In Thiaroye-sur-Mer, Marième, Amy and Ndeye are learning to navigate life without their husbands, who were lost at sea. Amidst uncertainty and hardship, they are constantly reinventing their homes, managing household finances and finding ways to care for their children. This report delves into their intimate daily lives, their aspirations and the quiet dignity with which they confront loss and silence.

At the edge of a dusty courtyard lined with colourful walls, Marième Diouf is tidying up pots and pans near a small stall where vegetables are scattered haphazardly about. The sun beats down on the rooftops this morning, making the bottles left on the windowsills sparkle. With her shoulders slightly hunched, Marième carries the weight of the days without her husband, a man she saw board a wooden canoe one Tuesday evening. His promises were carried away by the wind, along with the sound of the engine, which remains in her ears like a faint drumbeat. They had lived together for 15 years. Marième remembers the anxiety she felt when her husband announced that he was going to attempt the crossing to Spain. The following night, she stayed up listening to the radio, hoping to hear something, anything, to confirm that he was okay. But the hours passed without news, and the announcement came as a shock: her husband was lost at sea. 

Since then, Marième’s daily life has been governed by a different set of rules: meals are organised around financial constraints. She manages the family finances with the caution of a ship’s captain who cannot afford to make the slightest mistake. When she talks about her husband, her voice softens and her words are heavy with distance and time. “I miss him every day,” she says, “but I also carry his dreams for us in my hands and in my eyes.” Many women find themselves in the same situation, living without their husbands. In Thiaroye-sur-Mer, some families are caught between the promise of a better life and the precariousness of the journey to reach it.

Her skin bears the marks of years of labour. Amy Diop sits calmly in her courtyard, watching her two children play. She has lived without her husband, the father of her two children, for four years. Amadou Diop left in a pirogue for Spain. Since his departure, there has been no news. “Before he left, he told me about his journey. On the day itself, before boarding the pirogue, he came to tell me. So I knew,” says Amy in a small voice. Pregnant at the time, Amadou’s departure was painful for her. She was in a difficult situation, having to care for a two-year-old boy while several months pregnant. “It was extremely difficult for me. I cried from time to time.” When her husband’s death was finally confirmed, Amy Diop’s world was turned upside down.

“We thought it was the only door left open.”

When her husband set sail, it was as if one door had closed and another was still trembling in her hands. “We thought it was the only door left open,” says Ndeye Fall, her words returning like a wave crashing on the shore. She wears the silence that follows like a cloak: useful, heavy and necessary. With her hands covered in flour, she recalls the weeks after her husband was declared dead at sea: “I didn’t sleep for weeks, but I knew I had to hold on for my children.”

The absence of their husbands has had a profound impact on their domestic and financial lives. Every room in their daily lives bears witness to the departed, from the photos on the wall to the gestures that reveal the invisible work of grief. Amy describes the ‘silence of the house’ as an overwhelming presence that weighs heavily on the heart and forces everything to be reinvented. She recalls becoming a mother, father and breadwinner all at once – a situation that demands boundless energy. Nowadays, the young woman manages small purchases and market sales. Her voice mingles with the hubbub of the stalls as she discusses budgets, loan repayments and savings set aside for her children’s education. Meanwhile, Ndeye Fall bakes bread rolls and simple pastries not only for their taste, but also because each recipe evokes memories of her late husband, who loved these treats.

All three attend meetings where they discuss their rights and the assistance available to them. They also strive to maintain the solidarity mechanisms that have helped them thus far. Rather than dwelling on what she has lost, Amy Diop talks about what she can still gain: financial independence and a voice that is heard. “I want my children to have a different view of the world to the one imposed by their fathers’ absence,” she says, gazing at the horizon as if her desire is her compass. Sometimes, Marième Diouf sits by the sea, watches the waves and whispers to her missing husband, as if he could still hear her: “Promise me you won’t let our dreams fall apart.