Story 3 : History repeats - Be fair with parents - Part II

This post is continuation of the Part - 1. In the last post, you have seen how the poor Mother did service to both the Sons and Daughter-in-laws.

As we see in everyone's life, things turn around. You cant be energetic and healthy for long and all the time (Lucky if someone is). This mother at her 62nd year had slipped in the Bath room of Son2's house. She literally broke her leg and was hospitalized for 6 days. With a great difficulty, she has the signs of recovery and for some "UNKNOWN" reason this Mother was "SENT" to Son1's house after a week. The Daughter-in-law1 took care of her for a month and then they started moving her between the families every other month.

Till then, she could talk express her opinion and after 6 months she started walking again. All the while she was of course being kicked between the Sons families. The LOVE which Daughter-in-laws had on this Mother was gone. Now this poor Mother became a BURDEN to the families rather then LOVABLE Mother.

After few months Both Sons got together and cma to a decision that the Mother will be with each of them for 3 months in the rotation basis. Poor Mother again was happy that they decided to keep her (rather then sending her to old age home).

After an Year, this Mother developed weakness, (uncontrollable) diabetes and other symptoms. At the same time, REAL Unfortunately, this Mother had "Paralysis attack" and her Right Hand and Left Leg got effected. How can God (if you believe in him)  give her such sequence of bad events in her life. This time she had to take bed rest and can't move. Again after 4 months, she had another attach and her speech got effected. Currently (Feb 2010), she is around 70 years, on bed rest, can't talk, cant move and waiting for her death. Sometimes she cant recognize, can't cry when she sees her sisters and near people.

Following is the way Daughter-in-laws treated this poor Women and let her ready to Die.

• Both Daughter-in-laws felt it was a Burden on them to maintain her. They both started blaming each other for her condition. 
• Son1 and Daughter-in-Law1 would lock her in house (even in her current stage) and would go to Cinema, Pilgrimage, Friends place and Picnics. 
• Daughter-in-law2 is little better. However, she has competition with Daughter-in-law1 and does not want to serve her even an EXTRA day. They would calculate the exact 90 days of stay for the Mother. 
• For any reason of Bandh, Rain or Office work, if it was not possible to leave her at other Sons place, then they would calculate accodringly and adjust in next months. 
• Diabetic means that person needs proper amounts of food at regular time intervals. Both Daughter-in-laws had never cooked anything separate for her as it is a waste of time. They would prefer to watch a nice TV serial or a movie in that time. So, this poor Mother would get 2 slices of bread (this Mother sure needs some traditional Breakfast), lunch and Dinner. No one wants to know if wants to eat in-between and if she hungry at all.
• Other people come and go, but they never bother to introduce this poor Mother (in-law). She is given her "dungeon" and she is left her own.
• Daughter-in-law1 would not do any service to her but keeps a servant/nurse to take care of her. She never allows kids to go into that room as she calls that room as "Dirty and Sick". 
• The Daughter-in-laws would do hours and hours of prayers to GOD but would never serve their Mother(in-law) who is in NEED. What good is that Prayer for ? What good is that sort of God who asks them to pray and not serve their own people ? Even if God exists, he will definitely not appreciate this.
• When some of this Mother's sisters and relatives suggested them that "She many like the Old age home as she will have company and medicines will be given in time", Sons and Daughters retaliated and became angry on people who suggested. They said, we are taking care of this Mother nicely and there is no need to take her anywhere. The same people who suggested the Old age home also said that they would pay for the monthly expenses, but still no LUCK for this Mother.

And this list will go on to write all the things she underwent. Is it not so sad to read this. Don't you get angry on such Daughter-in-laws and SONs especially. Is it not sad that people talk about Values and they themselves don't care about their own parents. Is it not sad that we all inherit and ancient "Sanatana Dharma" and still act in an inhumanly.

Whats wrong : Unfortunately, these people can not be suggested anything. All the efforts of requesting, pleading and explaining the situation have gone in vein with these people. So, we would only want to see What's wrong and Request other Sons and Daughter-in-laws.

• You may all be thinking by now (or earlier) what the #%$^ are the Sons doing all while ? Yes, that's a decent question. But, these Sons have given up. When the Sons are asked about it, all the time they said only one thing, "We really really love our Mother; It's just that we are not in a positions to influence our wives to do something. We are not the ones who would take care of them from Morning to Evening when we are away to Work. If they don't have love and affection, we cant help it. We dont want to fight with them for life time".
• Well, there is only one problem here. The problem is Sons (80%)  and Daughter-in-laws (20%) and NOTHING ELSE. For any Son, soon after the marriage it becomes all the necessary to treat fairly - the parents from Both sides - Parents and In-laws. Some Sons seem to sway towards the In-laws so that they can impress the wife (No idea why this happens; But this happens).
• Sons don't give importance to their own Family Members. They think that they are too busy to communicate in their work. But in the mean while, Wife is developing a "feeling" that my Husband does not care about his own Parents. And now, such wives deduce that, "If my husband does not care his parents, then why should i care ?" and "If my husband does not respect his own family traditions and values, then why should i ?".
• Remember that by nature Women are better communicators than Men. So, even if you don't communicate on par with Women, Men should at least show (and have) respect towards his family. Wife MUST know in the initial years of marriage that you respect your family a lot. Of course, inversely, the same theory applies to Wife too.
• For some reason, if Wife is not interested in working with In-Laws, Son should continue to show LOVE and AFFECTION towards the parents. He should continue to Serve in whatever little time he has at home. He should encourage his kids to talk to Grand parents and play with them. Wife may not be willing or understand it initially,  But eventually she WILL. 
• When Son/Daughter-In-Law is living with In-laws, it is natural act that even In-laws will try to do some small work and help Son/Daughter-in-law in day-to-day work. Don't make it as a habit to push more work on them (As a Son, it's not difficult to identify it). Of course, we also see In-laws who are highly non-cooperative and become burden to everyone (But we are not talking about them in this case). 

