A childhood friend who got married before any of us
friends within our school batch, seemed
to be having some marital problems fairly early on in her relationship. Her
parents urged the couple to go in for marriage counselling. Teething problems
we all thought. And yet somewhere some instinct had told me it ran deeper. They
patched it up- to the relief of the parents -who were very keen not to cut a
sorry figure in their ‘community’. A brood of kids followed and all seemed okay
until recently many years down the line I received a cryptic message about
‘being treated like a maid’ and verbal and mental abuse. I was shocked. Nothing
had changed? She was the passive suffering victim of violence through all these
precious years?
Often the woman in a marriage is ridden rough shod
upon because she is not the bread winner and the contribution she makes in
terms of cooking, cleaning and generally being the ‘fall guy’ for kids, in-laws
and family is taken very much for granted. There is no value for the sacrifices
she has made and her husband is oblivious to her needs and desires. He feels
that any kindness ‘bestowed’ upon her is a favor.
I recognized this from the experiences of many
friends from school and college who got married to dominating men that wanted a
‘housewife’ to keep home and hearth. The statistic is higher when women give themselves
up headlong into the chores of marriage -giving up all financial independence
and cutting down drastically on personal pursuits of happiness.
CLICK BELOW ON
THE 'Read More' icon to read the entire article...
