How to love your parents?

‘We never know the love of a parent till we become parents ourselves.’ –Henry Ward Beecher

‘I always wait for your call and any delay makes me apprehensive that you might have forgotten’ my mother always tells me. She is eighty and she lives with my brother. I am in my mid fifties and she still treats me like a small child. She is very close to me and I make it a habit to call her daily. I talk with her for an hour and I talk about everything, my feelings, how I made a mess of my cooking and whatever comes to my mind. It makes her very happy. This happiness I give her did not cost me a dime, but gives my mother loads of happiness and to me a sense of emotional attachment that I have someone who lovingly shares my personal feelings.

What do your parents expect from you?

• They want your care
• They want you to visit them
• They want you to consult them when you make important decisions
• They want to be shown that they still have a place in your life
• They want you to interact with them

Are all these things very difficult? You feel that you are loaded with work and you just do not have time to talk with them. But you seem to have enough time to talk with your friends or colleagues. This is why most parents feel that their children never care for them. Imagine your childhood days! You literally cling to your parents and you always want their attention and they more than give it to you. They sacrifice their needs and get the best things for you. Though they cannot afford it, they send you to the best school as they feel your education is very important for your bright future.

You play with them, laugh with them and you enjoy each and every moment you spend with them. But you see a small change in your attitude when you enter adolescence. You find them very interfering and dominating. There are arguments between you and your parents and you become highly independent and gradually withdraw yourself from them which make your parents blink in bewilderment about this sudden emotional aloofness you show.

Your parents might be interfering, but they interfere because they are afraid that you might make mistakes. You trust your friends more than your parents as they always agree to whatever you say. Friends will always be friends. Of course they are fun to spend your time with and you are able to share your inner feelings with them. So you put them in a step before your parents. But will they sacrifice anything for you? No, they will not. But your parents never think twice to make any sacrifice for you.

The tragic part comes when you get married. You literally forget about your parents and lead your life with willful selfishness. You do not visit them, call them or give them money for their old age needs. You make a big deal about a ‘Fathers day’ or a ‘Mother’s day’ and create a great show of emotional attachment and gift your parents, but the next day you forget them.

Every day is a ‘Mothers day’ or a ‘Father’s day’. Whatever you are today is because of the sacrifices made by your parents. Does that mean you have to have your parents with you? In this modern society there is no adjustments and tolerance from the younger generation and most parents prefer to be on their own to escape from the ill treatment that will be meted out to them by your spouse if they are with you.

But they have small expectations and they are so mild that you should do it as a part of your duty towards your parents. They want you to call them and inquire about them. Not a difficult expectation! They want you to consult them when you make life changing decisions. They feel totally ignored when they come to know things about you from a third person. Nothing hurts them more!

You do not take your children to visit them and your children grow up without knowing the love of a grandparent. How they yearn to hold the child from their own children! You are doing a great injustice to them when you deny them this small pleasure.

'Parenting is the toughest job on earth as you are responsible for the physical, emotional and mental development of another human being.’ –Unknown.

You always view your parents as a burden after you outgrow their need. If they had considered you a burden you would not have been what you are now. They willingly shouldered the burden and stooped under the weight of it, but not for one moment they thought of lowering their burden so that they can have some time for themselves.