Request for any Son and Daughter-in-Law :

• Women can MAKE a Family and BREAK a Family. Please treat your Parents and In-laws fairly. 
• As the Head of the family, sometimes Men need to take tough decisions. But as long as it is good for the family and will keep you all together, stand by it.
• For a Daughter-in-law when she is not in good terms with In-laws, please be nice with then AT LEAST when they are in bed. Most of families are affluent now and can affort a nurse or maid servent. You can definitely show some LOVE and give them MORAL SUPPORT.
• Please remember what would happen to you in YOUR OLD AGE. Time is not Stand still . You will soon reach their age before you even realize. 
• If you talk about VALUES, CULTURE and TRADITION to your kids; Then, please be an example for YOURSELF. They dont learn from thin air, they learn from YOU.

We are hoping and praying that any parent SHOULD not be in such situation.

Story 3 : History repeats - Be fair with parents - Part I

We all grow in age with time; whether one likes it or not this is the fact and does not change for anyone. One would definitely see the stages of Newborn, Infant, Toddler, Pre-school(er), Grader, Teen, Adult, Middle Aged, Old and Super Old in their own life. Even though it is pretty evident that every adult/middle aged turns to Old age sometime later, many seems not to understand the "Fair Treatment for Parents".

Following is one such story where parent (mother) gets shuttled between her two sons. You will see that at times it is good to have Humanitarian grounds rather than on Relationship.

This family has two sons both married and living in separate cities. Both are very well educated and they earn nice money each month. One is a Business man and other is a salaried employee. Their father expired when they were kids and her mother did all the toil to raise these kids and give them proper education. She raised them from village boys to a respectable person in their city locality.

She was the loving mother for BOTH of the sons till the marriage. After the marriage this Mother still lived in village thinking that she does not want to be a burden on the sons and daughter-in-laws. As everyone would expect, both daughter-in-laws called her their homes whenever they are in need. During their pregnancy time or when they are not well and so on. This poor Mother did everything that she could right from 55 years till 62 years without uttering a word and VERY HAPPILY.

For this Mother the bad times in her life started. As she is getting older, she had an idea that she should write a will. She has some land and a VERY HUGE house in her village. She started developing Diabetic at the age of 60 years, her eye sight is diminishing, undoubtedly her stamina is touching rock bottom. For any person with common sense, these are very obvious signs of old age and its the time to give some rest to this Mother and do everything the sons and daughter-in-laws could do.

In this part of it, see how this Mother worked for the Sons and Daughter-in-laws. In the next part, we will see how she was treated after her illness and they are letting her die. In the second part,  we will also discuss what's wrong with the situation.

Son1 and Daughter-in-law1

Some Back Ground : This Son1 got married to a very decent family in the society and in terms of money and status they are well below this family. She is well educated and knows how to read and write. They have Son and Daughter.

• Whenever the Daughter-in-law1 wanted to go to her mother's home she used to call her. This poor Mother was happy that she can spend time with the grand kids and Son1.
• This poor Mother was called whenever the Daughter-in-law1's relatives came to the city for pleasure. Daughter-in-law1 wanted the Mother(-in-law) to be at home so that she can be with her relatives.
• This poor Mother used to clean the house, do the washing of kids cloaths, do the washing of vessels, give the kids bath, make the kids ready to school, cook for everyone .... she did all these thinking that "There is nothing wrong in doing OUR OWN work".
• During the May/June time when the crop is ready in her fields, she used to sell them and buy gold for BOTH the daughter-in-laws and get lots and lots of gifts for kids.

Son2 and Daughter-in-law2

Some Back Ground : This Son2 got married to a highly educated girl. They have Daughter and Son.

• The (Grand) Daughter is born with 4 fingers on her right hand. Especially as its a baby girl, this Mother was all worried and she used to do a complete month's fasting for 4 years continuously without looking at her health.
• This Mother used to take care of the (Grand) Daughter 24/7 and everything that one can imagine. Even when she was with Son1, she used to DAILY call the Grand Daughter and talk to her. She had that immaculate affection on this Grand Daughter as she has this problem.
• During the second pregnancy of the Daughter-in-law2, this Mother is with them completely and did all the service in spite of developing a serious diabetic condition.
• This poor Mother used to clean the house, do the washing of kids cloths, do the washing of vessels, give the kids bath, make the kids ready to school, cook for everyone .... she did all these thinking that "There is nothing wrong in doing OUR OWN work".
• During the May/June time when the crop is ready in her fields, she used to sell them and buy gold for BOTH the daughter-in-laws and get lots and lots of gifts for kids.

