I will marry you, if you don’t have a Mother!

It may seem inappropriate to say, that it has become quite common to find young women praying to meet a suitor whose mother is already dead. In other words, a guy’s prospects out of the many suitors on ground can be improved if his mother is no longer alive. This sounds very morbid, isn’t it?

Marriage, which is every mothers’ dream for their sons usually begin to turn to nightmares as the battle for control of the guy’s heart between the wife and the mother often squeezes energy and life itself out of the relationship. The mothers usually find it difficult to believe that another woman, who just emerged from nowhere, has the capability to make her son comfortable, and the wives will wonder why Mama cannot focus on her own husband and let her enjoy her own marriage.

This scenario is not limited to mother in-laws. You can also have meddlesome and never-let go father in-laws who are so obsessed with their daughters that they will like the daughters’ husbands to take instructions from them on how to run their homes.

There are instances where the mother in-law may not even want to interfere, but a young wife will initiate a war to ensure the remnants of family relationships of her husband is destroyed and the husband is completely detached from the rest of his family. Nothing wrong in having your hubby to yourself actually, but the problem is always that she will keep her own family associations intact, while making the guy a stranger in his own family.

It is well known that in this part of the world, we traditionally abuse family relationships, otherwise, why should you want to move into your son’s house after he has gotten married? Why is it after a lady gets married that all the siblings that her parents could not train will like to gain admission?  I bet you, most of the marital crisis associated with family issues is caused by things that are not directly beneficial to the couple and their own future – it is often the interest of elements in either or both families who probably want the marriage to fulfil their own expectations.

It is important we begin to sound it clearly to parents, marriage of your kids is not meant to fulfil your own expectations, design and agenda, and it is not meant to complete what you started in your own life. A young man and woman getting married is like a fresh seed with its own distinct purpose.

I think the golden rule is for parents to give out their children in marriage with the understanding that they are now independent. That also presupposes that you have trained your sons and daughters on what it means to be independent in a new family unit.  I think some parents will want to hover around their kid’s homes because they are not sure where and when things will go wrong. Crisis becomes escalated when parents from both sides are hovering in nature; this is a recipe for marital crisis.

Dear Friends, you don’t need a dead mother in-law. All you need are in-laws who understand their exact roles in the marriage. Don’t forget that every daughter in-law will one day become a mother in-law.