Why is it so difficult for us to consider our mother-in-law as our own mother? Why is it so difficult for a mother-in-law to consider her daughter-in-law as her own daughter? This is the biggest challenge that we have to overcome in our society.

Whenever I meet any married woman, she has only one thing to talk about – her mother-in-law.

She compares her parents’ place with her parents’-in-law’s place.

Whether we are daughters, daughters-in-law, mothers, mothers-in-law, sisters or sisters-in-law – we are all women by birth.

Women should always respect, understand and support one another.

Yet, there is always a conflict between women.  Most of the time conflicts happen due to jealousy. I don’t know why we are so jealous of one another. After all, we all are women. Jealousy ruins a relationship and should be channelized in a positive direction.

A woman can become another woman’s worst enemy when she harbours ill-will for other women. Most of the time the mother-in-law and sister-in-law team up together and make the daughter-in-law the victim of their negative emotions.

Why does the mother-in-law feel that the daughter-in-law has to do all the work around the house after her son gets married? Wasn’t she doing it before the daughter-in-law came into her house? Her own daughter does not do any work around the house. Yet she never asks her to do so.

Does she tell her daughter that she may have to do all the housework after she gets married?

When the bride and the groom take the second round around the sacred fire – they take a vow that they will respect each other’s parents after they get married and treat them like their own parents.

Our elders too say that we should respect our in-laws and consider them as our own parents.

But often mothers-in-law expect the daughters-in-law to learn and follow their customs on the very first day of their wedding. They know that she has lived in her parents’ place for 25 years.

Yet they expect her to learn everything within a day. How can she adapt so quickly?

When we buy a new phone – it takes some time to charge the battery and transfer the entire database from our old phone to our new phone. We are instructed not to touch the phone for some time till all the data gets transferred. It will take time for us to get used to the new phone. It’s the same with the new member of the family. It takes time to transfer all the new data. It takes time for all the family members to get used to the new member.

How can we expect her to forget her parents and expect her to treat others with love immediately? The other members of the family too will take their own time to understand her.

The relationship will evolve gradually over time. We need to be patient with each other.

The in-laws and the daughter-in-law should not expect too much from each other at this stage. Change does not happen overnight.

Both sides must be willing to co-operate with each other.

Even in our own homes, we come across many discussions which we don't like. Often we may find no logic behind such discussions. But we still accept our family members and let such incidents pass. But we feel differently when such things happen in our in-laws' house.

When our mother shouts at us it is completely fine by us.

Maybe our moms always used an extremely harsh tone to wake us up early in the morning every day. But we will ignore it and tell her that we will wake up in a few minutes. But if our mother-in-law says the same thing even in a polite manner we will get very annoyed and complain about it saying that she is asking me to wake up early every day. 

Both mothers are saying exactly the same thing but we think differently and perceive things differently with different people.

Often a mother-in-law treats the daughter-in-law as an outsider and annoys her by treating her like a slave. Will she be able to accept it when someone else treats her daughter in the same manner?

These are the things that create problems within a family. Often people end up divorcing each other or end their lives because this creates a lot of stress in their lives.

We girls are always told that “Yahan pe to sab chalega but jab sasural jaoge tab pata lagega. Saas aisa karke nahe degi. Sab tumse karvayegi.” We have been hearing such words since our childhood isn’t it? Hence we always feel that she is my husband’s mom and not my mom. Daughters-in-law are much more sensitive to the words of their mothers-in-law because of the psychology which has become ingrained in their mind from childhood.

Girls are always attached to their mothers. They share everything with her because she has been with her mother since her childhood. But she can’t do the same thing with her mother-in-law. The same thing applies to the mothers-in-law. She shares everything with her daughter but finds it difficult to share things with her daughter-in-law. Mothers-in-law take very good care of their daughters but when it comes to their daughters-in-law their thinking changes because the girl just happens to be her daughter-in-law and vice versa.

The mother should understand that her daughter has gone to another home and she had to adjust and start her new life there. She cannot hold on to her daughter anymore.

We need to understand that after getting married – a girl has to live her entire life with her husband and his family. The mother-in-law has to live her entire life with her daughter-in-law.  

Both of them have to live together now for the rest of their lives. So why not take care of each other? We always complain that she does this and she does that. But would our reaction be the same if our moms or daughters too had done the same thing?

Do we become angry and start arguing with our moms and daughters for silly things? I’m sure we don’t. Then why do we fight over such petty things? Why do we fill our houses with negative vibes? It is better to create a happy atmosphere for our families. Why don’t we focus on making our house more peaceful and loving so that when our husbands come home they feel good and happy? Let there be no stress in the house because he deals with enough and more stress outside the house too.

All these things are applicable to both sides. When we take care of one another all of us will be happy. Our husbands start respecting us and they will stand up for us when the other party is wrong.

All of us should take care of one another. We should not hold on to grudges. We should work on creating and maintaining healthy relationships. There should always be transparency in our relationships. Whether it is the mother, daughter, father, son, mother-in-law or daughter-in-law there must be transparency and understanding in our relationships. If a mother-in-law feels bad about something she should tell her daughter-in-law about it and vice versa.

Anyhow only the females have to run the house and take care of the family. We have to do it. But we can choose to do so with or without a smile. That depends on us.But it is always better to do so with a smile. Isn’t it?

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