Mired in my own thoughts...

let me accept it to myself. I am not as good as I think I am. I don’t like her and I cannot bring myself to forgive her, to be good to her or generally be a BIGGER, magnanimous person. the conflict in my mind is because I am trying to go against what comes naturally to me, to ignore / dislike someone who has caused so much of hurt(hurt is not the word, even trauma wouldn’t do justice). The problem is this is not that kind of relationship that can be ignored. I would feel guilty if I did it. it is very hard for me to be a hypocrite, so it is all the more tougher. It shows in my body language, I just cannot bring myself to feign affection and love. It is so not me. I am not a saint, “inna seithaarai oruthal avar nana nannayam seithu vidal” is very hard for me to do. I am not that kind of a person who wants to avenge either. I want to put IT back and get on with life. But I just am not able to FORGIVE or FORGET. I was OK for about 2 months, but it has come back haunting me again. Making me feel depressed, cry, giving me sleepless nights, extra ugly confrontations with DH, generally spoiling my life, the time I would have spent with Nikki, the time I would have spent reading a good book, cooking a new dish, talking to a good friend, choosing pictures for the collage frames that are lying idle for couple of months, hmm. I know I shouldn’t let this happen to me. She has forgotten everything and is having a good life. It is simply not worth my time. I know what the problem is. Me being the queen of lost moments, missed asking her so many things when IT happened. And I put up with abuse and kept completely quiet for the next 2 months, just because she was a guest at our home and the reason she was here is to look after Nikki so he won’t go to daycare before he is at least 1. Unless I give her a piece of my mind, and respond to everything she said, if not that, at least confront her for the insults that she meted out to my parents, especially my mom, I cannot be at peace. Wait, is this what is called revenge? I don’t know. Probably I am bad.

Do I know myself? Has IT revealed a completely new facet of my personality? I used to be the person who will keep quiet when I had confrontations with my father, sometimes he even has beat me, but I have put up with it calmly, forgiven him and almost forgotten everything. But what he spoke or did, did not hurt me THIS MUCH. It was kind of harmless, something that happened because he is a short-tempered person, he is not vile. I would just keep quiet for a couple of days, that will be my form of protest and ultimately either he or me will take the first step towards peace and everything will become normal. Nothing has haunted me THIS LONG and THIS MUCH in my life. Why it has come back NOW is because I am going to India. And I will have to go to THEIR house. I have no problem talking to THEM over the phone from here. I can manage that. But living in that house, just with the two of them, eating, sleeping, bathing, talking, smiling, listening to their talks, cooking dishes for them, eating food made by her, as though nothing ever happened between us, I simply cannot. I just CANNOT DO IT. But they have a right to enjoy Nikki, their grandson, and Nikki wouldn’t part with me, so I have to go. Do they have the right to enjoy the fruit of my womb whilst they hate me? Just because the seed for the fruit came from their lineage? I can manage being there for a few days or even for a week if DH is with us. I do not want to be there even for an hour when DH wouldn’t be there. There is no pressure for me from anyone. DH is completely cool, everything is upto you is what he says. See this is my problem. If he tells me, please try to stay there for a couple of days, I will fight with him . and if he tells me not to stay there, then I would ask him isn’t it wrong? After all, they are old people, they have some love (why it is only “some” is a big story) for Nikki, Nikki took to her well during her stay and I shouldn’t be denying them their rightful love. And there are these relatives with their endless inquisitive questions – when are you going to your in-laws?, oh you stayed there only for 2 days? Nikki is their property(I have already heard this).

I am making those painful phone calls every week just so we are in touch. With time, the calls have become less painful. But most of the times, something she says will linger on in my mind for a long time and will upset me. A remark that she makes comparing me with her daughter, something she says about DH, or I don’t know if it is me who takes everything in the wrong sense. Hmm. Human relationships are the most complex ones. It is tough to make DH understand where I am coming from in spite of being with him for so many years. Sometimes, I want to sit down with her, explain everything and tell her that she has misunderstood a lott of things, basically tell her that I am not what she thinks I am. And also gently remind her that she has no right whatsoever to insult my parents. And give her a chance to explain her behavior too. DH warns me she will never listen (he knows her better, after all his mother). It is akin starting another fight with her, if you start, it will be only you who will be hurt and do not come to me complaining about anything. She is foul-mouthed, arrogant, too egoistic and vile. (a sample: telling my mom that I do not love her or my family, I just act and talk as though I love them. logic: I don’t put food in her plate and give it to her, give her diabetes tablets on time, offer her snacks every now & then, generally take care of her).

