How many aging families have been broken up by "Pondering Women"?

After seeing the brief introduction of this event and the stories shared by others at home, I was deeply touched and envied.
Therefore, I finally decided to start writing, and I participated in this event by chance.

One of the purposes of this event is to show everyone to care more about the elderly around you, but another thought popped up in my mind.

This idea is completely contrary to the traditional Confucian saying of respecting the elders and respecting the old and the young.
(I hope that after posting the article, it will not attract too much scolding.) (laughs)

Parents, grandparents, according to the general idea, are very close people.
Also because of the blood relationship, it makes the distance between each other more inseparable.

It is common to see on the Internet, how much time do we have left to meet our parents?

Parents are 60 years old, assuming they live to 90 years old, they have 30 years of time on weekends: 2 hours for meeting and dining
1 year = 52 weeks = only 104 hours
30 years = 3120 hours = only 130 days

God, there is only less than one-third of a year left in disguise! Let's also assume that the father will live to be 90 years old without illness and pain, and meet every week. (It becomes even more impossible under the epidemic.)

However, sometimes the news reports that some younger generations treat their elders with indifference, disrespect, or even ignorance?

There are reasons behind it.

While you are blaming, please be sure to understand the ins and outs from multiple angles.
Don't make generalizations by what you see.

When there are boys and girls in the family, it sometimes exacerbates the cause of tragedy. Since ancient times, Chinese society seems to have preferred sons to daughters. Maybe the daughter will marry off, and what is left to her will be cheaper for foreigners. Sons will marry wives, and they will stay and take care of themselves for the rest of their lives.

Therefore, many families have a sense of injustice towards boys and girls in the allocation of resources.

Here I would like to share a few things that I have encountered with my good friends in real life.

When I was a child , my daughter had to do housework, and my son would go out to work to earn money in the future, so there was no need to study.
Traditionally, for some reason, boys are given more fruit and candy; they are beaten and scolded less often.

During the period of study , boys will be more likely to get the opportunity to study abroad.

As an adult , I found that the world's property prices are not easy for graduates to afford. The most common is that our parents ask their daughters to help their sons to buy a house. The requirements are very "simple": you have to pay a part of the household, and if you are more able, help to make up the down payment together. Then our family worked hard to buy a home together. But the house is only written in the son's name, and it has nothing to do with the daughter in the future. If the daughter asks one more question, she will ask why she is still greedy? Of course, the daughter must pay for the family, and the son needs to save money to marry a wife, so there is no need to give it to the family. Some parents will even make it clear that only the son will inherit any assets in the family in the future.

There are a lot of injustices in traditional and conservative families. But many daughters still love their parents very much. She tried to study early in the morning without comparing too much, just seeing them laughing was the source of motivation in life.

The whole thing has become more and more the daughter's contribution is the duty and should be done; as long as the son pays a little bit, the parents will be moved and keep it in their hearts for the rest of their lives.

After my daughter got married, something strange happened.

Because the number of meetings has decreased, the daughter cherishes the time she spends with her parents more. She has been counting down to the yin and yang of her parents in less than one-third of a year. But family happiness is not inevitable. After marrying out, the parents did not want to contact her. The New Year is a major event in Chinese society. She planned to buy a lot of Japanese fruits, and she said early in the morning that she would go back to pay New Year's greetings, but she couldn't read it at home. She took a day off to her husband's family. After noon, she patiently waited for a long time at the shopping mall near her parents' house. In the end, she waited until 9 o'clock in the evening on the second day of the first day of the new school - eating McDonald's with her husband silently for the holiday.

Once I was finally able to meet my parents. During the conversation, my parents even said that they regarded their daughter-in-law as her, and often cooked their daughter's favorite soup for her. (This can be regarded as an alternative spiritual compensation for the old man to his daughter?)

The other topics revolved around the son, and finally asked the daughter to help apply for other services from the government. (Daughter-in-law is also more valuable than husband and wife, and parents don't dare to ask for much.)

Seeing this, many people will say why they don't resist and express their hearts to their parents.

How can a daughter have no emotions of her own? She also asked in tears, lost her temper, and tried both soft and hard. The strongest part of parents is that they neither admit nor deny, and they can't read it directly. Building a relationship between the two sides is like clapping hands. There must be interaction, and both sides must contribute. Endlessly reaching out and getting no response, how is this relationship going to go on?

Finally, when my daughter began to change to the behavior of always giving her all her life, she learned to love and protect herself a little more. But unexpectedly learned that parents and neighbors said: "Sure enough! After my daughter married, everything changed! She has changed! She has become so strange!"

I believe that this patriarchal reality will continue in Chinese society. The above-mentioned family should also be better? There are some changes that are easy to shoot, and students have to earn living expenses and tuition fees by themselves. After complaining a little, the bloody dialogue came again: "I gave birth to you and raised you, and taught for many years. Parents are kind!"

It is not easy for a daughter to embrace her happiness. Growing up in an unhealthy childhood, her psychological quality will be affected a bit. If it is more intense, the friends you know will be more self-inflicted. Some daughters choose to ignore their parents directly, thinking that my parents just brought me into the world. How you treated me when I was young, I will treat you the same way now. Some only have hatred left, and even sneer at "the son wants to support but the relative is not there".

The old man thought he could still rely on his son? In the same way, some sons are so spoiled that they take their parents' efforts for granted, and when they are dissatisfied, they become resentful of them. Some husbands directly obey their wives, move closer to the wife's house, and take care of the wife's family more than enough.

In the end, in the eyes of outsiders, the young man turned into a bad person. Because others only see the result - the plight of the elderly who are getting old, and criticize the younger generation for not taking good care of or caring for our dear elders.

If you go deeper into the reasons behind it, you may have another understanding.

(In recent years, a lot of comforting books have been published; like "The Courage to Be Hated" or books about emotional blackmail, thanks to these writers for paying attention to their children's physical and mental problems, so that they can learn how to let go.)

At the end of the writing, I only hope that this generation or the next generation with more education will not let tragedies, big and small, happen again.

Off topic:
On the Internet, I saw a very touching picture.
The cactus has thorns, but the silly child still hugs it often.

I think even if there is no patriarchal family, it is not easy to find a good balance with parents. Depend on each other, but hurt each other.

After many stumbles, we finally found the distance with our parents. Keeping a short distance is the best for each other.

postscript:
One day, after her daughter carefully kept a certain distance to show her kindness, her mother said to her for the first time, "Daughter, you are so filial!"
It's ironic that Silent has been paying and getting no response, and I only heard this sentence after "change".
It was like seeing the rare cactus finally blooming.

Cover image: Photo by Thomas Verbruggen on Unsplash