Dear Pastor,

I am having a problem and I hope you can help me. Right now I am feeling very depressed. I am from a big family. My mother has seven children - five girls and two boys. Five of the children have different fathers. My mother taught us to sell our bodies to survive. Sex came as nothing to us. Sometimes we had sex with the same men to get money.

Two of my sisters got pregnant when they were 16 and one wasn't sure who was the father. My godmother helped me to go to high school and then to college. On my last year in college, I became pregnant for a policeman. We lived together for a while, but we broke up because he was too jealous.

Then I met a man who is twice my age. He has his own home and I went to live with him. I asked my mother to do days work for us. Because she is my mother, I gave her access to everywhere. My mother stole my money and when I confronted her she denied doing so.

started to give her gifts

She became very close to my boyfriend and he started to give her gifts. I told my mother not to come back and she said I can't stop her from coming here because my boyfriend and her love each other and he said that he prefers her over me. She said that they had sex.

Pastor, I have been crying for over a week. He admitted that he had sex with her once, but he never told her that he prefers her. He said when they had sex he was drunk. My mother has not changed. She is still dressing like young girls and prostituting herself. She has not been back to the house but my son is asking for her.

My boyfriend and I stopped sleeping together. My mother said my boyfriend and I are not married so I shouldn't run her. I am so depressed. Should I leave this man?

Y.W.

Dear Y.W.,

You should try your best to get your mother to see a family counsellor. Something has to be radically wrong with a woman who would go to bed with her daughter's man, and then excuse herself by saying that her daughter and the man were not married. That is disgraceful. She has no shame and the man doesn't have any shame either.

This man said he was drunk when they had sex. Was your mother also drunk? These are not little underage kids. These are grown people.

I suggest that you leave this man. Please don't allow the material things he may possess to prevent you from using common sense.

Get out of his life.

Pastor