Dear Pastor,

I am a regular reader of your column. I buy the Star every day just to read your column.

I was living in fear for more than 12 years. I was living with a man who have children. I have two. This man started to visit me until we became very good friends.

He told me he was married but his wife left him and moved out all the furniture from the house. She also left the children. He was abroad. When he came back, his woman sold everything, including his car.

After he told me his problem, I was very sorry for him. I used to be a higgler at a school gate. When I began talking to this man, I had money.

The first step I made was to lend him $50,000 to help him purchase a car to run taxi. He paid me back $32,000 leaving $18,000. He never gave me the balance.

One day he invited me to live with him. I told him I did not want to get involved with his wife. He told me they were separated. I told him he has to get a divorce first before I lived with him. He said he didn't have any money to do the divorce.

I started to go to the house. I put grills on the windows. I bought furniture. I took him with one bed. A woman who had a child by him took him to court for maintenance. He did not have any money. The judge told him he should pay $13,000 or spend six months in prison. I sent a friend with the money to pay for him. The woman who took him to court was living with another man.

The little girl used to spend weekends with us. The mother never took good care of her. She started to stay with us. We sent her to primary school and high school. She passed seven subjects. When we took her, we did not even have her birth certificate. I raised this girl from she was nine until she was 18.

Her father died and her mother wanted to take over the funeral. Before he died, he had filed for divorce but it was not finalised. She went to the funeral home and demanded the body. They told her it could not work that way. She wanted to take over the house.

I lived with the man for 21 years. He is dead but Water Commission is sending me bills he owes for water.

I gave this man a good funeral. I packed my things to leave before he died. He told me he was going to kill me if I did. I was afraid to tell people. He didn't give me money to buy grocery.

After he died, I got letters from the Legal Aid people telling me to bring the papers I have for everything. The funeral home charged me $300,000, plus other funeral expenses. Nobody contributed any money except his daughter, who gave me $20,000.

His wife said that she is going to take me to court. I pray God will help me. His wife didn't have money to bury him but now she is fighting for everything. She even wants her husband's bank book but never had one.

S.A

Dear S.A.,

I am sorry you are having such difficult problems with the wife of the man with whom you lived and did your best to help.

As I see it, you need to seek the help of a lawyer. Perhaps the Legal Aid people are representing the wife of the deceased. The man was married. If he wanted to divorce his wife, it was all in his mind but he did not pursue it. So you are going to have to walk away from that house, as I see it.

However, you might be able to claim for what you spent on his funeral.

I am not a lawyer but I believe you deserve to get back what you spent because this man and you had lived in concubinage, and you took care of everything to give him a decent burial. A lawyer would advise you appropriately.

Pastor