COACHILLA

I have always been serious with my books and my studies, so I never had time for women. There were times I had crushes on women who were close to me but I didn’t want to frustrate my education with relationship issues so I always bottled up my feelings. What even made it harder for me to approach women is the fact that I am introverted. So socializing with people altogether wasn’t my thing.  The only time I considered entering a relationship was when I felt I was ready for marriage. My closest friend, Adam, who knew about my difficulty in talking to women offered to play matchmaker between me and his female friend. I told him, “If you think this person you are talking about is someone I can marry then link us up.” He did exactly that and I opened my life to this lady. As I studied her closely, I realized that she wasn’t interested in me as a person. All she wanted was what I could give her. So I cut ties with her as quickly as possible and moved on with my life.  A...

I grew up in a polygamous family. My dad has three wives, and each wife has a number of children. My mother has four of us; two girls and two boys. While my father is physically present in our lives, he has never brought anything home in terms of finances. As kids, we looked to our mother for everything. Honestly, I am sure my dad has never contributed a pesewa to our upkeep. There were times we didn’t even have enough to eat, and the older kids would sleep on empty stomachs, just so our younger siblings wouldn’t have to.  Due to financial struggles, my elder brother and I ended up in the same class. This made things more difficult for my mum, so when we got to SHS we had to attend school in the north. Secondary school education there is free, so it was ideal for our situation. But even with that, it was still difficult for my mum to provide us with provisions and pocket money. And the conditions in the school were difficult. The food was terrible, and we suffered water...

I grew up in a family that often left their offspring to their own devices. This means the adults don’t lose a night’s sleep over how their kids live their lives. I could leave the house for days and no one would bother to find out where I went, or if I was okay. I could go out and come home with one of my limbs missing and everyone would act like it’s just a normal day. It took me a long time to come to this painful realization that, nobody cares. So I started looking out for myself the best way I could. I tried my best but I had to drop out of school when I was in my third year of high school, because of an injury I suffered on my leg. I couldn’t walk for some time but now I’m better, although I feel pain when I walk sometimes. I told myself, “I will go back to school one day when I can afford to. But for now, I have to hustle and take care of myself.” Through my hustling, I met a guy who took a shine to me. Along the line, he expressed his feelings for me and asked me to...

I was twenty-four when I entered my first serious relationship. By then I was a greenhorn. I belong to a church that strongly preaches abstinence so it was hard for me to want to do anything sexual outside the confines of marriage. I was determined that the man I marry would be my first lover. However, I got curious when I started dating Ben. When I turned twenty-five I couldn’t resist the need to satisfy my curiosity any longer so we did it, shuperu. You know how they say curiosity kills the cat? Well, in my case it broke my mother’s heart.  What happened was, I felt guilty after the experience. My guilt was so bad that I started having weird dreams about the whole thing. So I went to confess it to my spiritual mother and sought her counsel. My spiritual mother then told my mother about it. And my mum was disappointed. She even told me, “I am so hurt by what you have done. Do you know one day I had a heart attack at the market because of this?” I remember rolling my ey...