Marriage binds two people together forever. But there are a lot of times when two people are unable to make the marriage work and it ends up in a split. You can never force the other person to stay with you, contrary to their will. And what will happen if you forcefully try to?
There are a lot of people in this world who fear change, and the woman whose story we're about to read is one of those people. She is scared of letting go. Her over possessiveness and desperate attempts of stopping her husband from leaving her are going to ruin a lot of lives and the damage will be irrecoverable.
This real life incident takes us to Barranquilla, Colombia. Barranquilla is an industrial city, the largest in the Northern Caribbean Coast Region. The people of Barranquilla are boisterous and to a certain extent over-confident because of the bold culture they follow.
Meet Antonela Milena Padilla, a 37-year-old Colombian woman who is married for two years and lives with her husband. She is a bold lady who likes to live life on her own terms. She has a very lively personality but what her mind can think and plan of is unimaginable for all of us.
After two years of being together, Antonela's marriage had reached a point where it was on the rocks. The relationship had become quite unstable and there seemed to be nothing that was left between the husband and wife.
Antonela wanted to save her marriage at all costs and she had made up her mind that she would go to any heights in an attempt to save her marriage when her husband had made up his mind to leave her. And those exact attempts were going to be disastrous.
The couple lived together, stayed together in the same room, but there was truly nothing left in their relationship and Antonela could not accept any kind of failure, even if it was something as important and sacred as a marriage that is supposed to work only when two people in it are adamant on making it work.
Antonela's husband wanted to leave his wife because nothing seemed to be working between the two. He had made several attempts to save the marriage on his part, but there was absolutely nothing that could make the make things better. It was only getting worse.
Antonela, on the other hand, was on a very different path. She had made up her mind that she would not accept a divorced marriage and would do all that it would take to keep her husband with her. But what was to happen next was unbelievable.
The wife was so desperate to keep her husband that she started devising plans to stop him from leaving. She had decided to do something that would make his decision of leaving her, a difficult one for him to be on.
Antonela had decided that she would fake a pregnancy for her hopeless endeavors to stop her husband from leaving her. But what would happen on the due date? Antonela's plan for the due date was something we could never imagine even in our dreams.
Antonela finally told her husband or rather lied to him about the pregnancy, that she was carrying his child. A fact so big would surely move a man from taking the step of leaving his wife, or at least think twice about it.
The news was too big for Antonela's husband because he had never been a father before, and he forgot everything about leaving his wife in his excitement and happiness of becoming a father. But it would not be late until he would regret his decision of staying with a woman as cunning as Antonela.
Antonela started putting her plan of faking a pregnancy in action. She started placing a cushion on top of her stomach under her clothes to trick her husband and the whole family about being pregnant. But this was just the starting.
As days went by, Antonela started filling the cushion with rags to make everyone believe that the baby was growing inside and to specifically convince her husband. Everything seemed to be too real to doubt or consider being a lie.
The only thing that was now left was to get a sonogram report of the baby that was never even there. And Antonela's clever brain had a trick for this also. There was going to be an ultrasound and a report as well. But how?
Antonela was so dedicated to her lies that she knew exactly what to do in which situation. She searched for a google picture of an ultrasound of the sonogram and quickly took a printout of it to add proof to her lie.
The sonogram reports gave much deeper emotional hopes to the husband. Little did he know that it was someone else's baby that he had been anticipating to be the father of. But the worst was yet to come.
The due date was just around the corner. September 22nd was the due date as per Antonela's lies. And she was all set to play her worst hand. She knew her husband was trapped in her plan, and he was unaware of everything else around.
Clever Antonela had been successful in pulling her husband along in her plan. She knew there was no chance of any doubts from her husband's side because he was just too excited at the prospect of becoming a father.
When September started, Antonela prepared another addition to her lie and told everybody that she was to give birth to the baby by C-section at a local hospital only. Everybody, especially the husband, looked forward to the 22nd.
22nd September finally arrived and Antonela was ready to play her card. As soon as her alarm struck 10 am, she got ready and left her home without informing anyone. Where she was going was a mystery. What exactly was going in her mind?
Antonela's husband found it strange that his wife left for the clinic without telling anyone. And all that while, he kept thinking that she had gone to the clinic only but to his surprise, Antonela did not return home even by night and he got worried.
When Antonela returned home at night, everybody was confused to see that she came back without a baby in her arms. Where was the baby? What had happened when she had left for the clinic? Antonela had a whole story ready for each question.
Antonela continued her story of lies with a bang this time. She told everyone that she had been kidnapped on her way to the clinic in the morning. She said she remembers that a red van stopped by and a gang pulled her inside the van. What happened after that is unknown even to Antonela. But this was not all...
