A young Indian couple got married in Riyadh. The boy was brought up in Riyadh and the girl was a product of Mumbai's elite society. It was a beautifully paired couple when looks and personality were graded but soon things began to scramble down. The girl wrote to her mentor, a religious personality who also counseled people in need. "My mother in law interferes a lot in every affair, right from kitchen to cleaning bathroom or deciding the colour of the bed sheets and curtains of bedroom." The girl exclaimed further, "I can't even make a dish of my choice as she is very fussy about the eating habits of her son". Then she posed a question, "Why is it that only I have to adjust all my styles and habits in accordance to my in-laws?" Soon the girl underwent a miscarriage and both, the daughter in law and mother in law blamed each other. Though they live under the same roof yet their eyes don't meet happily. Their marriage continues but their happiness doesn't.
There are two ways of allowing the married children to stay separate. One is to give them a separate house and other is not to interfere too much in their lives. Here are few reasons why they should be weaving their own nest:
1. Every woman dreams of establishing her own home. Allow her along with your son so that it makes the husband and wife both self dependant instead of hanging around the neck of parents sucking their time and energy in petty things like grocery to paying electric bills.
2. Establishing a separate house means ways paved for settling the younger siblings who are next in line to marry.
3. Observation of Hijab with the brother in law. The Messenger of Allah, Peace be upon him, called the brother in law as death. It means highest amount of hijab should be observed with him. A newlywed bride looks pretty and every day she is wearing a new dress and moves around the house but the presence of unmarried brother in law may be very difficult to observe hijab or enjoy the liberal environment that a house offers.
4. Parents are not meant for doing babysitting of grand children. In some Western countries, the Indians and Pakistani parents in laws are actually invited to stay with the couple till their grandchildren grow up. The husband and the wife go to work and earn while the old couple stay back looking after kids. Marriage counselors say that these parents are either treated like maids or their seniority is not tolerated for a long time resulting irreparable cracks in relation. Better visit your married children and stay with dignity.
5. Presence of parents in couple fights can spoil the chances of a quick compromise. A married lady once wrote to me that whenever she has any disagreement with her husband it becomes a regular affair for her mother in law to interfere and take sides of her son making it very hard for the daughter in law to keep the quarrel at a low profile, which otherwise could have been an easy patch up but now the firing from other front broadens the scope of war.
6. Lessen the chances of gheebah, back biting. Two swords cannot be accommodated in one sheath, says an Indian proverb. Staying together can also allow many human weakness on both the sides to be exposed to wrong assumptions leading to gheebah.
Good intentions are not enough to carry on relations happily but an early provision of helping to establish your son and daughter in law can stop many hazardous family catastrophes before falling.
