Yaadein.....................................

When I was a child Diwali time was one of the most exciting time it meant new clothes,holidays, lots of sweets,and other food items (in that order only).I  was not very fond of crackers in fact I was scared to burst crackers.

Our festival used to start with holidays, today's generation may not believe but we used to get nearly one month holiday from shashthi (if I remember correctly ) till after bhai duj. In those days our sleepy little township bursted with activities.9 days of navratri were the best,every evening something was there- Hindi,Oriya ,Bengali plays,classical dance show,kavi sammelan,dhooni nritya competition,one night one orchestra group used to perform,dandiya,then of course raaavan dahan on dusshera.

We girls used to wait for ashtmi and nawami when we were called by aunties to their homes we used to be excited about the food and the money and of course the importance we used to get on those 2 days.

After dusshera for us it was time for crackers,and play, for elders it was time to start cleaning home,making sweets,buying clothes etc.

The Diwali at that time was celebrated for full five days starting from dhanteras .There used to be  a party by ladies club followed by a party one day after Diwali. 

The sight of diyas on the boundary wall,was much better than today's electric lighting.It was compulsory for us to go to our neighbour's house to wish them and get their blessings.Even after 10-15 days after Diwali people used to come to our  home for "Diwali Milan" and we used to go to their homes.

I wish I could turn back time and go back to those time when festivals meant festivities,feasts,excitement,forgiving others and making new beginnings. 

Why in laws don't let son and daughter in law get closer Reason 2

The second reason why parents don't let their son get emotionally attached to his wife is their dominating nature and their urge to control their child's life.Many people are dominating by nature they want everything to happen just as they want,everybody should obey them without asking questions and their commands and wishes should be fulfilled without delay.Now it is possible that only mother is like that or only father is like that so one parent is there to pacify children but if both are of same nature we can easily imagine that situation.

Result and blame game

Result time is the time of stress for everyone students, parents, teachers.With the declaration of result the blame game for poor results begin teachers blame parents and vice versa .My sister is a teacher and class teacher of class 11.April to July is the time when her tension level really shoots up.

She has pointed problems in teaching and parenting both.

Teaching :

1.There r many teachers who r in the field to earn a living not because they enjoy teaching for them their job is to finish the course whether children understand the basic concept or not they don’t care.

2.There are more than 45-50 students in a class which makes it impossible to take care of each and every child’s academics.

3.Many teachers themselves don’t know the basics of the subjects they r teaching

4.Tendency of management/govt. to make teachers do non academic work also. Many times a teacher is asked to teach many subjects like maths, English, moral science in classes ranging from 5 to 10 irrespective of his/her field of specialization.

5.Large no of untrained teachers who r not familiar with psychological learning and teaching principles and techniques, child development.

6.Frustration and burnout are common.

7.Combine all this with the tendency to blame teachers for every failure, misbehaving and arrogant parents and their wards, non sympathetic management pressure of media (remember the case when a college teacher was forced to say sorry to a student for allegedly slapping her) .The job stress multiplies many fold.

Parenting :

My sister really dreads the day she has to give results and at the time of admissions. She says that the parental pressure is unbelievable. Many parents r simply blind to reasons refuse to even think that their decisions may create problems for their child in later life.

1 Parents feel their responsibility ends when they enroll their child in a good school and coaching classes.

2. They don’t discuss with child his interest and his ability to cope with a particular subject (maths for eg ) even if the child refuses to take up a particular subject parents force him/her to take that subject Sometimes just to fulfill their unfulfilled desire to study that subject.

3. Many fathers don’t turn up in even a single parent teacher meeting they come on the day of final results. They r not aware of year long progress, and strengths and weakness of the child and simply fight, blame the teachers.

4 Even if parents come regularly they expect that with the help of 2-3 tutions their weak child will give good results.

5. My sister says many parents don’t understand that the child has to pass the internals also even though they are told in advance.

6 Many people don’t provide proper study environment at home believing that studious student can study in any environment.

