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The author's mother-in-law lived her life for her family. Isn't that how the earlier generation lived? Shouldn't we be putting ourselves as a priority too while taking care of others?
The author’s mother-in-law lived her life for her family. Isn’t that how the earlier generation lived? Shouldn’t we be putting ourselves as a priority too while taking care of others?
You know those times when you have to take time off from work because one of your family members is sick and in the ICU? Meanwhile, as you sit in the ICU with mobile jammers on, you have loads of time to think and ponder. As you ponder, your thoughts swirl around the relative lying in bed and your relationship with them.
I have had plenty such occasions where I sat in the ICU while either of my parents or in-laws were in the ICU. This time, it was my mother-in-law, and the initial emergency has passed. She is now supposed to be stable, and after that, she was shifted to a room.
As I sat in the room for the relatives of the people in the ICU, I felt like I was in a chiller, cold with no windows. Like a piece of meat preserved, to be used later.
Jokes apart, at this stage of life most of us have crossed a number of our hurdles, (children are grown up and we are chilled out), ready to take on the next phase of life with enthusiasm. I believe, life gives us a chance to live all over again after 40.
I was thinking of my mother-in-law and looking back, from a woman’s point of view, I visualise another woman. A woman who was so driven by her sense of duty towards her family that I often was left amazed at her commitment.
Her entire day would be filled with planning and preparing for the festivals during shravan as she waiting for the guests to arrive for the functions. She had four children, all of whom were recently married. And thus, all the festivals would be oriented around the arrivals of the daughters-in-law’s parents and relatives. There were gifts to be bought for them, for the new daughters-in-law, sons-in-law, lists to be made, groceries to be ordered, and dry snacks to be kept ready.
Her life was full, as if the festivals and functions had no end. I wondered if I would ever be so committed. Then I remembered how she told me, as she wiped her eyes, “If I had got a job like you girls, I would have loved to do it. But I was not allowed to, by your father-in-law. He said, that I had too many responsibilities at home.”
She took care of those responsibilities. Responsibilities of her young brothers-in-law, sisters-in-law, her own children. She almost forgot about the job till she got daughters-in-law who were professionals.
I also remember, her first sickness. She had to undergo an angioplasty for it. After the procedure, a psychologist came and asked her, “Do you feel that you are stressed because your children are away from you?”
This question was among several questions that the psychologist asked, but it was the one that brought tears to her eyes. It was true, her own children had children who went to school. This meant that her children would visit her less often. Sometimes, not for months or even years together.
At the same time, she had started visiting them more often as she fell ill all too often. Her heart, probably, craved days when the house was full; the time scarce and she was busy in the kitchen, cooking savouries, pickles and delicacies for all of posterity.
Good or bad, time never remains stable. Change is a constant and there was vacuum in her life. She was sad and confounded and tried run her children’s houses by dominating them or their wives. Naturally, there was friction, her children could not comply to all her demands. Time had changed, after all.
Today, as my mother-in-law lies in the ICU, so tired and broken from irrecoverable past illnesses at 82. Her arm is paralysed and my heart aches for her, as it should for another woman.
She lived her entire life putting others before her. They all became self-sufficient and she had a chance to start her own life. However, she was so used to thinking of others, that she never realised that she could be her own priority.
That’s when her commitment towards her family became an intrusion for others. It was painful, not just for her but for everyone else too.
We are all grown ups too. My husband and I have gone beyond fighting for the ‘your mother said so,’ ‘your father did that,’ instead we have gathered things to rejoice over. We continue to do so despite things that made us bitter at one point.
Today, she is under the spell of sickness and has lost one of her bodily functions, I feel sorry for her. I feel so because she gathered nothing for herself. She is empty in that respect.
I think, women from the previous generations have taught me a lesson. A lesson that while living for others, we have to be aware and leant to live for ourselves too. We should keep ourself as a priority, for we come in the world alone and we die alone. When there is no one for us, we are own and only companions.
Picture credits: YouTube
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Neena was the sole caregiver of Amma and though one would think that Amma was dependent on her, Neena felt otherwise.
Neena inhaled the aroma that emanated from the pan and took a deep breath. The aroma of cumin interspersed with butter transported her back to the modest kitchen in her native village. She could picture her father standing in the kitchen wearing his white crisp kurta as he made delectable concoctions for his only daughter.
Neena grew up in a home where both her parents worked together in tandem to keep the house up and running. She had a blissful childhood in her modest two-room house. The house was small but every nook and cranny gave her memories of a lifetime. Neena’s young heart imagined that her life would follow the same cheerful course. But how wrong she was!
When she was sixteen, the catastrophic clutches of destiny snatched away her parents. They passed away in a road accident and Neena was devastated. Relatives thronged her now gloomy house and soon it was decided that she should be married off.
Women today don’t want to be in a partnership that complicates their lives further. They need an equal partner with whom they can figure out life as a team, playing by each other’s strengths.
We all are familiar with that one annoying aunty who is more interested in our marital status than in the dessert counter at a wedding. But these aunties have somehow become obsolete now. Now they are replaced by men we have in our lives. Friends, family, and even work colleagues. It’s the men who are worried about why we are not saying yes to one among their clans. What is wrong with us? Aren’t we scared of dying alone? Like them?
A recent interaction with a guy friend of mine turned sour when he lectured me about how I would regret not getting married at the right time. He lectured that every event in our lives needs to be completed within a certain timeframe set by society else we are doomed. I wasn’t angry. I was just disappointed to realize that annoying aunties are rapidly doubling in our society. And they don’t just appear at weddings or family functions anymore. They are everywhere. They are the real pandemic.
Let’s examine this a little closer.
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