Being a polygamist and sharing your precious time with not one, but two families is surely already enough of a challenge to conquer. And then when lockdowns and curfews are put in place, well then, we can really only imagine how complicated this can get. How do you choose which family to be stuck in quarantine with, and who is considered your primary family in such a case? While thankfully, most of us will never come across the dilemma, when it comes to Kuwaiti polygamists, this is a real struggle they have right now.
Believe it or not, a shocking eight percent of Kuwait is actually polygamists, and the strict measures that have been put in place recently to encourage social distancing has made their lives a lot more complicated. Kuwait specifically is known to have placed some of the most strict regulations, which includes a curfew that allows people only to leave the house for groceries once every six days. One 45-year-old polygamist, known as Abu, has expressed that as a father of ten children, his situation is incredibly complex, and is often stopped by police officers that don’t always understand his situation.
Thankfully for Abu, at least both of his wives live relatively close to one another, but the lockdown still seems to be causing problems in his relationships. In fact, things have gotten so out of hand for Abu that he had to have officials step in to help. One member of the committee suggested that Abu just pick a name out of a hat to choose which wife to quarantine with and that he promise to spend more nights with the other wife after the restrictions are lifted. But as you probably could have assumed, things aren’t that simple to solve. Moral of the story, you’re best off having just one wife and one family right now.