Love Life is a Naijaonpoint weekly series about love, relationships, situationships, entanglements and everything in between.
Dayo* (29) and Tomisin* (27) met in 2022 when a mutual friend connected them.
On this week’s Love Life, they talk about how a failed NYSC posting pushed them together, dealing with uneven efforts from one party, and how a phone screenshot almost ended it all.
Dayo: We met through a mutual friend in 2022. Our mutual friend referred Tomisin to me because I helped people sort out their NYSC postings.
From her very first message to me, I could tell she was a warm, chatty person. She easily asked questions and made conversation, even though we had never spoken before. It threw me off because I was in professional mode and wasn’t expecting that energy. I actually had to call my mutual friend and ask her, “Does this girl know me from somewhere?” She said no, that’s just how Tomisin is with people.
Tomisin: I couldn’t tell whether he was being professional or just rude. I was doing my best to be friendly and warm, and he was giving me these flat, one-word responses. Like he was just tolerating the conversation. I didn’t know what to do with that.
I thought, “Okay, this person is not interested in small talk.”
So I pulled back and just focused on the business at hand. But it was confusing because I’d heard good things about him from our mutual friend, and the energy did not match.
Dayo: It was a disaster, which had never happened to me before. My plug failed, and Tomisin was sent to Edo for camp. She’d been specific about wanting Lagos, and I gave her my word because I always had a 95% success rate.
Tomisin: I was devastated. I cried and sent him a heated voice note. My mum was also upset, and she sent him a voice note when he didn’t pick up our calls. It was a whole thing because this was not what we agreed on. He had assured me that everything was taken care of, and that I’d be serving in Lagos like I wanted.
Dayo: This was the first time my plug had failed me. I didn’t even know what to do, and her mum’s voice note made it worse. She wasn’t even angry. She just sounded really hurt, like I’d intentionally put her daughter in harm’s way.
I explained that I would get her redeployed after camp, but she was already in tears. So I went to her house to meet her and her parents in person. I sat down with them, apologised properly, and promised that the redeployment would happen. Then, on the day she was leaving for camp, I followed her all the way to the park. And before she boarded, I gave her ₦20k.
Dayo: I just felt bad. It wasn’t her fault, and she was going somewhere she hadn’t planned to go. I wanted her to at least have something in her pocket.
Tomisin: That gesture really got me. And while I was in camp, he kept checking on me and even sent more money. That was when I started seeing a different side of him. The professional, dry-response guy was gone, and there was actually a very caring person underneath.
Dayo: I got her redeployed to Lagos as I promised, and I lowkey thought that would be the end of our interaction. But I found myself texting her and checking on her even after everything was resolved. She was struggling with her PPA placement, so I helped with that, too. And before I knew it, we had built a friendship. I always had one reason to text or call her.
Tomisin: It was so funny how he went from this “one-word texter” to constantly being in my DMs. We talked almost every day. And what stood out was that he actually paid attention. If I mentioned in passing that something was bothering me, he would come back to it later and ask how it was going.
Most people let things like that slide, but not Dayo. I don’t think I’ve met anyone as attentive as him.
Dayo: It was gradual on my end. I started noticing I was going out of my way to reach out to her even when I didn’t have a reason. I was just looking for excuses to talk to her. But even then, I still wasn’t sure what the feeling was.
Then, one day, during a conversation with our mutual friend, she mentioned that we’d actually make a cute couple. I think that was the first time I pictured us together and I couldn’t get the thought out of my mind. I knew she was single, so I felt it was a done deal in a way.
Tomisin: I actually wasn’t trying to date anyone. I had relocation plans, and I didn’t want to get into something that was going to turn into a long-distance relationship. So even though I was starting to like him, I wasn’t going to make any moves. I just let things be.
Dayo: I did. I asked her out in February 2023.
Tomisin: I said yes. By that point, I had decided to go with what felt right rather than overthink the relocation thing. He was good to me, and I liked him. So it was a very easy yes.
