Are you feeling lonely, helpless, indecisive?
Is your relationship causing you stress?
You are not alone!
Remember, your mental health is just as important as your physical well being.
In a first of its kind initiative to help and benefit Rediff.com readers, mind/life coach, NLP trainer and Mental Health Guru ANU KRISHNAwants you to talk about your problems.
Every week, Anu will answer your queries, address your concerns and offer expert advice on how you can take control of your life.
In her previous self-help series Anu spoke about why couples are fighting more in the lockdown, and offered advice on how to address and solve day-to-day problems.
Dear readers, if you have a question for Anu, please e-mail them to getahead@rediff.co.in (Subject: Ask ANU) for her advice.
Meanwhile, here's the unedited excerpt from our offline session with readers.
S: I am in a relationship for 9 years including 4 years of marriage.
Since the day of marriage, I am having regular fights with my wife concerning my mother and sisters.
Of late, I am feeling like I have lost the love between the two of us. We have stopped talking and don’t get a chance to spend some time together.
Whenever we do, we end up arguing about past mistakes and all. We never talk about the future.
During this pandemic second wave, we came to our native place and after spending some good days, she went to her home for some days and now she is not willing to come back.
We recently had a fight over phone and stopped talking. I started calling her and talking to her but she does not seem to be in a mood to talk.
Now I have stopped talking to her.
I am a bit worried as I feel like I am left alone. Despite so many efforts towards her and her family, she finds a reason to get pissed at me every time.
I am not sure anymore what to do. I try to make her understand. We are in the same situation for 4 years.
If I don't, she won't be taking any initiative from her end.
ANU: Dear S, It does seem that you have concluded what’s going to happen before you have tried everything in the treasure chest?
Relationships can have a long life if we are willing to set aside our differences and keep egos at bay. Now read on and think deeper about these questions.
What went on between your wife and mother/sisters? Did you wife end up feeling hurt and lonely? Did she feel that you sided with your mother and sisters more than you did with her?
Constant arguments about things from the past honestly can lead to no good. It is important to know what exactly your wife feels at this very moment, but it seems like she doesn’t want to talk to you.
When you say you have made many efforts towards her and her family, why do you think, she hasn’t come back home or why has she stopped talking to you?
You did mention that she finds a reason to get pissed, but is there something that she expects from you or a certain behaviour that might help her get to an even ground?
Will involving a senior family member to talk to someone senior family member (not your mother) on her side?
With their experiences and their calm minds, they maybe able to break the ice between both sides and get the two of you to talk.
Please find a neutral member on both sides who can arrange for this in a wise manner without bringing in egos or past battles inside.
Communication must be re-established and throwing your hands up in the air may not be very useful if you want your marriage to continue.
Yes, past need not be brought back into the present, but it is necessary to understand what is going on in her mind before concluding anything.
M: I have a strange problem at my end.
My wife has a different mood, in the morning she would be fine and all of a sudden without any issue from my end then too her mood gets off and she keeps quite.
When I ask her she replies saying it is nothing. This annoys me a lot. I keep quiet and this goes for 2-3 days. If her mood is ok, she will talk.
I do understand that if I hurt her then her mood goes off; then it's ok. But if I have not done anything then also it happens. What should I do?
We fight over past events.
We are not able to close the issue and come to a solution.
Currently we are not talking to each other for the last 4 months.
I have 2 daughters --aged 14 and 10. i am very much worried about them.
ANU: Dear M, the lockdown has been straining on many families in terms of relationship maintenance and connecting 24/7.
Even if this is not the issue, it is imperative to understand the reason for her mood ups and downs.
Since I don't have any information on her age, if she’s in her 40s, it could hormonal also. Bringing the past can simply be a manifestation of what’s going on within her.
It is possible that she is simply exhausted from all the house-work that has surely gone up for all homemakers in the past year or so.
Give her a day off every week and offer to take care of the household chores with the help of your daughters.
They are old enough to be part of this and they maybe able to reach out to their mother faster.
Also set aside some time from your schedule as a couple to talk about the day/week and plan for some activity to do together that involves just the two of you.
Marriages after a point in time reach a plateau and needs some spice and excitement.
Taking each other or each other’s needs for granted can cause a deterioration in relationships and it helps if every individual in that relationship takes the onus of doing ‘more’, thinking ‘more’, feeling ‘more’ for the other individual.
This definitely helps recreate the relationship and you get a chance to start all over again.
Best wishes for a beautiful life.
JR:I need your expert advice in parenting my daughter.
I am a 45 year old mother having two children, a daughter (aged 10 years) and a son (aged 7 years).
My husband is very bad at finance issues and because of that we had some issues with my marriage. So
I shifted to my mother's place with my kids and we were not in touch with my husband for quite some time.
It’s been six years I have been bringing up my kids with very less support/ no support either from my husband or my mother.
Since my husband is not staying with us, my kids have been missing their father. Of late, my husband visits us often and he spends time with the kids whenever possible.
Though she is 10 years old, my daughter is not having that level of maturity.
She is very illogical and dull. I have been training her in certain household work like sweeping the house, washing her clothes and all.
She is doing all the work with no concentration/involvement/interest and so the output is pathetic.
She is like that in her studies also. I have been explaining things in a very detailed way even then she is doing things like that.
During my childhood no one was there to explain me but for my daughter I am there but she is not understanding the value of it. I am getting frustrated and irritated because of her.
My question is since she was missing her father couple of years in the recent past, her behaviour is like this.
Is there anything that I can do for her improvement?
Shortly she might be starting her puberty cycle and before that I would like to make her logical and smart.
I have been consistently trying for this by chatting with her alone but could not see any betterment. Kindly help me out.
ANU: Dear JR, when you say: She is very illogical and dull, what does this mean?
Does she take time to understand things? Or is it that she is being evaluated based on what others her age are doing?
At age 10, do you want a happy child or a child who excels in washing clothes and doing all your housework.
Sharing responsibilities at home is perfectly fine, but to judge your child based on that by saying: ‘output is pathetic’ only demoralizes the child further.
She possibly has missed her father all these years and what you need to do is fill it with more love, care and what is the point in driving the point that you didn’t have anyone and she has you and she has to understand the value of this.
She is 10, please allow her to be her age and feel free with each of you.
Create an environment that is loving and caring and supporting from both parents will enable her to relax, be cheerful, grow and be active. And this environment is not for any sort of evaluation or to see a favourable behaviour from her in return.
In a few years from now, she will be hitting puberty.
Let her walk into that phase with confidence and pride rather than self-doubt and shame. I am sure that as a mother you know how important that time is for a young girl.
Start thinking of how to be back together as a family as it isn’t easy for you as well to be away from your husband.
This could also be adding to your stress and maybe it comes out in different ways.
Be with your daughter, love her and encourage her and even after that, you see that there is a challenge, then maybe it’s time to visit a professional who can step in and help.
Happy parenting and be well and stress-free!
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