Thread by @GbengaWemimo

She started the creche right after her NYSC
It had always been her life goal to own one
She loved babies and when she was in
secondary school, her mother ran a creche
Her mother was a matron with the government
hospital
Her mother also took maternity cases at home
especially

cases involving members of her father's church
Her mother's creche was a side hussle
It was located at the second sitting room of
her father's mansion
A house built to impress the world but was found
to be too big for the family
Too many rooms were unfurnished and unoccupied

this was primarily because her father lost his banking job before completing the building and they had to move in
before their rent expired
Because her father married two wives, one wing was built for each wife and her children
To present a front of equality and keep the families

apart while keeping them together under the same "room"
As soon as her father lost his job as the regional director of a merchant bank, the second wife sold many of the properties under her care and took off with her secret lover
The move caught the entire family by surprise,

even the second wife's children
The body blows were too much for her father
The loss of his job, his other investments (a mill, hotel and some hectares of land) sold off by his second wife
Her father fell ill and almost died
By the time he recovered from the illness, he was a

shadow of himself
Her mother had to brace up to the challenge of raising ten children (Five from her and five from the second wife) by herself
This was what led her to start a creche
Her father didn't recover at the hospital, he recovered at a uniform wearing church
The founder

of the church insisted her father had a divine call and must pastor a church
Her father bought into the idea
Perhaps in order to atone for the sins, he committed in the past which were haunting him at that moment or because he really had a call
Her father started a church that

attracted a lot of poor people
Her mother was dragged into the mess and she ended up providing free maternity care for the members of the church
As a secondary school student, the creche was her baby
Her mother paid her and a professional nurse to man the creche and she was a

a natural
Babies loved her as much as she loved them
The parents of the babies placed in their creche also loved her
It was her calling
It was all she wanted to do and she prepared herself for it
She saved up most of her NYSC allowance and invested in creche equipment
She also

registered her company and since she studied nursing she was certified to run one
She started small and it grew
Within a year, her creche had forty babies ranging from week old babies to two-year-olds
By the second year, she had bought a property and employed more staff members

the creche had over a hundred babies
One day she got a visitor, an old friend from the university
They were not too close but they were on talking terms when she was an undergraduate
The friend came to inform her that she was starting a nursery and primary school down the street

and would like her to direct the parents of the babies in her care to the school
She didn't have any plan of starting a school and eagerly agreed to help her friend
Her friend sent marketers with fliers to her creche to canvass parents
With her endorsement, many of the parent

started placing their children in the school
Things were good for about a year
Then she began getting reports from unsatisfied parents who tacitly blamed her for introducing them a partner who doesn't really care for their children beyond fleecing them of their money
These are

parents whose friendship and respect she had spent years cultivating
She tried talking to her friend but her friend told her point-blank that running a creche and running a school are two different things
They are also two different people and their approach to issues cannot be

the same
Her friend said it was in consideration of her that she hadn't started her own creche
The school should ordinarily have one but they had a working agreement and she was honoring it without poking her nose into how the affairs of the creche were run.
In order words, her

friend asked her to mind her creche & keep her opinion about the school in her pocket
When she got home, she discussed what transpired at the meeting with her fiancee
Her fiancee laughed and told her to stop being short-sighted and sentimental
"Start a nursery and primary school

today, I will back you up with the finances and recruit good hands for you. If you want anything done to your taste, you have to do it yourself"
She prayed about it for a week and told her fiancee she was ready
Her fiancee was a manager with a microfinance bank and such an offer

was too good to pass by
Her creche as at that time owned two properties and had over three million naira in their savings account
All she did was remodel one of the properties into a nursery and primary school while the other property remained the creche
She applied and got her

approval from the state's board of education and recruited teachers
By the time the next academic year started, she rolled out her nursery and primary school
Of course, she expected her friend to get angry but it was the logical thing for her to do both business-wise & it wasn't

as if her friend cannot start her own creche as she had earlier insinuated
Within a week, her school was full
Parents who had been grudgingly patronizing her friend withdrew their children from her friend's school and brought them to her school
Her friend couldn't hold back the

bile
Her friend called her on the phone and rained curses and abuses on her
Her friend called her a saboteur, a Judas, a wolf in sheep clothing, an unfaithful person, a witch
She tried to explain to her friend that the problem was within and not without
If your customers were

satisfied they wouldn't be looking for a better option
Customer satisfaction is the key to patronage, not sentiment
Should she have insisted people must patronize her friend when even she knew her friend was not running the business the right way?
Would she have told the parents

came to her with their complaints to put up with it because there can be no alternative?
Really?
If a third party had seen the lacuna and started a school in that estate, would her friend have the guts to accuse such of sabotage?
The accusation was sentimental and immature in her

opinion
She tried to reason with her friend and her friend told her to shut up
Then she starts her own school and her friend felt it was done out of spite
She told her friend to look within and do better but her friend was too blinded by emotion to see things as they truly were

Within two years, her friend's school folded up and her friend moved out of the estate
Her school thrived and within five years, she started a secondary school which thrived gloriously too
She and her friend never reconciled
She still wonders if what she did was wrong...

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