The clever lady told everyone that when she finally woke up after the effect of the drugs had gone away, she was outside a supermarket and it was 7 pm. What happened between those 9 hours is a mystery even for her. And what about the baby?
To finish her storyline, Antonela concluded that the kidnapping gang had stolen her baby and took the child with them. "And why would a gang of strange men do that?", was her husband's first question to the lady.
A seed of suspicion had already started to grow in Antonela's husband's mind. Just a few minutes earlier she had said that she had been drugged by the kidnappers and now she says that she vividly remembers the kidnap of her baby by the gang.
And the last lie to her husband's question was that the gang was an organ trafficking gang and they wanted the baby's organs and that is why they cut the baby from inside her belly to sell the baby in the black market in return of money. All of this story horrified the family.
The husband and his family were such kind people that when they heard Antonela's story they did not care if it was a lie and were concerned about her health if it was to be true. They were worried that if she had actually been kidnapped and the baby had been cut out from her belly, she might have an infection and it needed to get checked.
The action that Antonela's husband took next, was going to change everything. Against her will, the family decided to take her to the hospital and file a complaint against the kidnappers. Antonela's cover was soon to be blown away.
When Antonela was admitted to the hospital, the staff was scared after they heard of what had happened with the poor lady and immediately called in the police. Everyone was hell-bent on getting justice for Antonela and find out the kidnappers. Only if they knew what the actual truth was.
In order to find out who the kidnappers were, the police had launched a massive operation. They were unaware of the fact that the story was false and a lot of power and force had been put into a mission that was going to have vague results.
Antonela's lies were going to get uncovered very soon. The first thing that gave rise to doubt was how there were no marks of a knife on her stomach that could prove her story of 'back street cesarean'. What was happening?
After investigating Antonela's health further, the truth that Antonela had been dreading about finally came out. The doctor told the husband and the whole family that his wife was never pregnant in the first place.
The doctor even told that there had been no drug that was found in Antonela's body either. All eyes were suddenly on Antonela. And the most strange part was that her face showed no signs of guilt. She had another set of lies prepared for everyone.
Antonela had decided that she would not bend down in pressure. She kept on insisting that she was pregnant even when all reports and all proofs were against her story. The only question that remained was, how did the family not notice anything?
During the journey of faking a pregnancy, Antonela would go to a clinic to show that she was having her regular checkups. Her husband used to accompany her but he would wait outside the room for her. He would have known the truth if he had accompanied her for once inside the room.
Antonela's mother-in-law was confused about what was happening. She said, “She had a belly. It was small, but no one suspected a thing. My son lived with her and they slept together. However, he never tried to bond with the baby or touch her belly.”
The mother was concerned about her son and had no clue as to why did Antonela play such dirty tricks. She said with tears in her eyes, "I’ll have to speak with my son so he can explain what’s going on to me. He has had serious relationships in the past, but he never had any children. There is no reason at all for her to do this."
After all her lies were revealed, the police officials told that Antonela could be charged for wastage of public resources. A lot of people who were actually sick and needed treatment were asked to wait to put her case first in the hospital.
The police told Antonela's husband, “In the hospital, we see people in queues from 5 am waiting for appointments, and this lady who is feigning pregnancy was attended to before others who really needed help.”
Antonela overheard all that the police officer told her husband from behind the door. She was unaware that things would take such a turn but accepting the fault was not her trait and she started devising yet another plan.
The police commander Mariano Cotero Coy announced the truth to the news channels as well. He said, "The woman went around showing an ultrasound scan that she had taken from the internet, she simply modified it and deceived her sentimental partner. But at the hospital, she took a test which showed she had never been pregnant."
There are so many things that Antonela has done which make us doubt even humanity. She lied about the purest form of the love of being a mother. She betrayed not just her husband but the whole family in a lot of ways.
Antonela was not sorry for what she had done even till the end. She never realized the intensity of her lies and was not guilty even for a second for making everyone related to her suffer. Instead, she had the next plan ready.
Around 3 am on Sunday morning, just two hours after her reports had arrived, Antonela ran away from the hospital. The blood tests had confirmed that she was not pregnant and she knew there was no way out now.
Since the 23rd of September, after she ran away from the hospital, no one knows about Antonela's whereabouts. And after all that she had done, nobody even tried finding the wicked woman who had played with everyone's feelings.
Even if Antonela ever tries to come back, her husband has made it clear that she would never be welcomed back in his life even by mistake. There was no place in his life for a treacherous person like that lady.
The husband finally ended up getting what he had always wanted. Antonela was finally out of his life and there was no chance that she was coming back. He had made himself strong enough to not be fooled by anyone anymore.
It seems that Karma had finally played its cards against Antonela's plans. The woman had made a joke of motherhood and her lies were going to get back to her sooner or later. And ultimately, she was left alone by everyone.