Tomisin: Not the best period of my life. I didn’t have a job at the time. My plans to relocate weren’t going the way I wanted. Things were generally not looking up, and I was in a low mood for a lot of that period. Dayo was trying his best; he was very generous and showed up in ways I genuinely didn’t expect. I really appreciated that, but I was just unhappy. It had nothing to do with him.
Dayo: I couldn’t stand seeing her sad. I’d tried to pull some plug for a job, but it didn’t work. A part of me felt really frustrated because we were supposed to be in the honeymoon phase of our relationship, but Tomisin was constantly sad and worried.
At some point, beyond offering words of encouragement and trying to speak on her behalf, I felt I needed to do something about her situation. So I put her on a monthly allowance. I also took her out regularly, making sure she had what she needed for day-to-day life.
My NYSC hustle was going well at that time, and I had forex income on top of it, so I was comfortable enough to do it without feeling the strain.
I even had the idea at one point of opening a small breakfast cafe and setting Tomisin up to manage it. That one didn’t work out in the end, but I was thinking about how to set her up properly.
But then, things slowed down for me financially in 2024. And that was tough.
Dayo: My NYSC plug passed away. So that whole side of my income just stopped. And the forex trading had become slow, too. So the money wasn’t coming like it used to. Luckily, around that same time, Tomisin had started picking up freelancing and was earning well. So I felt relieved that she wouldn’t feel the bite after I stopped her monthly allowance.
But that’s when I also started noticing something about her.
Dayo: That she is stingy. Not frugal, actually stingy. Before, I’d always assumed she was disciplined about saving and careful about spending. I respected that. But when I was the one who needed something, I saw what it actually was. I would ask her for as little as ₦10 or ₦20k, and she would look me in the eye and tell me she didn’t have it. I knew she was lying.
Sometimes she would give it, but then she would make sure she collected every kobo back. It was strange to me. My girlfriend, whom I’d done a lot for when she wasn’t in a position to do for herself.
Tomisin: I prefer to say I am frugal. I have always been careful about money. I don’t believe in giving it away just because someone asks, unless it is a genuine emergency. That’s how I was raised and how I operate. Dayo is not the first person in my life to call me stingy. I’ve heard it from people who know me. It doesn’t offend me because I know my intention is to be responsible with what I have.
Tomisin: Not really. I’ve heard it many times. I know who I am with money, and I’m not going to pretend. But I also want to push back on some of what Dayo says. Not everything he calls stinginess is stinginess. Sometimes I genuinely don’t have money to give, even if there’s a number sitting in my account. Money can be allocated; it can be tied to something; it might not even be entirely mine. He doesn’t always consider that. Once he believes that I have money, he expects me to splurge or readily give when he asks.
Dayo: I hear that. But when you’ve been with someone, and you’ve done as much as I did for her during the period she was struggling, and then when the tables turn, they’re lying to your face about ₦20k, that goes beyond being frugal.
Dayo: I did. I sat her down and called her stingy to her face, and like she said, she didn’t flinch. She basically just said, ” Yes, I know I’m like that.”
That response shocked me because I came prepared for a real conversation, and she just responded as though it was old news.
Tomisin: I also want to say something else about this. I sometimes genuinely question how broke Dayo actually is when he says he is broke. He’d say he doesn’t have money, and then the next minute he’s suggesting a date or doing something that costs money. So it’s hard for me to know when to take the complaints seriously and when it’s just a habit of speech. I’m not saying he doesn’t have moments of need. But the signals are often confusing, which affects how I respond.
Dayo: That’s because I know how to manage. I still want to make it a good time for us, even when things are tight. That doesn’t mean I’m not genuinely struggling.
Dayo: Not really, it got to a tipping point around March. My car broke down and needed serious repairs. I was looking at about ₦500k, which I didn’t have at the time. So I went to Tomisin and asked if she could l loan me. She said she didn’t have the money. I knew from how she said it that she was lying. I found a way to get into her phone, looked at her account balance, took a screenshot of it and sent it directly to her.
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