STOP BUILDING MANSIONS TO WELCOME YOUR DIL…..SHE ISNT GONNA STAY THERE !!!

Any Movie maniac would perpetually be triggered to decipher DIL as “heart”. But the punch will deftly wash off given the elaboration of the term as Daughter in Law. She can be the heart as long as she stays away from your son. As soon as the institution of marriage sets its wheel and is on the road, her definition will be bartered based on the dance-drama she may enfold with her husband’s family members. 

The abhorrent and detestable notion that a woman has to settle down at her husband’s home after the wedlock has been recast by the modern generation to a considerable extend. Erasing the rituals and traditions in one go isn't a walk in the park. Nevertheless, the trends have been revamped and the conservative Indian system is gradually getting accustomed with the new terminology of married children living separately. But even today, any independent lady who moves with her husband to a separate house in the initial stage of their marriage is illustrated by the guy’s family as a “Difficult DIL ” unless the shift is necessitated by concrete circumstantial grounds. It is indeed contradictory when you say she is a nightmare for you when your son’s dreams lies glued with her. There are reasons umpteen for a pragmatic lady of today’s world to start her married life in an independent way. Marriageable age has altered now where most ladies get into the track of matrimony once they are seasoned and matured enough with definite streak of independence.

The previous generation had been ingrained with the idea that a marriage is a meaty tie between two families and it wasn't typically odd for them to place themselves within the frontiers of a joint family. But as far as the new-gen is considered, a marriage is a delicate contract between the two where the rest of the family members fade away into nihility. The driving force for Indian parents to be oblivious about privacy is just the fact that many had not known what the term “Privacy” is during their wedlock. A bonding without privacy can sustain for years but the commitment chipped in and the efforts pulled in will doubtlessly vary depending on the initial charge of love you define within the fundamental and crucial “beginning days” of your wedlock. The future returns from your marriage is directly proportional to the initial investment you are willing to slide in. The funding you make in a marriage commences from day one where privacy plays the most pivotal role.

A joint family had its glory in the past when people particularly had nothing to do except administering the cultivated land which they possessed and owned. They had time left for mixing and mingling and remixing and repeating the same odd things again. In a modern scenario with a work culture demanding deadlines and targets, EMIs and Bank Loans, people are not just moving from houses to flats but even from studio apartments to kitchen-less nests. Apart from these rigmaroles, there are quite a few psychological aspects that one may need to consider if your DIL strongly wishes to move out. 

1. The Disparity in Perception

A modern girl today squanders a major share of her schooling or College life in Hostels where the world lies before her in all vibrant colours. She is raised up with a lot of freedom unlike the older generation ladies and therefore her vistas are wide and they hardly get matched with the gray hairs at home. And no matter how, it runs rugged, joining hands with many under the same roof with divergent ideologies. 

2. The Career Pursuit 

More often than not, a healthy education calls forth in seeking a wholesome job too. The hunt for a job can oust them away from the residential area or away from the husband’s family. In a predicament where a home maker can take her own liberty, a working woman has wider boundaries in claiming her independence through her career. It is obnoxious if you wish to retain her at home by entrusting the household chores. If her will for a job is strong enough, she will find ways to strip herself apart from the home scenario. You will ultimately lose the bargain with her as she goes not just alone but with your most important possession - your son !!

2. A Safe home is a home with a Single Ruler

Most girls today hold high, their own individual tastes and proclivities. She might be a girl who has a definite choice of colour schemes for her living room or someone who wants her bedroom to be designed in distinct pattern. Though we call it a male dominated society, unfortunately, it is always the culture, choice and taste of a lady that would be reflected at any home except for a few exceptional cases. Thank the stars; She rules the home. From bedspreads to draperies and from Candles to matchsticks, she chooses the brands and she dictates the quantity. And the co-partner - the husband, agrees to her standards on two grounds. First is possibly the ideal one, where he accords and is convinced with the choices, suggestions and opinions of his wife that he nods with a smile. Second is the case where he nods with a frown where he tries not to usher in an argument with his wife for the smooth sail of the family. Consequently, the woman rules the home. And this indeed creates ripples as soon as the DIL arrives - who is definitely another Smart Ruler. No two Rulers can reign in the same territory and akin to that, the new ruler should be given a different province to rule. So let them move out !!

