Before I got married myself, there was a term which was thrown around a lot by married people in my life, called, “Marriage shock”. The legend goes, no matter what you do, no matter how much you try and make sure that the spouse you are choosing is perfect, the living arrangements are perfect, the family is perfect.. one can never escape the “Marriage Shock”. It creeps up on you when you least except it and one exclaims, “I want my mommy and daddy now and that’s it!!!”.
Digging deeper I found out that the reasons for women mostly might be:
I feel like a prisoner!
I hate his mom!
I hate my nands!
Though women care about the man problems more:
He is very filthy!
I hate his friends!
He still talks to his old girl friends!
He has too many expectations!
He doesn’t let me meet my friend or talk to my friends!
I have no life of my own!
More serious ones:
He is a lunatic!
He is ultra possessive!
He beats me up!
His anger is outta control!
However, the topper is this specially for love marriages:
“He is not the same as he was before marriage!!”
WHAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!! Hold on!! FULL STOP HERE!!! REWIND….. WHAT DID YOU SAY AGAIN!!!“He is NOT the SAME as he was BEFORE MARRIAGE!!!!!”
EEEEEEEEEYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! Ok… this is what I was banking on when I said yes for marriage to my fiancé. That it seems I can live with this man, based on how he is now. If he is going to change, I see no reason to go through this whole big ceremony, leading me to agonizing pain! To that, they wave their hands in the air and laughingly say… “ O its gonna be fine, don’t be scared!”
The interesting part is, they never tell you the exact problems that they are facing before one is married. They are so much trying to portray that their hubby is perfect, they never tell you the exact problems. However, once you are, then they open up, even before you are through the first week of your marriage.
So here I was about to get married and my biggest fear was, could this happen to me too?.. “He is not the same as he was before marriage!!” I was shit scared outta my wits. Staring at my man thinking, can he change? Can he REALLY CHANGE enough to make me MISERABLE!?
So, one month into my marriage, here is my analysis, as to what happens to the husbands of these women. After men get married, especially those men who get married to the women of their choice, they feel the need to prove it to their families that they made the right choice. That it’s in perfect conformity with their family’s. Now that they feel the need to do that, they aspire to be the kind of husbands that they have seen all their lives, who conform to norms, the kind of norms that they have seen all their lives. They want to portray and feel as the man of the house. They force their wives into traditional roles of wives that they have seen their mothers and family women in. While they chose to marry progressive women but they force them into traditional roles. To top it off, without showing any mercy or understanding.
That lack of understanding and mercy is what changes them from husbands to a simple conformist to norms. The relation of kindness, tenderness and understanding is replaced by simple role playing. Marriage is a new and different experience for both men and women, and they need to help each other slowly get into the new roles, along with helping each other out through the fulfillment of those roles and completion of their new found responsibilities.
This trend is changing a lot nowadays, and the couples do seem more like very good friends than traditional husband and wives. Men have grown mentally to accept their spouses as a unique person rather than mere wives. They have grown out from conformist to norms to being loving, caring and understanding husbands.
So for those husbands, who have turned into conformist to norms and are just ultra possessive, commanding, pushing and demanding; need to realize they are making their wives unhappy and love and respect is being lost. They need to trust and understand their wives and help them evolve, like how their wives try to help them out. Or otherwise, sooner or later, their marriage would turn into just two people who are living together rather than that of a husband and a wife.
So, one month into the marriage, and its going PRETTY fine, I’d say, “He is not the same as he was before marriage but even BETTER ;)!!”
September 18, 2009 at 12:04 AM
Well well well...days will pass into weeks and weeks into months and years for you to unfold mysteries of a married life…the husband may remain the same or not, the important question is do YOU really remain what you were or you wanted to be? Gone are the days when educated and progressive girls like us used to just inform our parents before going out with friends and colleagues BUT NOW things have changed….go into the permission seeking spree and then wait for the ultimate judgments by either saaaas or the great susar…!!!!!!!!! but perhaps that’s all life after marriage in a society like ours is all about….so live and enjoy the marital bliss in whatever shape and size its:)
September 18, 2009 at 1:27 AM
The last line is a clear attempt to please your husband and tell him, "oh no no, I didn't write this article because I think you're a conformist". Sigh. There has to be a version from the husband's side as well to make things even.
September 18, 2009 at 2:11 AM
not at all honey bunny.. trust me!
September 28, 2009 at 11:40 PM
lolz m waiting for bilal's article.Arshia