The biggest mistake that all Indian parents are making collectively

The one thing I regret the most in my life is telling my parents about my relationship with my loving girlfriend, Saloni (changed).

Before I start my story and the morals connected with it, let me tell you that I am very close to my parents and we love each other very much. They are extremely supportive of me in every aspect except this one.

Saloni was my junior in college and I fell in love with her at the first sight only. She was an average looking girl but there was a unique innocence on her face that pulled me towards her. I previous have had crushes and infatuations too, but this was different. It was love. This girl was different. The way she spoke, chuckled and teased was all beyond this world. Her playfulness, Ohh, I still can clearly remember that!

We bonded and connected at every level. We had so many similarities. We shared many interests. It was just like a movie story. After spending a good amount of time with her, I decided to propose her and she accepted.

The peculiar thing about this proposal was that I did it on a very special day, my birthday. It was the best gift that I ever got. We began dating and romance and all was going well until this happened.

Me: “Mom! I want to tell you something.”

Mom: “Yeah, sure.”

Me: “I told you about Saloni, right.”

Mom: “Yeah, what about her?”

Me: “I am in love with her and I proposed her today and guess what, she said Yes!”

Now let me tell you all that I told my mother about Saloni a few months back and that time I told her that we are very good friends and she was very fine with it. She was also okay with my late night talking with her and all. Now getting back to the conversation.

Mom: “What!!! Why?…..”

Me: “What do you mean why? I told you I love her. And the plus points are that she is in the same college as me and same caste as us(not that I care). I don’t think that you should have any problem with that. Do you?”

Mom:”Nope, it’s fine!”

And the conversation ended. But I could sense that she was not fine. However, I let that go. But after 3 days, she came to my room at night while I was talking to Saloni and said this.

“How much time will you waste in these late night talks? Hang up the phone and study!”

I had never seen her like that. I was tensed and slightly scared. I didn’t know what to say, and after a few more days, hell broke loose!

My mother started resenting my every move that was directed towards Saloni. She started to think that I went to college not for studies but for Saloni. This all was very much confusing to me because my performance in college was drastically improving because I used to teach Saloni and that was making my concepts even stronger. I reached to that level in my studies where a senior almost 5 years older than me asked me to teach a specific topic to him. True story!

I tried to console and explain to my mom that having Saloni in my life is indeed making my academic performance better and that is the greatest plus point. What more do you want in life? If your son’s career and love life are going fabulously hand in hand, then what’s the problem? But she was not willing to hear any more from my side. Her only argument was.

If someone from our neighborhood sees you with that girl, what will people say?

This “What will people say?” has ruined more lives and crushed more dreams than the deaths that occurred in World war 1 and 2 combined. I mean, she was completely ignoring the fact that I was also succeeding in my career. Her only concern was, Society!

Tension began rising in my house and we fought daily on the same matter. I was so under pressure that I had to come clean to Saloni about it and we decided to break up!

Yeah that was a tragic end to my beautiful love story.

The things that Indian parents are collectively doing wrong are,

1.Listening to and following society on every single matter of personal importance like marriage, career etc. They make personal matters social.

2. Taking side of the other people rather than taking side of their children.

3. Giving maximum Fucks about the relatives and giving no Fucks about their children.

And all this is done in the name of,

"We know better than you as we are more experienced".

"This is for your betterment only".

And, the most irritating one.

"What will society say?"

I am not saying that Indian parents do not support their children at all, but when it comes to the matters which are not acceptable to the society, things take a complete U turn. They need to understand that it’s our personal life and society is no one to meddle in that. What we do is our problem and our commitments and nobody else’s business.

Aryan :)