In 2012, both the Ghanaian and Nigerian entertainment industries were shaken by news that the very public relationship between actress Yvonne Nelson and musician Iyanya had come to an end.
A decade after the breakup the Ghanaian actress has revealed that the singer cheated on her with another actress adding that she cried for about two months after they broke up.
Opening up about the romance, the actress in her new memoir, ‘I Am Not Yvonne Nelson’ noted that at the time of the romance, she felt assured that Iyanya was the one she would be with forever.
“We had a decent relationship-breakfast in bed and all the niceties of a dream relationship one could think of. He tattooed my initials, YN, on his wrist, and I thought that was a big deal. If he wasn’t serious about me, he wouldn’t do that. In his hit song, “Ur Waist”, he mentioned how he lusted over me,” she wrote.
Yvonne Nelson was taken aback when someone through a call informed her that Iyanya had another actress over at his place anytime she travelled from Nigeria to Ghana, she said.
“That actress turned out to be Tonto Dikeh of Nigeria, one of the female celebrities Iyanya named in his “Ur Waist” song. When I was convinced about the authenticity of the information I received, I was heartbroken,” excerpts of the read.
“I took to Twitter to rant and vent. Tonto Dikeh responded on Twitter, saying people changed and so did feelings, so I should move on. I later heard more stories about what Iyanya did with some of his female crew members.”
Yvonne Nelson added that despite the evidence presented to her which indicated that “it was a pattern, his way of life,” accepting her loss and moving on was emotionally and psychologically tasking.
It did not help that their relationship and break-up had become a thing of public interest, where people proffered unsolicited opinions on the relationship, making the task of moving on that much harder, the actress stated.
“It is often easy to convince the mind, but the heart lacks understanding. The heart would often want to be left alone to do things its own way. That was my ordeal during the break up with Iyanya. For two months, I cried inconsolably. A friend of mine got irritated at a point. She didn’t understand why a “whole” me would brood so long over a man who had betrayed my love,” she wrote.