Author Archives: The New Indian Wife

If you are like most brides the world over, you were not just worried about picking the right wedding dress but also worried about how to look good in that dress.  You did extra crunches, extra lunges, hired a trainer, worked out harder and ate a whole lot less in the months leading up to your big day.  You knew all eyes were going to be on you and you wanted those Aunties and ex-boyfriends to eat their hearts out at just how good you looked. 

And damn, you did look good! 

Then it happens.  The wedding is over, you are happier than ever, and there is cake.  A big huge delicious wedding cake with carefully considered flavors, fillings and designs waiting there to be enjoyed by you, your handsome groom and all of your guests.  If you are lucky, some of that cake was left over and made its way home with you.

Once the wedding is over, the stress of planning, arranging, and beautifying yourself is also a thing of the past and you can just sit back and relax…with cake, cupcakes, pizza, sodas, candy, chocolate and all sorts of fabulous treats that you were denying yourself as you prepared to look the best version of you on your wedding day.

And so it begins. A nibble here, an extra helping there, some dessert after so many months of no sugar…oh and the carbs!!!  How delicious bread tastes!!! 

In my case, My Leading Man loves to cook so there were lots of cooking nights for us. My mother-in-law was with us for a few months following the wedding and she would cook us the most delicious (and fattening) meals.  And since we were newly married without a care in the world, My Leading Man and I would indulge in all the culinary treats my mother-in-law could whip up. 

And so it began.  The creepage of post wedding pounds.  Within a few months, My Leading Man gained thirty pounds and I gained ten.  The extra pounds probably relate to a lifting of stress, throwing away exercise time in favor of couple time and indulging in good old fashion eating.

It is a story that I hear with so many couples. After the wedding, the post marital pounds start to creep on.  You can try to avoid it but it happens to almost everyone.  Call it comfort, call it happiness, call it whatever, but for some reason newlyweds do start to gain weight.  So to all the newlyweds out there, accept that you will pack on the pounds after the wedding. It is something that happens even to the best of us, with the best of intentions.  Now the question is, what do you do about it? 

After you indulged in your post-wedding-eat fest, it is time to get you and your Leading Man back on track.  You don’t have to be quite as strict as those pre-wedding months but have a plan in place to correct course, make it fun and try to do it together.  It may not happen overnight but being healthy has to be a way of life for most of us, especially after those post-wedding indulgences.

After a long work-induced hiatus, The New Indian Wife is back!  I can give you oodles of reasons for why the lapse between posts.  Mostly I blame work which has been all-consuming and overwhelming the last few months.  I have been on the road, in the skies and in hotel rooms working all hours of the day trying to advance my career. My laptop has literally been tethered to my wrists. The pendulum swung so far towards work that there was little time left for everything else.  No time for My Leading Man, no time for my family, no time for my writing and most upsettingly no time for my health and well-being.  I left behind all the things I love the most and focused far too much on something that shouldn’t matter as much as it has over the last few months.  I want my life back!  I want to spend time with My Leading Man, I want to focus on being a good daughter, spend more time on the phone with my mother in  law, I want to go to yoga regularly, focus on meditating and most importantly I want to get back to my writing.  In the weeks and months leading up to my wedding I released all my pre-wedding stress by blogging all about the pre-wedding happenings.  I have felt a true and profound loss without the blog the last few months.  So what am I going to do about it?  Well, step one is to make some changes.  I need to peel myself away from work, where the politics, stress and client demands have been all-consuming.  That won’t happen overnight but one of the ways to remove my work shackles is to not open my laptop when I get home from work and not working on the weekends.  I am going to make a conscious effort to reintroduce time for all the things that should matter most to me and need to be tended to each and every day– my marriage, my health, my family and of course, my writing.  So while I may not write everyday, my fabulous readers can rest assured that I will be back writing about my experiences as The New Indian Wife. So let’s keep this blog moving, shall we?