3. The Ownership strategy

The basic concept of any relationship is ownership or emotional possession and the tie starts working sturdy to its pure strength only when that ownership is handed over. If you plan to marry off your son or daughter, the ownership strategy is inclusive of the package which has to be passed over to their spouse. It is often painful that the lion’s share of divorce cases originates and stifles through the issues of this emotional ownership. Marry off your kids when you are fully equipped to release your emotional investment towards them. Let their partners be in full charge of them. 

4. Self confidence

Reiterating the same point, a girl who has strict vision about her life ahead, do parents really need to bolt behind in helping her to set her own independent family and home? The greatest folly of parents lie in underestimating the potentials of the girl who walks in. It is candidly dangerous and cranky to tie the so called DIL to the husband’s family in the pretext of facilitating her to learn how a family should be run. She needn't be taught by giving a trial to run a family nor is it important that you go and stay with them when they had moved out . Remember they have moved “OUT” and try not to be “IN” frequently. 

5. A private space to breathe high

When you start the initial days of your nuptial knot inside an extended or joint family, there are dollops of colours that you miss amidst the crowd. Your initial privacy gets stuck just to your bedroom. The most important component after a marriage is seclusion and privacy which makes the best basic foundation of bonding which will pave way for the years to come. For all those who had missed the initial privacy of their marriage, they had undoubtedly missed the most exquisite slice of their nuptial rope. When the parents start instituting themselves into the conjugal bond of their children, shaking their mode of privacy, they know not the stress they install within the mindset of the two individuals who are supposed to remain man and wife for the future days. 

Your cozy outfits get confined to your bed-chambers. Your cool denim shorts need to be masked in pyjamas as you step out of the room. Your breezy late-night-walks might be interrupted with safety warnings. Your craving for a Dominos Pizza may end up in raw chapatis. The awesome rainy mornings would not be lovely with the guilt game of your MIL being already awake. The ringing laughters when you are tickled suffocate within the bars of your room in hushed up smiles. Your movie plans for Sunday would be clouded with the arrival of a bunch of relatives. The occasional fancy of cooking together or having a drink together or dining out will be hindered often in the names of gender rules or social rules or economic rules. The tiny love-salts which couldn't be showcased gets shadowed among the rabble. An easy cup-caking day or an afternoon spooning in the couch will never ever happen. Above all, the real bonding and the real mischief with which the sail has to start with, is completely dilapidated with the presence of too many eyes around. You will have old grannies grumbling on one side and dashing kids driving their cars inside the house smashing every nook and corner. It is quite easy that these manoeuvres can easily pull a check on you from a flickering romance to the life realities.The inceptive days of matrimony needn't be realistic since your journey ahead is going to be all about realism. So it is recommended that you can be a bit quixotic and utopian in the beginning days. No wonder, the concept of Honeymoon emerged in Britain long back to provide the so called seclusion for the new couples. 

A Honeymoon is quite extraneous if you get the good golden days independently with your partner in the initial years. Even if your partner takes you to Bora Bora for the tenth marriage anniversary, it sure is not going to ignite the spice which you might have got in the initial kick of the wedlock. The logic doesn't state to cast off the parents or in-laws but on the other hand it justifies only a necessary requirement of bonding and a private space which you are supposed to beget on a mandatory basis while in the stage of embryonic matrimony. The privacy that you demand initially and the fancy that you retain in the first days, slowly dwindles as you get into the humongous responsibilities of rearing kids and building up the family and the presence of other family members would not be a hindrance to your privacy in a later stage. Because there comes a stage in marriage where you aren't bothered about private space anymore. But the initial privacy is obligatory for any wedlock and not being seriously concerned about it is a greater imbecility from the part of both families. It is not surprising that most of the European stream had flung in the air the concept of extended families. 

Its high time to stop stretching your hands out to your kids unless it is too necessary. Stop worrying when your kids feel it is important to move out. Stop wobbling when your son hasn't visited you for a month and instead be happy that he is much preoccupied in establishing his own family. Stop visiting your married children frequently. Each time you trespass the privacy of your son or daughter, unwittingly you are dissipating the intimacy they had rendered into each other; Unknowingly you are destroying a system they had structured in their home. Each woman has her own set of rules that she designs for her home. Let us not destabilise those rules with ours by instituting ourselves into it. 

It is transparently conspicuous as why the Garden of Eden was called a Paradise in Bible, for Adam and Eve were the real ones who basked in the glory of pristine privacy. A world of privacy is undoubtedly a Paradise and lets owe the same paradise to our kids where we can stand and stare the beauty of their evolving relationship. Let us stop being the audacious Satan who crept into their serene Paradise to spoil their sport.

A.Krishna Sunder