7 Parents keep on blaming child about his failure and don’t care to know the reason of failure.

problems after retirement - solutions

The main problem after retirement is that the person has a lot of time at hand and very less work to do.This creates huge vacuum in person's life and mind and unfortunately most of the people try to fill this in ways that can't be said "adaptive" in today's individualistic and independent minded society.for ex nearly all of them then decide to take all the matters of household into their hands continuously interfering, criticizing, demanding and in general trying to control everyone's life around them which understandably is resented by others.So what is the solution ,how can one avoid conflicts and lead a peaceful life .Some of the suggestions are--
1 Don't feel that now that you are retired you should not do anything.It's true that with age physical strength declines but still you can do things which you like.Till now you have been busy in fulfilling your responsibilities now do something which has taken backseat like pursuing a hobby, doing something you always wanted to do like travelling,painting,music opening a school anything .
2. Maintain disciplined life style wake up early go for a walk do yoga,basically be physically active.
3 If you want you can now give back to the society teach underprivileged kids,do something for less fortunate people.
4  This is also a good time to renew old relations,meet friends,relatives.
5  Take this time as an opportunity to renew your love for your spouse now that you are free and you can spend time as husband and wife spend time together travel, go for walk together .
6. Instead of interfering in small matters like which thing should be kept where and how the food should be cooked and why daughter in law and son are alone in room,try to help like paying bills or dropping /picking kids from bus stop or school.
Basically Keep Yourself Busy and most of the problems will b solved when you feel tempted to interfere or scold or control everyone stop and remember how you felt when your father did the same to you

problems after retirement

Retirement is an important event in anyone’s life. It is a stage when a person officially retires from active work life. This is a very crucial transition stage in a person’s life as well as his family’s life. It has a huge impact on the life of the retired person some of the problem faced by the person are as follows

Financial Problems-

1. If the person is the only earning member of the family then the source of regular income is stopped which is a matter of concern for the person.
2.If the person has not made any financial plans and not saved properly.
3. If he doesn't have good relations with other family members or has no one who can take his care of his finances.

Health Problems-

A Physical problems – Many physical problems arise at the old age some of them are life threatening, some limit persons mobility, but most of them are recurrent if not taken care properly. Decreasing eye sight, decreasing hearing ability , limits person’s working capacity.
B. Cognitive problems- Mental problems like Dementia, Alzheimer’s start at this age. If the person has already suffered from some mental illness then there is always a chance of relapse at this time. The people with mental problem are considered as a burden by the family if the person is old also then the chances of abuse are high.
C. Emotional/psychological/adjustment problems- At this time the most concerned area is the area of adjustment .The person has to adjust with the family, with himself & with the environment.

The person suddenly finds himself absolutely free, it feels good in the beginning but as time passes the boredom is very difficult to tackle. Earlier everyone wanted his time and he was busy now he has time and everybody is busy .H e wants to talk to people give them advice share his experiences but no one has time. In this situation the person might feel neglected, ignored. Problem also arises when the person starts interfering in daily chores of the home like cleanliness, or the way of cooking. This leads to daily conflicts with the ladies of the home. The person also has to adjust with the fact that now he is not the earning member of the family and the control of the home is gradually moving to the hands of the son.

The person might have feelings of emptiness, worthlessness, helplessness, which might lead to depression. They become hyper sensitive, this leads to perception of neglect, rejection and feelings that since he is not earning he is not needed by the family. If the person lacks social support like friends, and is not willing to engage himself then the problem arises.

The problem also arises when the person retires from the post of authority. He is habitual of waited upon many people at his call no restriction on spending money. When such a person retires he suddenly finds that he no longer has many servants for him on the contrary he is expected to help in certain household tasks like paying bills, looking after grandchildren buying vegetables.