DH thinks she has gone insane, so there is no point talking to her. Or else why anyone in their right mind would go to neighbors after I go to work and gossip about me, my parents, how I am torturing her at home, insulting her, give them her gold bangles and ask them to arrange tickets to India(her return tickets were already booked and she had the eticket with her), I shudder at the thought of somebody from DSS visiting us on complaints from our neighbors. Other than taking care of Nikki at home when we went to work (I used to telecommute on 3 days when she was here, so that lessened her burden), she was never asked by us to do ANY household work. She could not stand that her son’s house was run by me and she had no say whatsoever in lot of things (Back in India, FIL does all household work, she does only cooking – once a day, and spends all her time outside home(neighbors, window shopping). And she is an extremely dominant personality, arrogant often, FIL has no say whatsoever in anything, once he told me “I cannot spend even 5 paise without her approval”).

I think she also got lonely here when both of us went to work and that made her depressed. There was no Indian TV available in our area and we were not allowed to have satellite dishes. I did not have many tamil books for her to read, and she accused me for that too. “Idle mind is a devil’s workshop” – she misunderstood every little thing I spoke / did. If I shout at DH for not helping me clean the bathroom because there is tough stain and it hurts my wrists (I have a very bad case of De Quervain’s), she would understand that I am passing an insinuating comment at her that she made that stain and I am indirectly insulting her by asking DH to complete the cleaning. I am a v.e.r.y. absentminded person, misplace and will be searching for my rubber band(I have a couple that I use every other day) and cell phone almost everyday in the morning rush. One day I said “I don’t see any of my rubber-bands” while searching, apparently MIL was using some of mine, she thought I am insulting her, but she did not say anything to me or DH then. Instead she went to the neighbors after I went to work, cried to them telling them that I called her thief, got some rubber bands from them and used them. These are just samples, I can go on and on and on. Even if I try to brush off all these thinking that she really was depressed at that time, I cannot forgive her for the things she spoke to my mom. I am sure she was out of depression by then, having shouted at me, calling me names, accusing me of every possible mean thing, giving me curses in movie style(slapping her stomach with hands), threatening suicide when DH was not home, she did everything possible to hurt me other than hitting me. She tortured my mom with insults every single day(1 full month) that she lived with her. It really kills me when I think of that. And it is just 4 months since she left us. The wounds are still raw, I was almost into clinical depression, but for my mom’s presence here, I wouldn’t have survived it.

In the hindsight, I think I could have done a few things to avert this situation. I should have spoken to her more (DH doesn’t talk other than the mandatory conversations), got her books, arranged for some TV at least from the internet. She had gone to the neighbors (1 telegu, 1 tamil) and started comparing them with us and I think that is where the major problem started. This I don’t think I could have done anything. Neither could I have changed how things were at our home. I had lot of postpartum problems, without DH’s help I cannot run the home and also work full time. I can only make breakfast for him, cannot make sure he has it. Fruits are there for everyone to eat, I cannot feed him with fruits, milk and everything. And also attend to her, in spite of her showing a long face to me. Dynamics of every home is different, comparing will only add to the problems. This has taught me many lessons:
1. ILs can be mean just for the heck of it, no rhyme or reason.
2. Education and Age are not in anyway directly proportional to wisdom and maturity. They can very well be other way round.
3. Without knowing a person’s nature, do not get favours from them, do not invite them home for long stays, just because they are RELATED. Do not underestimate IL’s vileness.
4. Do not be so naïve (I did not know my MIL gossiping to neighbors about me for 2.5 months, until the day fight erupted and she told it to me herself. Never thought she HATED me so much, she was calling up her(ISD calls) relatives back in India and complaining about me. And the stupid me was talking to them nicely not knowing about all this, can quote lot of things from marriage days)

Now, I don’t know why I want to maintain relationship with them. Why am I against shunning them? Why do I want to keep peace with them? Because they are OLD? Because DH is their only son? Because they have fought with their daughter family as well and are not even in talking terms with them either? Because I want to be good? Because Nikki needs 2 sets of loving grandparents unlike me who had love from only one? Because I do not want to regret in the future that, had I given it a chance, things could have gotten better. Because it will be easier for me to “maintain” relationship since I am in the US? Is it because of a sense of duty towards them? Because they have some love for DH and Nikki? Because there were some faults on my side too? Little bit of everything I think. One thing is for sure, I just do not have it in me to undergo one more episode like this. It will break our marriage. This one already tested the strength of our marriage.

