Life We Would Have Loved

Huffington Post /

My favorite place in the world is not on an island beach. It’s not at an Egypt­ian spa or even in the soft caress of a man’s arms. My favorite place… is my bed­room. It’s serene. I paint­ed the walls a sub­tle shade of grey and installed a light dim­mer to get the per­fect light­ing to end the day, on my back nes­tled on top of my satin sheets, star­ing at the ceil­ing and imag­in­ing the day’s events past­ed there for my review. When I go over my own life and the lives of many of my friends, I notice such a dis­crep­an­cy between true pas­sion and prac­ti­cal liv­ing. I grad­u­at­ed from col­lege and set out to achieve my heart’s desires. One job led to the next and with each posi­tion I felt less than ful­filled, watch­ing my career tra­jec­to­ry head too far away from my goals. Then one night lay­ing in my Zen, talk­ing to God, and study­ing myself, I decid­ed to become an active par­tic­i­pant in my life, demand­ing from it what I want­ed instead of blind­ly accept­ing what it pre­sent­ed me with. Con­ve­nient­ly, around this time, I lost my job. I was­n’t that into it any­way. I want­ed to work again, to sink my teeth into some­thing I loved but I vowed not to make the same mis­takes over and find myself in an office cubi­cle watch­ing the clock until lunch. 1. Most of us accept posi­tions out of des­per­a­tion instead of hold­ing out for what we real­ly want It is true that we have real prob­lems and things cost real mon­ey. That is not some­thing that can be ignored, but my faith remind­ed me that a job is not a source of sus­te­nance, it’s only a resource. My source of income had­n’t changed. Heav­en has always been on my side. So instead of wor­ry­ing about my next pay­check, I .… read more at The Huff­in­g­ton Post.

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How I Learned to Trust Again…

Health and Wellness, Huffington Post /

My 7‑year-old son, Jere­mi­ah, has been suck­ing his thumb since birth. When he began devel­op­ing teeth, a cal­lous start­ed form­ing on his thumb in the area where teeth hit skin. About that same time I began devel­op­ing a very pla­ton­ic friend­ship with a man I met at church. It was slow at first, a brief hel­lo here, a wave good­bye there. I’d see him on Sun­days and he’d ask how my week was to which I would recap for him the hap­pen­ings at work, my car trou­ble, and the “new” thing I was doing to curb my then 2‑year-old’s thumb suck­ing habit. He start­ed sit­ting with me occa­sion­al­ly dur­ing ser­vice, or I with him, I’m not sure which. One day he sug­gest­ed lunch after church, to which I reluc­tant­ly oblig­ed. “You know I got the kids with me,” I said. The thumb suck­er and the oth­er one. “It’s fine. Bring them,” he answered. So I did. The months turned into years and we learned each oth­er, our life sto­ries, sour love affairs, brush­es with the law, encoun­ters with God. Once he bought me a gift for Christ­mas, which I prompt­ly returned. I can’t take this. I’m see­ing some­one. I dat­ed a lot and I told him. Most­ly cor­po­rate types, tai­lored suits, pol­ished shoes, a stark con­trast to who he was. Anoth­er time I went away on busi­ness and came back a week lat­er heart­bro­ken and torn. He was there with kind words. Fri­day nights when I had no oth­er plans, he’d come by with food and a movie. When my car broke down, he was there to give me a ride. When I was run­ning late, he’d get my chil­dren from school. When I was sim­ply lone­ly, I’d call him and we’d talk. So I asked him one day, “How come you’re so nice to me?” Read More at The Huff­in­g­ton Post

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The Most Valuable Lesson I’ve Learned From My Kids

Huffington Post, Uncategorized /

At first thought, one may think that Chris­sy and Miah are lit­tle girls, but despite the advice of fam­i­ly and the num­ber of con­cerned stares I get when I call their names in pub­lic, I con­tin­ue to refer to my twin boys Chris­t­ian and Jere­mi­ah as such. Although at age 6 and in the first grade, they are grow­ing out of their adorable “baby names,” and it is increas­ing­ly hard for me to come to terms with the fact that I’m bare­ly 28 years old and already I’ve been a moth­er for over six years. Friends of mine are fin­ish­ing dis­ser­ta­tions, tak­ing the bar exam, dat­ing, and plan­ning wed­dings, while I’m bal­anc­ing sin­gle moth­er­hood and a nine-to-five, and have added karate lessons three times a week to my list of things to do. I’m tired, but I made my bed so here I lie. It start­ed with a stom­ach ache in Accra, the cap­i­tal city of Ghana… READ MORE at Huff­in­g­ton Post.

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