What Baba Segi reminds me of

“Lola Shoneyin’s ‘The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives’ portrays men’s role in infertility and the need for this reality to be adequately acknowledged; a woman’s value need not depend on whether or not she has a biological child.”

It was supposed to be a Netflix original series. That was the plan. Mo Abudu’s Ebony Life Studios had acquired the right from Lola Shoneyin, and the literary community was looking forward to seeing the cinematic version of their favourite novel, ‘The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives’. Shortly after the plan was announced, Netflix pulled the plug on its funding of original productions from Nigeria. Till date, it has not given details about why it took the decision. All we bank on are rumours and conjecture.

But, the good news is that the dream hasn’t died. Netflix pulled its carpet, but Abudu has been able to get other partners to replace it with a fluffy rug, a movie instead of a series. And come December, we will see actors such as Iyabo Ojo, Odunlade Adekola, Omowunmi Dada and Shaffy Bello breathe life into Shoneyin’s lively book in which a polygamous man, Baba Segi, one day finds out that nearly his whole life has been a joke, a lie, with his wives as the major players in the drama of his life. Were it not for his youngest wife, the beautiful and university-educated Bolanle, he might have gone to his grave without knowing the truth.

While those who have read the book are speculating about who and who will play what characters, I am more concerned about Baba Segi’s real-life replicas. The news of the movie adaptation reminds me of a woman. Throughout the first year of her marriage, her menstrual flow was constant. This cycle would be repeated for the next seven years. And, in those years when her period maintained its constancy, tears and sorrow were her uninvited guests. They never alerted her before they start cascading down her cheeks, leaving her helpless hubby to play the consoler when it happened in his presence. Many times she cried when he was away at work or visiting friends and family members.

Months after months, her monthly flow never ceased for once. The prayers and the fasting did not work the miracle she expected. Science seemed to be where she should have put her hope and trust. After going for series of tests, moving from one hospital to the other, a gynaecologist told her it was time she tried the In-vitro fertilisation (IVF). It is estimated that approximately 3.5 to 5 million children have been born worldwide following ART treatment. It is estimated that over 40,000 babies have been born through IVF in Nigeria since 1989.

The IVF route did not come cheap. She and her husband had to cough out about $3,300. It could have been more if luck had not smiled on them and the first IVF was successful. Age was still on my friend’s side so good eggs were harvested, fertilised and implanted in her uterus. And it did not take time for a successful pregnancy to occur in her uterus. And like the parents of Louise Brown, the first child successfully born through IVF treatment in July 1978, luck smiled on my friend and her hubby, she carried the pregnancy to term and they had a son— thus joining the expanding list of beneficiaries of the work of Robert G. Edwards, Patrick Steptoe and Jean Purdy.

Many women go through as much as ten IVFs and still have to adopt babies or take babies from family members. A popular pastor’s wife’s quest for those tiny tots who love to scatter homes with no knowledge of how to fix them saw her waiting for a decade. She sought help, including IVF. The money went down the medical drain and her tummy remained in perfect shape. Eleven IVFs refused to yield results and she opted for adoption, and life continued.

Before my friend took the IVF route, a pastor, who came for a programme in her church to pray for women, told them that in trying to have babies, they should emulate Sarah and Anna who never had IVF. He also mentioned other women in the Bible who conceived without scientific help. My friend, at that point, felt she had backslid into sin and was not trusting God enough. She was torn between going with science or with faith. Her gynaecologist resolved the dilemma for her: IVF is not satanic, the gynaecologist explained. In fact, the gynaecologist added a clincher: IVF is a miracle from God.

There was another issue for my friend and her husband to resolve: who should know about the IVF. They decided it should be for their ears only. And of course, the medical hands involved.

The day my friend narrated her story, another woman shared hers as well. She also had IVF. Not one, not two, not three, not four…She had ten and still there was no pregnancy. She eventually went the adoption route. She blamed the fact that she did not act on time on the belief in Africa that such matter was spiritual and should be left to God to handle.

My friend buttresses this point by saying it is wrongly generally believed that a Nigerian man can never be sterile. Thirty per cent of infertility, my friend says, according to statistics, is traceable to men who have either low sperm count or zero sperm count. Baba Segi falls in this category.

Infertility is not just primary. A couple who have had a kid before may find it difficult to have another, a situation experts describe as “secondary infertility”. It is said to account for more than half of all infertility cases.

My friend believes it is time Nigeria and the rest of Africa went the way of nations such as Canada and Belgium where universal coverage of IVF improved the use of safe fertility treatments. She also believes the time had come to drum it in the hearing of ignorant men: men too can be infertile with either zero sperm count or low sperm count, thus being a major contributor to what researchers have found out: five to eight per cent of couples battle infertility worldwide and the prevalence in sub-Saharan Africa is higher, with 10 to 30 per cent of couples in Nigeria slugging it out.

An expert says a man will have low sperm count and it is the woman that will be taking drugs; lifestyle factor such as smoking of cigarettes, marijuana and cocaine plays a major role in male infertility. Obesity reduces sperm count, and what men eat and the vitamins they takes are key to improving their sperm and reproductive organs.

My final take: Lola Shoneyin’s ‘The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives’ portrays men’s role in infertility, and the need for this reality to be adequately acknowledged. A woman’s value needs not depend on whether or not she has a biological child; government need to put in place health coverage that can reduce the financial burden of IVF; in-laws, friends, family members and the society at large need to stop depressing women in the waiting room.