Hmmm. I go mad thinking how I should react to them in various hypothetical situations that might happen when I go visit. I should tell them this, that, what not. One part of me says, keep mum, do not start anything by yourself. Another part of me says, she cannot get away with what she has done. Another voice says, who am I to punish? She will not be able to bear it if I give her a piece of my mind. And it will only deteriorate things further. That is not what I want, so should I act as though nothing ever happened between us? What if she brings up something again? Endless questions. God, let me have the mental clarity to take things day by day, one at a time. Do not confuse my already confused mind with so many questions, hypothetical situations, what-ifs and whys. Let my mind imagine only positive things that I can look forward to. The time that I am going to spend with my family, my cutey naughty niece, my sister, my paati, uncles and aunts, seeing Nikki pampered with love, getting myself pampered, shopping with my mom and sister, seeing my friends and their kids, showing off Nikki to them, there are so many good things to look forward to. I need this break. Let nothing mar my vacation. PLEASEEEEEEEEEEE.

Fair and Lovely !

This irks me to no end. Not because I am dark skinned, but because I am happy about my color. Why is being dark considered such a bad thing. Why do people go gaga over somebody’s color, (rather lack of it, white is lack of color)? Won’t one look lovely without being fair? Does fairness alone bring about loveliness in somebody’s face? Good, healthy, blemish less skin gives glow to people of any skin color.

Now, to why this topic came about. There was a baby shower last Sunday for one of our friends who is having her second baby this December. When we started lunch, started a conversation with her. I was asking her if she has gotten over nausea and if she is able to eat all kinds of food. She was telling me that she is not able to drink Tropicana Orange juice, but her husband is forcing her to drink, in spite of she substituting it with clementine (fruit from the orange family). I was like, what?? Whole fruit is better than the Trop OJ that lacks fiber and comes packed with sugar and preservatives. It took me a while to digest what she told me. Actually, I am still digesting it. Her 1st daughter (lets call her D) was born with “GOOD” color because she had Tropicana OJ during her pregnancy. So she is supposed to eat all that she ate during her first pregnancy and NOT EAT anything new that she did not eat during that term. And that includes “NO PRE-NATAL VITAMINS” until 5th month of her pregnancy. (because of lot of reasons, she went to the doc only by the end of her 4th month during her 1st preg).

Now, let me make a few things clear before I go on with this. She and D are dark wheatish color. Her husband is pitch-dark. I have seen pictures of her in-laws. The husband gets his color from his mother. D (the daughter) has some problem with her kidneys and eyes from birth, which I think might be because the mom did not have the pre-natal vitamins during the vital 1st trimester. Having Juice, saffron all that is ok, but not having pre-natal vitamins?!. I was furious, how can you not eat pre-natal vitamins, I asked her, you can do it even without your husband knowing it. Only then, I came to know, she also believes in it. Since she had D in a remote town near Madurai and D was brought up there without crib, swing, bouncer and all the paraphernalia that comes with a baby in the US, they wouldn’t buy anything for the second one, other than the bare necessities. I already started pitying the second one. Her logic is they are trying to treat both of them impartially and bring them up equally. What would you say? There were lot of things that came to my mind, but I kept shut. I did not want to pick up an argument with her. Will you be able to give the undivided attention and all of your time to the second one like you did for the first one. There are a lot of things that are special for the first one. I couldn’t keep quiet completely though. I asked her, “A, you would have seen a plethora of beauty products in US, have you seen any product being marketed for making people fair? There are lot of blacks here, darker than us Indians. They don’t crave to become fair. Infact, I have seen whites here wanting to get some tan on their skin”. She just smiled and she said “your son is fair, so you are talking like this”. I did not see any point in pursuing this topic with her. Then in the same gathering, I spoke to 2 more people who buy “Fair & Lovely” from the Indian grocery stores here and use it religiously. “You still haven’t lost hope?” was my question.

I was ranting, ranting and ranting all the way home and I still am. I cannot stand that people can think like this. I do not judge somebody’s beauty / personality by their color. I did not have any color preference for my baby. DH happens to be fair and since my son is a clone of his father, he got his color too. I actually like brown skinned people. Being brown / black is a part of my identity. I am proud about it. Wanting to become fair, according to me is, trying to become someone you are not. Masking yourself because you are ashamed of your identity. Only people with low self-esteem would do it. I have heard this thing about color from lot of us Indians. My in-laws too, my SIL denounced me for being brown (she is a shade darker than me). I laugh at such people, those comments do not even bother me. I have been wanting to rant about this for a long time, when my MIL made an ugly comment about one of our friend’s baby because she is dark. (the baby is a doll, beautiful big eyes, lovely lips, I love her). Because it was my MIL, it did not affect me a lot. But people in my age group thinking like this. I thought living in the US might change people, their attitude and outlook towards life might improve a little bit, everything else might, but “the craze for being fair will be for ever” I think. “Fair-ever”! Indian cosmetic makers know how to name their products.

