Scary experience with parents

Dear friends,

As one becomes older, you slowly start realising how the table is turning with respect to your interaction with your parents. Increasingly, it is they who ask questions and seek physical and moral support; they who prefer to keep quiet to let you tide over you bad and agitated moods; they who feel a bit intimidated by the technology, the fast lifestyles and the complete redefinition of careers (that white collar jobs are things of the past; taking risks in job does not lay you off but pays you off!).

It is a bit scary when you realise this - all along,one takes it for granted that the parents are the shock absorbers. But there comes a time, when they need to be protected; when they need to be talked to like you would talk to your kid. They need to be told about how to do certain things and how to take care of themselves.

This was a bit frightening for me initially. There was even a reluctance to let the child go and replace it with an adult when dealing with the parents. Thankfully, I found a good compromise where I can still remain a child and seek lot of things from them - it is just that those things are different from what they were, when I was small. Now, I take a hard stand as an adult when it comes to their health, spending money for them (somehow most parents would splurge on us but hesitate a lot to allow us to spend on them), creating some social networking for them, exposing them to new technology like internet, send them to places they have always wanted to go to, etc. And I willingly turn a child in asking my mother to cook special recipes, make her the spiritual guru for my kids, ask my father to teach my daughter some subject, ask my father tips on how to deal with bureacracy.

I think for them also, it is a sensitive phase - allowing children to take over their lives. I have realised that we need to still make them feel that they are in control and it is just that we are more available now to take over things and let them enjoy life. After all, they deserve it!

Cheers,

Sumathy