He is also expected to curb his expenses. This also hurts people they feel that when they were earning they gave best life to their children but now they are being asked to spend less.

positive psychology

Just reading a book on positive psychology by Jeana L. Magyar-Moe, Jeana Magyar-Moe.They say that we focus on our weakness and think that our strengths will take care of themselves.How true, instead of focusing and nurturing our strengths we focus on our weakness trying to improve it and in the process we forget about our strengths.Now when I think I feel it is true in every area of life - looks, for ex, we are so obsessed with fair complexion,always trying to get a fair skin that we ignore our other good features like beautiful eyes or hair instead of taking care of it we brood over complexion.Similarly we try to fix our wt ignoring our good facial features or skin.similarly in studies we focus on the subject in which we r weak we take tution on that subject,spend 1 hr more on that subject apart from tution and we don't get the time to nurture the subject in which we r good.Positive psychology says do the opposite- focus on your positives and manage the weakness.Nurture,strengthen your basics in the subject you are good and manage the subject in which you are weak.

For Caregivers

Taking care of a person suffering from a psychiatric problem is a huge responsibility, it requires immense patience, self control. Care giver has to fight the illness, social stigmas, insecurity about patient’s future(especially if the patient is their child, or a lady ).Apart from this they have their own anxiety, fears, helplessness, anger towards God, patient, society, themselves. If the illness is severe the primary care givers life is centerd around the patient and his/her own life takes a backseat. It’s natural to feel burnout in such situation.Family support i.e delegation of care giving work, emotional support to each other becomes very necessary.The family can take help of counselors/psychologists/treating doctor to know about the illness,treatment,and how to handle the patient .They can take couselling if required .Apart from this they should keep foll things in mind-

Care giver should take care of their health also.

They can take help of relaxation exercises to help overcome mental tension and to relax.

Learn to recognize early signs of relapse it prevents later problem, many patients become non cooperative once they become symptomatic or suffer a relapse.

Care giver should ask the treating doctor to explain about the illness, treatment, medications, and any other doubts.

Encourage patients to do some work according to their capacity, encourage them to leave sick role.

Remember patients too are human beings they understand things. I have seen many families who talk about patients freely in the presence of patient thinking the patient doesn’t understand anything, this is wrong.

Many people make fun of the patient, treat them as a mode of their entertainment, when patient reacts they laugh, this is inhuman care givers should discourage such people.

Many patients complain that their family members don’t give them any respect,shout at them, call them mad, crazy, fool all the time. Remember everyone needs respect talking in a low voice with patients is very helpful as it conveys a sense of respect and also they too remain calm---this is especially true when patients r stable and trying to lead normal life.

Set the limits and firmly adhere to it. Tell the patient clearly which behavior is unacceptable and stop the patient every time he shows that behavior. Don’t laugh or make the patient demonstrate what is unacceptable this also include foul, funny language.

Why in laws don't let son and daughter-in-law(DIL )get close-Reason 1

When a girl gets married she has thousands of dreams of a married life and many fears. She has heard and seen countless incidents of in laws bad behavior towards the DIL, with husbands doing nothing to protect wife. But when you r getting married everyone shows u a rosy picture and u too tend to suppress negative thoughts try to keep a neutral if not a positive mindset. You decide to try your level best to keep everyone specially husband happy try to win hearts. That’s what every girl decides.She is told you are going to “your own home”. The girl too comes with the mindset this is my home now. The in laws too are excited they had thousands of dreams of son’s marriage. They, in the back of mind have the fear that the dil will snatch their son from them. But they too suppress this thought and take a wait & watch approach. Now when the son gets married for some days or months he is smitten by is newly married wife trying to know her tell her about himself and his family. This is the toughest time for the family, if the family is patient and quietly lets this phase pass everything is ok but if the negative thought comes like she is snatching my son, he doesn’t care about us anymore, what will happen to us if he will be like this always going around her, this fear leads them to start trying to’ get back’ their son. They try to keep them apart not allowing them to spend time together if they try to go out in the evening the in laws make one excuse or other to stop them or send someone with them. They employ several strategies to tell son what an incompetent girl he has married (even though they have chosen her) like:

1 Criticising the DIL in front of son, making false complaints, crying.

2 If the DIL makes some mistake telling everyone, repeating it endlessly.

3 Making big issues of trivial matters.

4 Constantly making fun of her looks, way of dressing, way of talking, walking finding out imaginary faults in her looks, dress.

