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UYep! A big part is the social conditioning. I agree that she is financially independent and has a much higher potential to earn as compared to the husband (she already has a job offer that pays her really well). After learning that she has the offer, the husband literally said this to her âwhatâs the point of having this job, now you donât have a husbandâ. Itâs pathetic.UThe parents obviously tried to find a doctor match at first (the wifeâs sister is also MBBS/MD doctor and was married to a doctor of same speciality through arranged marriage). For this girl, things happened to work out differently (as described in other comment) and the parents selected this person working on PhD at an elite university. She never gave her salary to the in-laws, she stood up for herself and thatâs precisely why the in-laws became abusive over time. They married their son to a doctor girl with the sole aim of taking all her money.UThank you for the supportive words! Indeed, even the grandfather can be like father figure for the baby girl. The husband and the in-laws have shown little interest in the baby in this case, hence there wonât be any issues with custody. I am sure that the baby girl will receive FAR more love and care with her maternal grandparents and mom as compared with her fatherâs side of the familyUThank you for sharing this story and itâs heartwarming to hear that the daughter did so well being raised with love and care by her brave single mom!!UTotally agree with you!
The issue is that both men and women in the society have deeply ingrained patriarchal values. Times are changing, women are breaking the glass ceiling everywhere. A lot of women are financially independent and now see marriage as only about finding a loving partner and not someone who will take care of them.
But a large portion of the country still reels under the traditional ideas where a womanâs purpose/value is defined by whether she is married (not by whether she is happy/healthy/fulfilling her dreams). Here the wife herself and everyone around her is defining her position based on whether she is married. Whether she is educated and financially independent somehow just doesnât seem to matter if she doesnât have a husband.
The husband did say the following to her after he left her with the baby âwhatâs the point of you getting a job now if you donât have a husband anymoreâ. Her in-laws have repeatedly tormented her saying âyour life will be destroyed if you donât give us the money, nobody will marry used goodsâ.
Indeed the right thing to do here is not just get a divorce, but also teach these monsters a lesson they never forget.
However it is equally unfortunate that a highly educated woman was sought out as bride with the sole goal of taking away all the salary she earns. It was not out of respect for her education. It was assumed that she wonât be able to leave the marriage because of this deeply flawed idea that ânobody will marry her again and her life will be destroyedâ.
The wife (and her parents) in principle do want a partner who loves and respects her, not a bad marriage where she is treated inhumanly.
The reason why divorce becomes hard in such situations is 1) fear of the massive stigma and crazy levels of social ostracism a divorced woman faces (harsh reality that hasnât received as much attention on media/social platforms) 2) her relatives/friends/colleagues who assume itâs the womanâs fault that husband left her/she couldnât adjust/she has ego because she is educated/etc. 3) if she wants love, she has a much harder time finding that given the massive stigma and real fear that a girl child may suffer sexual abuse in the new home should she find a match 4) bad marriage is hard but each day of her life as divorced woman is harder e.g. colleagues/clients who judge her for not wearing mangalsutra, plumbers/carpenters not heeding to your call for weeks because they did not hear a manâs voice on the phone, having nobody to pick you up late night at the bus station and being scared for life, men who look at you as easy target for s*x because you have no man to protect you, etc etc. 5) knowing that the husband moved on to have another wife in no time and faces zero stigma, so questioning your decisions everyday. 6) only in-laws/husband abuse you in bad marriage, but the entire world around you abuses you after divorce (zero awareness of this on social platforms).
I agree that in these cases the woman needs to remain strong and brave, enforce her boundaries and not let the patriarchal values stop her from protecting herself.
But countless women who stay in abusive marriages are not stupid. They know that they are going to die everyday regardless of whether they leave the marriage.
Hence the decision boundary for leaving marriage is usually not crossed unless the abuse has reached impossible levels – this is a harsh reality for many women in the country.
I do agree that times are changing and more women are taking the decision to leave bad marriages, doing amazing things, doing great job as single moms especially when they are financially independent. But 90% women are stuck.
UThank you so much for the legal advice in this situation, thatâs extremely helpful. I will forward the link to my friend and talk to her about this.UYes, filing a case for harassment is easy but then thereâs no saving of marriage. Itâs tricky to find a balance between saving marriage and filing for divorce.How HARD the life of a divorced woman with child in India is, can only be understood by someone who has gone through it, or someone who has seen a close family person/friend go through it. If one hasnât seen the pains closely, one doesnât know what the divorce entails. I empathise with your sister.
If the divorced woman has a girl child, the girl child also faces a lot of problems finding a match in marriage.
I have seen a couple of highly educated, intelligent, good-looking girls in the last 3 years, who were raised by divorced single moms, constantly rejected by guys on traditional matrimonial platforms despite their academic/professional achievements. The prospective matches or their families become very worried once they learn that the girlâs mother is divorced. Even with love marriage, once the guy introduces the girl to his parents, the parents do not approve.
I have seen these two girls struggling to find matches because the parents of guy get worried about a number of things: what will the society say if they bring a girl from divorced family to their home, what will they tell people in the marriage ceremony if asked about girlâs father, what will they tell their relatives, what will they print in wedding patrika as the name of the girlâs parents, and so on.
When in reality, these girls have done amazingly well being raised by single moms, and they deserve more respect.
UYes, filing a case for harassment is easy but then thereâs no saving of marriage. Itâs tricky to find a balance between saving marriage and filing for divorce.How HARD the life of a divorced woman with child in India is, can only be understood by someone who has gone through it, or someone who has seen a close family person/friend go through it. If one hasnât seen the pains closely, one doesnât know what the divorce entails. I empathise with your sister.
If the divorced woman has a girl child, the girl child also faces a lot of problems finding a match in marriage.
I have seen a couple of highly educated, intelligent, good-looking girls in the last 3 years, who were raised by divorced single moms, constantly rejected by guys on traditional matrimonial platforms despite their academic/professional achievements. The prospective matches or their families become very worried once they learn that the girlâs mother is divorced. Even with love marriage, once the guy introduces the girl to his parents, the parents do not approve.
I have seen these two girls struggling to find matches because the parents of guy get worried about a number of things: what will the society say if they bring a girl from divorced family to their home, what will they tell people in the marriage ceremony if asked about girlâs father, what will they tell their relatives, what will they print in wedding patrika as the name of the girlâs parents, and so on.
When in reality, these girls have done amazingly well being raised by single moms, and they deserve more respect.
UI feel you! Gathering the strength to leave is harder and harder as children get involved. As many people pointed out here, being single mom is better than raising kids in a toxic environment.UYes, the in-laws have been the most abusive. However, the husband here says he will never leave his parents (but is comfortable leaving his newborn daughter). The husband is in pathological denial of the fact that his parents may have hurt the wife in any way. He says he will never let the wife âbreak his familyâ and separate him from his parents. Meanwhile, the in-laws have expressed to the wife that they will not hesitate to physically hit her (though they havenât hit her yet). Husband refuses to believe that in-laws did any of this.When the wife complained about harassment to him, he did not hear a word and dropped her with the child to her parents house. Now he says he does not want the wife and in-laws say they will find another girl.
