I did struggle with 80% of what you said and almost went for divorce. But, may be you will be surprised to know I bounced back and sort of repaired my marriage for my kid’s sake (divored parents in india is too much to handle for a little one).

You are very much right when you said you suffer when you were weak. I had a hell when I was trying to please everyone and ended up spoiling my health. I was a bit too stupid when I was newly wed and never realized MIL’s intentions.

But, I realized (and many indian women have to) that you can keep others happy only when you are a happy person. I struggled my way back to work (DH was a bit understanding and helped me out). I dont care what the not so old bats say anymore. Yes there is still struggle involved but there is light at the end of tunnel.

I cant thank you enough for this site and your article.

P.S: I’m saddened to see few unhappy women around whom I doubt will be potential MIL from Hell in making coz forgiving is not an easy thing to do.

I thought I would escape that by growing up in a different country and marrying a nice Indian boy who was totally westernized. Sadly, though his mother hardly ever goes back to India, she is of this school that you describe.. We just finished a course of couples counseling and you know what the final discussion was about? It wasn’t about me, it wasn’t about him, it wasn’t about us. It was about his mother and how she probably needs to be on some kind of anti-depressant and be forced to get up from crying on the couch and go out and DO SOMETHING with her life besides hating everyone and everything and making everyone around her miserable…

It’s not “tradition”. This is not really Indian culture – it’s about what happens when women are only allowed to be mothers and have no other life of their own, then their children grow up and try to become adults and she freaks out because she feels she has no purpose in life anymore and is just waiting to die. How pathetic and sad for them. Get these women OUT of the house and doing something – make them take a class, volunteer, do arts and crafts… in the worst cases, GET THEM SOME MEDS!!!!!

I suggested this to my FH when I finally realized what was going on with his mother. I wasn’t angry with her anymore, I was angry with HIM for not recognizing her chronic unhappiness and not helping her do something about it and allowing me to handle the fallout of it when it had NOTHING to do with me. He didn’t listen to me so we went to therapy and now several months and several hundreds of dollars later, he has now heard the same exact words from the mouth of a professional and agrees 100%. YOU’RE WELCOME!