5Criticising her parents and always try to prove that the DIL and her family has lower status than theirs. Making fun of her parents, family traditions.

If this does not work they try to keep them apart by:

1 Never giving them privacy specially in the daytime.Not allowing son to remain in the room when the DIL is there. If son & DIL r in the room they will continuosly move in & out of room,will go & sit with them, will send someone in the room or will simply call one of them out of the room on one or the other pretext (cooking food,watch your favourite programme on t.v and many many more)

2 Don’t allow both of them to go out together either they try to accompany them or they try to send someone else with them or one of the parent falls ill or they call some guest at that time.

3 If son lives somewhere else they try to keep someone with them or continuously send people to their place or one of them lives with them.

4 Emotionally blackmailing the son repeating before son how they have raised him ,fulfilled all his desires etc(which is true) .They again &again tell son that they r bonded by blood ties and the d-i-l is an outsider. If the son cares for his wife or gets emotionally close with wife they say you have changed a lot now all you care about is your wife.

Here we are talking about people who have no pathology, are what we call normal people. They do all this merely out of insecurity. They believe that if son & DIL love each other too much then the son will forget his parents then what will happen of them, who will take their care. They don’t even realize that they are spoiling son’s life and they are actually pushing the son away. This also leads to increased insecurity in d-i-l , she feels that in laws are trying to create a rift between them and r trying to snatch away her husband. First she tries to win their heart this makes a husband feel happy that his wife is taking care of his parents and he gets closer to wife, which in turn increases the insecurity of parents and they increase their efforts to get back their son. Now the d-i-l gets worried she keeps on thinking why they are doing this to me now she tries to keep her husband close to her starts complaining about her In laws tries to get husband’s support. Here 3 things can happen

1 the son stand in support of his parents, blames his wife for everything and accuses her of trying to divide his family. In this process he gets the support of his parents, parents now feel secure but the son ends up losing his wife’s trust, love and in some cases wife.

2 The son supports his wife tries to explain things to parents. Parents either stop here only and everything is alright or parents become more insecure now their efforts, blackmailing increases and they start hating their d-i-l. In this case son looses the parents.

3 The son decides to stay mum. He doesn’t support anyone. The tension increases the son ends up loosing his mental peace.

So in the end it is the son who has to loose either his parents or wife. The solution to this problem lies in the hands of son only. He has to explain to his parents that they will always be an important part of his life. He has to tell them that since wife is new to the family and to him so he needs to spend a little more time with her to understand her and to help her adjust with the family. This doesn’t mean that he is ignoring the parents. He can also say that since they know him since forever he expects them to be more understanding of his feelings .He can also explain that now that he has married he will have to take care of his wife also and just like them she is an integral and important part of his life. Similarly he can explain to his wife that his parents r very important to him and it is his duty to take care of them and as a life partner he expects his wife to understand this and support him.He has to make sure that wife feels secure that though her husband top priority are his parents she too is important for him.

Introduction of Psychology

Psychology, in simplest words can be defined as study of behaviour.People often think that psychologists are mind readers, face readers,can tell what a person is thinking almost immediately after being introduced to the person.This is not the case.Psychology actually is a scientific study ,it is based on lot of theories which in turn are results of various researches and close observations of people in various situations.These theories and the principles are widely applicable .We can use psychological principles in almost all spheres of life.Actually all of us use these on day to day basis it is just that we do not know the technical terms .For example in our daily life we try to understand why a person is behaving in a particular way ,we try to find out the reasons behind his/her behaviour, this process, in psychological terms is known as attribution.