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unheard voices of parents, seeking time form their children.
India is a nation of culture where a child is taught values since childhood, from touching the feet of their elders to respecting their parents, from worshiping daughters as female deities to considering son as the backbone of the family, from eating together to inculcating the values of being independent and capable of standing on their own feet.
Indian parents have always taken it one step further when it comes to their children. They might be eating less but would never let their child sleep hungry. They might be working day & night but would be satisfied, just by seeing their child’s smile. They might be buying just one cloth per year but would never fail to gift clothes to their child on festivals or their birthdays. They might be earning less but would try their level best to provide their child the best possible education so that they can grab whatever opportunities they want. Indian parents have always treated their children with utmost care and love but when they grow up; does the child do the same? Do the parents do this because they think that they are investing in an asset that will eventually in future help them meet their requirements of old age?
The United Nations Population Fund 2017, report highlights that the population growth of senior citizens in India will increase from eight per cent in 2015 to 19 per cent in 2050. In the decades to come, young India will have more older people. Along with such transformation, the country also witnessed growth in old-age homes. Around 500 old-age homes were registered in 2016 across the country, which has grown to 728, with the most number of old-age homes in Kerala. Out of 728, only 325 invite older adults to live for free, as the rest of the old-age homes demands pay-for-service. According to reports, if the current situation exists for long, there could be an annual 25 per cent increase in old age homes in India.
In recent times, it has been noticed that children don’t want to live with their parents and there can be multiple reasons behind that. It can be due to privacy infringement as most middle-aged people want to live alone without any burden or responsibility of their parents.
In many cases, children move to a new city or country for higher studies or jobs and then settle thereafter sidelining their parents. In some cases, children want a nuclear family; they don’t want any interference in their personal life so they opt for just living with their partner. Sometimes, the reason can be a difference of opinion or they might feel that their parents are not someone with whom they’re comfortable sharing their opinions or they might not end on the same decision and hence they don’t want to deal with daily arguments hence they opt to live alone. Some worst-case scenarios can be when children snatch their parent’s property and leave them alone in old age homes.
Under any circumstances, it is very disheartening for the parents to live and spend the rest of their lives without their child because, like the way when a child is young and needs love and affection from their parents, In old age, the parents too need and deserve the same love because now they’re at that fragile age when they’re already at the verge of losing their own life and if at this stage their child on whom they’ve spent their whole lives would take them as a burden then their whole life would become meaningless. Parents while parenting never think of their child as an asset or a liability, all they do is, expect that when their child grows up, he will become an individual who loves them, who gives them respect and care.
Adults these days need to understand that when they were a child, they too were infringing the privacy of their parents but their priority was their child and not their privacy. Parents, on the other hand, need to develop a sense of understanding and adapt themselves to the changing scenarios. They also need to be more open-minded and should be flexible with their opinions.
Children are like spring, the more you try to push them down today, the more they’ll jump higher in the future. Being too strict with this generation can just make their child agree with their choices today but as soon as the tables will turn and things will go in their hand, they’ll run far away from their parents. Children these days need freedom and they don’t want any interference in their personal lives but what if parents make them feel so comfortable with their presence that they don’t ever even sense uncomforting living with their parents?
Parents before being parents, need to become their child’s friend so that they don’t rely on others and as soon as any problem arises their child runs back to them instead of running from them and taking them as their problem. The parent-child bond needs to be so strongly developed that the children always feel attached to their parents and never want to live without them.
Children should keep in mind that becoming modern doesn’t mean that they forget their values and roots or leave their parents homeless instead they need to keep in mind that communication is the key to solving the problem and they need to communicate things with their parents. Parents too need to understand the problem and fill that communicational gap with their child, only then this generational gap can be filled. It is not a liability of a child to take the responsibility of their parents but every child must remember that whatever they are today, it’s because their parents worked day and night to make them shine so bright.