Writing - the long-forgotten, rediscovered therapy...

Some History:

Writing is like catharsis for me. I have been writing ever since I came of age (not literally , but around the time I started thinking on my own and became an individual. Guess around 8th grade). My diary used to be my best friend (will explain the past-tense later). My college days was when the writing frenzy hit its' peak, I wrote poems, stories for my college magazine. I wrote in my diary everyday, even the day before the semester exam when I was cramming 6 months worth of stuff(?) into my mind to vomit it on the answer paper the next day. Writing was like downloading my feelings and thoughts from my heart/mind. In the introspection process, I dissected what I thought, what I felt and went into psycho-analysis trying to reason why I chose to do something over the other, why I felt this way and not that way, etc. I wrote about my dreams, ambitions, my thoughts about God (I became an atheist then, now I am not sure what I am,probably agnostic), Marriage (I hated this for all the same reasons tamilpunkster says, and had some more reasons too. Vowed never to get married, only to fall in love after a couple of years, that is a story worth a series of posts), Babies, Life, Happiness and lot more. More than anything, it was a medium for me to vent out all negative feelings out of my system. When I finished writing, it always made me a better person, the anger inside my heart melted away as I wrote about it. I had clarity in my thought, I was a strong individual with very strong beliefs and dis-beliefs.

How I lost it:
As I moved out of my home and started working(around the sametime I fell in love),somehow this habit was forgotten. I don't know if it was lack of time, or I was afraid to put my feelings in writing (in case someone gets to read it), or I was buried too deep in love that I had no time to think/feel anything else, this habit gradually stopped. My writings were limited to emails that I wrote to friends and DH.

Over the years, the marriage took its' toll on me(as a person) and now with my little one I absolutely find no time for anything. I have become a short-tempered, less tolerant, non-thinking person who is always under stress. I blame DH for what I have become (and for lot of other things :D).

Why I re-discovered it:

There was a major problem with my MIL about a month ago. Though in the hind-sight, I think I have contributed to it knowlingly or un-knowingly, when she started bullying me into a fight, I easily fell into the trap, and let my tongue spit a little bit of venom from the poison tree that had been growing in my mind ever since our marriage. My heart just couldn't take it anymore. All the insults that were meted out to my parents, every incident when we were we are neglected (even our little one), absolute lack of love and affection towards us,everything flashed to my mind. When she started accusing me of all nonsense that I couldn't even think of, I lost it. I went down to her level, and barrage of words were fired at each other. All the while DH was asking me to keep quiet, which I was not able to do. Seething and raging with anger, I told her a couple of things which hurt her more. The next day, she picked upon what I said the previous day and it grew into another petty fight.

I realised that it is taking us nowhere, and out of sheer courtesy towards her age and the reason she is at our home is to look after our son when I went to work, I apologised to her for the hurt that I had caused her. I REALLY DID MEAN MY APOLOGY. It was not just mere words. I really couldn't bear seeing someone so hurt, that too by my words, and that too when she was a guest in our home. She never did feel a little teeny bit for what she had done. She stood her ground and kept yelling all nonsense about me. The hurt I felt was immense. I am still feeling it. The net effect is my lactation dropping drastically, my milk production went down to a mere 3-4 ounces from 12 ounces when I pumped every morning. I can neither forgive her nor forget all that she said and did. For the past few weeks, I am not able to do anything properly. I did not even feel hunger for few days. I would have taken off from work, but since it would mean being home with her, I went to work merely to escape from her. I am taking the next week off to complete my work.

I have been thinking and thinking and thinking about it. Only to feel depressed one moment, thinking about my sweetie-pie and trying to be happy the next moment, my mind is still in a turmoil. My mom is here and things are a bit better. Probably that is why I am feeling better too. If only I had left the channel for venting i.e. writing, open, probably it would not have affected me this badly. Probably I would have learnt to ignore her, or deal with her in a better way. Writing means a lot of introspection and reasoning. I am still mulling about the whole episode. I will write a detailed post, on the actual problem, and the solutions that I think might work. Unlike my diary which is read only by me, my blog is open to lot of sensible people who can understand me.

I am off to Niagara this weekend (with MIL!), because according to her, her US trip is not complete without one and people back home will laugh at her if she goes back without seeing it. Will get back and do the post I am talking about. And about the trip ofcourse. This is the first long road-trip that we are making with our littleone. Looking forward to all the adventures.

Happy weekend guys! Off we go!