Nse Ikpe-Etim, the Nollywood actress who won the ‘Best Actress in a Drama’ award at the 2014 Africa Magic Viewers Choice Awards amongst other awards, has revealed that she had to remove her womb to live a normal life.

The 44-year-old actress who rose to prominence in 2008 for her role in ‘Reloaded’, engaged her fans with her life ahead of the premiere of ‘Heaven’s Hell’ which she featured in. In an event tagged ‘Conversation with Nse’, she disclosed that her father died when she was 15, leaving only her mother, who was a teacher, to take on the burden of raising the family.

Nse Ikpe-Etim who disclosed that she is never going to have a baby, that she removed her womb to live a normal life after she was diagnosed three years ago with Adenomyosis (a condition whereby the inner lining of the uterus breaks through the muscle wall of the uterus).

“I was told I couldn’t have kids,” she said to the now sombre audience. “And so, I had to have a hysterectomy (removal of the uterus) to make me have a life again and to stop going through what I was going through. And I’m literally telling women and men, it really doesn’t matter if you can’t bear children. What really matters is what you would do for the world, for the universe”.

Etim is the first of six children. In an interview with Toolz, she stated that she’s had Caucasian Godparents. She got married to her childhood friend Clifford Sule on 14 February 2013 at a Lagos registry. A traditional wedding ceremony followed in her hometown in Akwa Ibom State and Lagos State respectively, some months after the civil union. She currently resides in London with her husband, a senior lecturer at Middlesex University who frequents Nigeria for film engagements.

Recalling the moment the doctor told her she would have to remove her uterus to live a normal life, Nse said: “Tears dropped and then my husband squeezed my hand. It was reassuring there was someone there and it was telling me that this is reality, my reality”.

She fell into depression: “I didn’t think there was any point anymore because my society taught me that I have to be a mother to be appreciated and every time I went online, I would have one troll or two say ‘you never born? But i’, thankful that that didn’t break me”.

“I wanted a set of twins”, she said. “I wanted children. I wanted so badly I was brooding forever. I did everything our society wants every woman to do so that we can be accepted as women”.  She however described as “Crazy” how some media reports speculated on her being pregnant.

What do you think? Does being a mother actually define you as a woman?

Source: UncleSuru