The Silence That Shaped Me by Torsaa Emmanuel Oryiman

Why would life be so unfair to me? What have I done to deserve all this pain and, hardship? Sometimes I sit alone, lost in the quiet hum of the night, questioning every breath I take, every step I make. I search my heart for answers that never come, and the silence feels heavier than words. 
What sin did I commit to be born into such deprivation?

Before I took my first breath, the world had already cast its shadow over my father’s life. He didn’t walk into hardship—he was born into it. A man burdened with more sorrow than joy, more weight than a soul should bear. He fought, not just for himself, but for everyone he loved. Each day for him was a battle—a battle against poverty, against expectations, against the injustice of a world that never gave him a chance to rest. He was the third-born, not the eldest, yet it felt like all responsibility was poured into his lap.

His parents were humble farmers, their hands blistered and calloused from the fields, their backs bent not just from labour but from carrying the weight of hope. They prayed that their children would grow beyond the boundaries of soil and sweat, that education would be the key to freedom. They starved, they wept, they toiled endlessly just to send their children to school. But life is cruel in how it tests dreams.

As the children climbed the ladder of education, so did the costs. Every pencil, every book, every exam fee became a mountain too steep for their tiny farm to carry. The land, once a source of pride, became a silent witness to their suffering. My grandfather, once full of hope, now walked with hunched shoulders, not from age, but from the crushing weight of worry. Then came the day that would change everything. One heartbreaking afternoon, with eyes rimmed red and voice heavy with sorrow, he gathered his children beneath the mango tree where they had once played and shared laughter. But that day, there was no laughter—only silence, fear, and a storm of reality.

He told them the truth they had all sensed but dared not speak: they couldn’t go on like this. The farm was drowning under the pressure. There simply wasn’t enough to keep everyone in school. He asked for a volunteer—someone to put their dreams aside, to make the ultimate sacrifice so the others could have a shot at a better life. The silence that followed was more painful than any scream. No one moved. No one spoke. How could they? Each of them carried dreams too big for their small world—dreams of becoming doctors, teachers, maybe even someone important enough to change the family’s story.

Days passed. The air in the house grew heavier with every passing moment. There were no meals shared around the fire; no evening stories told in soft candlelight. Just silence. Just tension. And then, the decision was made—not by choice, but by circumstance. My father, the third-born, was chosen to step down.

That moment did not just shatter his dream—it shattered his spirit. My father cried for days, his tears soaking into his thin mattress, his cries muffled by the pillow so others wouldn’t hear the sound of a soul breaking. He stopped eating. He stopped smiling. The spark in his eyes—the light that only a dream can ignite—was gone. In the quietest of moments, when the moonlight bathed the house in silver, my grandfather would sit by his side and whisper, “I’m sorry, son,” over and over again. But no apology could undo what had been done.

Eventually, my father rose—not because he healed, but because he had no choice. He accepted his fate with the dignity of a soldier sent to war. He went back to the farm, not out of passion, but out of duty to the family he loved more than himself. His hands, once soft and young, grew rough and calloused. His back bent under the weight of work far too heavy for one man to bear. He became the backbone of their survival, the silent engine that kept the family going. Even when darkness fell, and the fields emptied, he remained—his tears falling quietly with the evening dew, watering the very soil that had stolen his dreams.

The years rolled on, and slowly, his hard work bore fruit—literally. The fields began to yield more than enough. The farm that once mocked his sacrifice now seemed to reward his perseverance. But prosperity is never free. It draws attention, and not always the kind you hope for. The same villagers who once scoffed at his sacrifice, who turned their backs when he needed them most, now returned with outstretched hands and empty promises. They borrowed, and lied, and left him poorer with every transaction.

At first, he gave freely—because that’s who he was. A man who knew pain too well to wish it on others. But over time, he began to notice a pattern. People weren’t just borrowing; they were using him. Their kindness was a mask. Their gratitude, fleeting. So, with a heavy heart, he began to say no—not because he stopped caring, but because he finally started protecting what little he had left.

And that decision… that one act of self-preservation… marked the beginning of his torment.

The villagers turned on him like wolves. Rumours spread like wildfire—he was called selfish, greedy, arrogant. They dug into old family histories, resurrecting long-dead feuds. “He deserves this,” they whispered. “Let him suffer. Let him feel what his ancestors made us feel.” It didn’t matter that he was a different man. It didn’t matter that he had done nothing but give, give, and give. The world had already chosen its villain, and he wore the mask they handed him.

But what they didn’t know was that behind that mask was a heart that still broke every day. A man who still mourned the education he never got. A man who prayed every night that his children would never have to make the sacrifices he did. A man who, despite it all, still believed in goodness.

The same villagers he had once helped—the ones he had fed in times of hunger, clothed in times of need, defended when no one else would—now turned against him without mercy. They slandered him in the markets, mocked him in whispers that grew louder with each passing day, and painted him as heartless simply because he had chosen, for once, to guard his own heart. It wasn’t greed that guided him—it was exhaustion. Years of giving, of bending, of breaking for others had left him hollow, and all he had asked for was space to heal. But the world doesn’t like boundaries from those it has always taken from.

