Kunal and Preeti got married a few months ago after several years of dating. In just a few months after marriage, their world seems to have turned upside down. The feelings of love and happiness have now turned into anger, bitterness and resentment. They feel burdened by a mountain of expectations and desires. Preeti shares very seriously that marriage is not all what you see in movies; it is not just champagne and strawberries. She breaks into a smile and shares that, in fact, initially marriage is more like Tom and Jerry! But unlike Tom and Jerry, one doesn’t even have separate rooms to go and sulk in after a fight or a misunderstanding!! Kunal and Preeti both believe that the fantasy of marriage is so different from its reality. They feel that their relationship is slipping through their fingers like sand. Are you at the periphery of marriage? Can you, perhaps, relate to bits of this story?
One of the biggest landmarks in an individual’s life, especially in India, is ‘Marriage’. In the Indian set-up, especially, marriage requires a huge lifestyle change for couples and their respective families. Yet, its burden falls on the married couple. Dealing with such lifestyle changes can often be stressful and, at times, cause a strain on the couple’s relationship. It is a common belief that, in India, marriage is more challenging for women than men. While this may be true to an extent, marriage poses just as many restrictions, challenges and stressors for men, as well. Leaving one’s natal home, intrusion into one’s personal space and daily routine, figuring out roles, tasks, financial expenses, and decision-making processes, making space for an additional family to love and care for, and balancing work with one’s new marital life are challenging for most couples.
Arranged marriages can have their share of difficulties depending on your comfort level with your spouse and his/her family. However, in love marriages too, although you know your spouse and, perhaps, to some extent, the family, love marriages also tend to thrust upon themselves enormous pressure of having to prove themselves to the family. So, despite the form of marriage, the transition from singular to plural can prove similarly burdensome. For this reason, pre-wedding counselling becomes extremely important.
Pre-wedding counselling helps to prepare you for the changes that come with marriage and equips you to deal with them.
- It provides a neutral space where you are able to talk through and iron out issues related to marriage, such as expectations from spouse and family, financial roles, task and responsibility distribution, equality and decision making, to name a few.
- It helps you sharpen your communication skills, with special focus on effective listening, so that you can better understand your partner.
- In today’s day and age where breakup of engagements, separation and divorce are becoming increasingly prevalent, pre-wedding counselling safeguards you by helping preserve the balance in your relationship.
- It also provides a platform to talk about commitment, children, value system, religious inclinations, family intrusion and how to deal with the influence of others on the relationships. It is important that no matter what choices you make (independently or together), the couple is always on the same page.
Thus, preventive therapeutic work preserves and helps enhance your relationship bond. It ensures that you are prepared for your marital journey, making it one of the most beautiful and gratifying experience in your life! And, who knows ... you might just manage to veer your marriage towards champagne and strawberries!