She did all the above in spite she is in her 60s and NEVER EVER COMPLAINED. This poor Mother was so naive that several years ago, she considered the non-stick cookware's black coating as some sticky substance and she tried to peel it off with spoon while she was washing vessels. One of the Daughter-in-law shouted at her and did not talk to this poor mother for 2 days till SON intervened.

In the next part you will see how this poor Mother was treated when she became ill and could not move.

Story 2 : Husband and In-laws treat unfairly.

This couple is married for last 12 years and have 2 kids. Both kids are going to schools and they do very good in academics. Husband his own Academic Business and is doing great! Husband (and of course wife) lives with the parents and till now they were taken as examples for "Good Combined Familes". Wife takes care of the in-laws very nicely.

Father-in-law after retirement goes to the same college as a professor and is a very famous professor. Mother-in-law has some slight memory problem and she need to be partially watched by the daughter-in-law/wife. The wife wakes up in the morning 5.00am, does all the house hold work, makes breakfast for the father-in-law and husband so that they leave home by 7.30am. 

Recently maternal uncle of the Husband visited them for 2 days. This is the first time that these husband's side "uncle and aunt" where with them and all the previous instances that they met were in functions. During one evening, the Wife calls both the Aunt and Uncle to their backyard when no one is there and cries for her life time. This Aunt and Uncle were shocked and asked what the problem was.She then reveals the problems she was facing right from the day she was married. 

• Husband tortures her verbally - a lot.
• Husband does not treat her as a wife at all. 
• Husband goes on trips and does never speak to her over the phone. But he definitely calls his parents and talk to them.
• Whatever his parents say, thats the final work for him. Not that it is bad, but sometime people would like to have some independency. 
• For rest of the relatives and friends Husband is a great guy. But he feels that she is not the right match for him. It was definitely an arranged marriage for them and at that time, he liked her too.
• He asks few questions which no women would like to hear. like...
• Did you have affair before marriage ?
• Did you have %$^(* before marriage ?
• Do you think you are beautiful ?
• The in-law treats her like a mere maid servant. 
• There was no time that they all eat together. She always HAS to eat after everyone is done eating. 
• Wife has no freedom to even ask that we will go to a move or some picnic.
• The father-in-law scolds her all small and big things and thinks she (daughter-in-law) is a small school girl.
• In-laws behave nice with the kids but not with her. Whatever she does is wrong.
• ...and others...

After listening to many more things that the Wife explained to Aunt and Uncle, they both were shocked. They never felt that the father-in-law and Husband could be so rude daughter-in-law/wife.The Aunt explains the daughter-in-laws cry as "It made me feel dead". 

The next thing they did was to wait till the next morning and called the Husband privately. The Aunt and Uncle took the lead to explain him the situation and inquired him what his intentions were. For all that we know, he just laughs for everything and there was no real reaction. However, the Aunt and Uncle tell him that this kind of treatment is not appreciated and it will be bad for their family to treat her in that way. They tried to explain what she is undergoing with the in-laws treatment too and requested him to treat her fairly.

For now, we all hope that things are going fine and perhaps a little better for now. But there are couple of points that we need to see.

• Just because people are smiling and jovial does not mean they they are Happy. There could be a lot of devastation that we dont see in their eyes. 
• People are playing different roles (Father, Father-in-law, Husband, Uncle, teacher, etc...). Just because we know one person who is very good as a "Father" does not warrant that he is a good "Father-in-law" too. Of course inversely, if one is a good "Daughter" she may not become a good "Daughter-in-law".Before you judge, you need to consider different roles people are in.
• There is so much of pain, frustration and devastation in this women that as soon as she sees SOME relative of Husband, she breaks up. And that too, imagine explaining all your problems to someone you are meeting for 3rd or 4th time and crying for hours and hours in front of them. Can someone imagine the sleepless nights and mental agitation she underwent.
• The role of parents is not only to Guide their kids (Husband) but also in letting them live independently. After sometime,  parents should be in the passenger seat, and let the Husband/Wife (Son/Daughter-in-law) drive. Otherwise, elders should drive their own car. 

Suggestions : 

• Again, the most important thing is that she is missing lot of social network (not the Internet thingy). In this situation, it is very easy to get lost in the problem and not care about the importance of the friends and neighbors. They cant solve your problems, but they will help you walk through it. 
• Depending on the situation, it is necessary to talk to ones own parents. After all, parents are the biggest support system in these situations. It is true that the parents will definitely feel bad about such marriage. On the other hand, keeping problems to ones self, will explode sometime or the other and we don't want a bigger loss that time. 
• When people don't understand the value of fair treatment, there is no harm in talking to all related persons about the way you feel. You are not asking for someone to change, but are letting out your frustrations. Remember, you are not trying to come out of the relationship.You want to strengthen relationship by being open. Living together with differences is always difficult than separating for a simple issue.

We would like to hear your suggestions too.