Is your boyfriend a roach?

Yes, you are a cockroach, mende wewe!

It seems with every new dawn people decide to be trash when it comes to relationships. I envy my mother’s generation; dating was so much simpler but then again 90s dad were afraid of raising children and the majority are deadbeats. I digress!

In this marvellous year of 2019, individuals are coming up with new ways of ruining relationships.

In comes roaching, yes derived form cockroach, that little bug/insect. I don’t really know in which group of living organisms it lies. Roaching is when the person you’ve been seeing/dating is hiding the fact they’ve been dating other people. When you find out and confront them, they claim they didn’t realize it was a monogamous relationship.

“I didn’t know we were exclusive”

Are you dumb? We have been seeing each other for months now and you choose not to inform me that we are a community. What role do I play Mr Sir? What position do I hold? Thank you Lord I insisted that we use protection.

This ladies and gentlemen is the reason why you should always ask “what are we?”. This very uncomfortable question needs to addressed as early as possible to avoid finding yourself in a catch 22. The answers to this dreaded question could be, but not limited to, “I don’t know” “we are just chilling” “you are babe” “you are my woman” “we just friends with benefits”.

Don’t be a roach, let me say that in Kiswahili for good measure, Usiwe mende tafadhali. Be honest with the person you are seeing and explain the level of your relationship. It’s not that hard honestly. This also applies if you have offsprings roaming this earth. The topic of children should be announced early on and not snuck into a random late-night text like “Hey, I was busy at work today. Btw, I have a 4-year-old son. Okay, goodnight!”

There you have it folks, a new term in dating that you need to add to the list. So ladies, are you dating a respectable man ama yeye ni mende (or is he a roach)?