Hatred festered, not merely from jealousy, but from something older—something colder. Ancient grudges resurfaced like ghosts clawing out of unmarked graves. The people spoke in riddles, with eyes that refused to meet mine. When I confronted them, raw with confusion and rage, all I wanted were answers. Why? Why such cruelty? Why now? Their reasoning twisted like a vine choking a tree—generational revenge, they said. “Your father’s blood is not clean,” one of them told me, his voice low and bitter. “What your people did to ours cannot be forgotten.” I stood there, shaking. My fists clenched. My voice cracked with disbelief as I cried, “Why must the innocent pay for sins they did not commit?” But they looked past me, as if I were already guilty by blood.

And then came the storm.

Not just a storm of weather, but of fate. The skies wept with us as if heaven itself was mourning. The crops failed. The once bountiful fields turned to dust and sorrow. My father—my hero—fell ill. It began with a fever, then a cough that refused to leave, and soon, it was as if the years of toil and heartbreak were demanding payment from his bones. Everything we had built, every sacrifice he had made, began to crumble before my eyes. Our home, once filled with the smell of roasted yams and laughter, became a place of medicine bottles and whispered prayers.

I was just a child, small and scared, unable to understand the storm tearing through my family, yet old enough to feel the coldness of fate tightening around us like a noose. I would lie awake at night, staring at the ceiling, listening to my father’s laboured breaths, wondering why life had to be so cruel to someone so kind.

He became a shadow of the man I had known—thinner, quieter, but never bitter. Even when his legs could no longer carry him to the fields, even when his voice grew faint, he never let the fire in his spirit die. One evening, when the power had gone out and the candlelight danced across the hospital wall, I asked him the question that had been eating at me for years: “Papa, why does the suffering never end?” He looked at me then—his eyes, though tired, still full of depth. And he whispered words that would etch themselves into my soul forever.

“Son,” he said slowly, “the day you wake up without a struggle is the day you’re in a coffin. Life, my son, is pain—but pain teaches us to live. It humbles us. It molds us. You will know yourself in the way you bleed, and you will find strength in the tears you never thought you’d cry.”

I didn’t understand it fully then, but as I grew older, those words became my armor. Pain became the echo of his wisdom, and even in loss, his voice guided me.

As if that wasn’t enough, as if life hadn’t already stripped us bare, my grandmother—the gentle matriarch who once carried me on her back and sang lullabies under moonlight—developed severe eye problems. Day by day, her world faded into shadows. She could no longer sew, could no longer walk around the compound without someone to guide her. Surgery was her only hope, the last chance to reclaim even a sliver of light—but how do you pay for surgery when you can barely afford to eat? The choice felt cruel: sight or survival? Bread or medicine?

We nearly gave up. There were days when the cupboard echoed with emptiness. We ate once a day, sometimes not at all. My mother would pretend she wasn’t hungry just so I could eat. My father, already fighting his own battles with illness, would lie and say he had eaten in town, just to watch us finish the last crumbs without guilt. Hunger clawed at our stomachs, but what hurt more was the silence—the kind of silence that sits heavy in a house, thick with helplessness.

Illness, hunger, and isolation became our daily bread. People we once called family stopped visiting. Friends disappeared. The village that once cheered my father’s harvest now whispered behind our backs. We were no longer the proud family with strong arms and a generous heart—we were the forgotten ones. But somehow, through it all, we survived. Not because life got easier, not because miracles rained from the sky, but because God carried us through the fire without letting us burn.

Today, we are still standing—not tall, not without scars—but standing nonetheless. Not because we are superheroes, not because we are immune to pain, but because we refused to stay down. My father may not have had a university degree to hang on the wall, but he taught me lessons that no classroom could ever hold. He taught me what it means to sacrifice everything for those you love. He showed me that faith isn’t found in easy days, but in the ones where everything falls apart and you choose to keep going anyway.

Our story is not just one of suffering—it is a story of fierce resilience. What the world meant to use against us only revealed how unbreakable we truly are. Pain didn’t destroy us; it built us. Rejection didn’t silence us; it refined our voice. The fire we walked through became the furnace that forged our strength.

So, to anyone who is hurting, anyone who is drowning in nights that feel endless—I see you. I feel your pain, and I promise you, it won’t last forever. Please, hold on. Hold on when your hands shake. Hold on when your heart feels too heavy to carry. Life may bend you, but do not let it break you. The longest nights often birth the brightest dawns. The world may forget you, but your story matters. You matter.

Let your slogan be “never give up,” not just because it sounds good, but because it is the anthem of survivors. The ones who walk through the storm and emerge stronger, wetter, bruised—but still alive. Still breathing. And sometimes, surviving is the bravest thing of all. So take heart. The sky will clear. And when it does, you will look back—not with bitterness, but with pride—knowing you endured the impossible.

Torsaa Emmanuel Oryiman

Image: Sun rays from behind a dark cloud from Pixabay.com