When the parents fight in front of the children...

Zvidzidzo and Dambudzo were having a hard time trying to figure out what was going on with their guardians. Their behaviour didn’t make sense and the children were beginning to feel very uneasy.

“Lets play over the events of the past year and see if we can identify a pattern”, Dambudzo remarked after a moment of silence.

Phase 1

Their guardians kept going on about how they were way better guardians than the new guardians next door. They must have felt threatened; the new guardians was becoming a huge hit in the neighbourhood. Full of promises and hope for their family and the community at large. Mum and dad would go on and on about how the new guardians was just smokescreens and nothing would materialise from their promises. Dambudzo and Zvidzidzo were forbidden from interacting with the new guardians next door, the enmity was so bad that one day Dambudzo and Zvidzidzo received a thorough lashing for receiving sweets from the new guardians. Eventually the efforts of the new guardians were successfully thwarted, they literally faded into oblivion….

Phase 2

After the neighbour issue had been resolved and mum and dad were confident that they were again the best parents in the neighbourhood. Of course they would fight behind their bedroom doors but never in front of the children. Hushed voices, black eyes and one word answers in the morning were the evidence they saw in the morning but the parents never fought in front of the children…

Phase 3

Mum and dad had a nasty fight … in the living room … during supper … while the children watched. It was bad, there was name calling, punches, character assassinations, you name it. Dambudzo and Zvidzidzo were perplexed. Mum and dad had been together for 35 years and they had never, not once fought in front of the children. In good times and in bad. Mum and dad would have a huge argument one night and be at the breakfast table the next day smiling.  Occassionally,  when they disagreed in public they would hush it up and give each other that “we’ll deal with this later” eye. But on this day the children had witnessed the altercation with their own innocent eyes…

Phase 4

Mum and dad must have noticed that the huge fight had unsettled the family. The children were frightened and all of a sudden dreaming of the prospect of new guardians. The children were not longer sure about mum and dad and the direction they were taking. So mum and dad woke up the next morning and took the word extreme to another level. They were kissing and hugging in front of the children, showering each other with all sorts of words of affection. It was totally awkward, the children had never seen their parents behave in such a manner. They had always been the extremely conservative couple, all this affection was confusing the children more than it was consoling them…

Zvidzidzo’s pessimistic nature took over, “I think they are getting a divorce, they are being extra nice to cushion the blow”

“There is no way they can divorce, they have been together for 35 years, they have been through so much together. Besides they love us and would never want to disappoint us”

“you go  on believing whatever makes you sleep a night. If they divorce, I know who I am going with”.