Like many of my fellow Americas, I am pretty stressed out. I can blame all sorts of things in my life from tough bosses, tough clients, financial pressures, family, friends, etc.  Generally, I think I am just wired towards being more stressed than others. My MILji agrees.  In a conversation earlier this week she said “Your personality is the kind that will always take on stress.”  I sighed because I knew she was right.  

She continued that there is no point in being stressed out.  “You have to find the joy in little things and allow those little joys to take your stress away.”  She then told me a story about her garden.  My inlaws love their garden.  My father in law’s section is loaded with vegetables that he cares for like they were his own children.  My Milji’s section is filled with beautiful carnations, marigolds and roses.  This year, when my father in law asked what she wants for her birthday, she quipped “an extra foot of space in the garden.” That’s how much they love their garden.

She goes out into her garden everyday. If she wanted to she could just glance at the garden and think that it is looking pretty, green and lush today.  But if she really wants to feel the joy of her garden she will take a walk through her flowers and admire each and everyone.  “Just look how unique each petal is.  How perfect it is. How amazing it is that God created such beauty” she said to me on the phone.  “Just looking at the uniqueness of each and every flower takes all my stress away” she continued with so much joy in her voice.  She said that I need to spend more time looking at each little part of my life and the joy each of those little pieces has given me. 

Simply put. I must take time to smell the roses.

I want to be right.  All of the time.  Not some of the time. Not a majority of the time.  But all of the time. 

Growing up, I was usually automatically deemed “right” because I was the eldest of my two siblings. Any argument over the remote control – I won. Any dispute on who said what to whom – I won.  Any disagreement on whether it was my turn or my sister’s turn to wash the dishes – I won.  I was always right. At least, that is the way I remember things.  My siblings may have another view on the matter.

Unfortunately, the institute of marriage does not lend itself well to being right all of the time.  There is a whole other human being with a whole other set of views on life (see Lesson #5).  There will be disagreements and sometimes that Leading Man of yours will not just want to be right but he may actually be right.

In some ways, I admire those women who defer to their husbands and let them take the lead.  It might be easier that way.  But for those of you who are anything like me, defering to others is the equivalent of having your teeth pulled.  I just really, really, really want things to go the way I want them to go and I just really, really, really prefer to be right.

But slowly and surely I am learning it is okay to not be right all of the time.  It is okay to give up and defer to the other person, especially when the other person is right.  Not that I am saying he is always right but he is right some of the time and I am learning (albeit pretty darn slowly) that I don’t always have to hold my ground, I don’t have to always be right.  Sometimes, it’s okay to be w-r-o-n-g or as I prefer to call it, just not right.  Sometimes.

We are all creatures of our environment.  Our model of marriage, as with family life, is largely based on our own experiences living, fighting, learning and laughing with our parents and our siblings.  Your frame of reference for a marriage is most influenced by your parents with some occasional inputs from Cliff and Clair Huxtable from the Cosby Show.  The frame of reference that you do not have walking into a marriage is the context within which your spouse grew up.  While you may have spent time with your mummy and papa in law before marriage, the curtains only come up AFTER you are married (more on the inlaws in a future posts – and yes there will be more than one on that all important topic so stay tuned!!)

Everyone puts their best foot forward before marriage, as they should.  But the full picture of the environment, the interaction and the belief system of your spouse’s family will likely not be revealed to you completely until after marriage.

That’s when you may have a realization, like I did, that other families do things differently than we did. Now conceptually, I understood this before marriage as well.  I knew my gora friends did not eat aloo paranthas on Sunday.  I knew that they didn’t drink masala chai in the morning and adrik wali chai in the evening. I knew that they wore baseball caps and not turbans.  Even within Indian families, I understood that some families liked extra thardka in their daal and some kept the plastic on the furniture while others did not.

But that didn’t stop me from believing that my way of thinking was the right way of thinking. Not just because I thought that way but because my family also tended to think the same way so that meant it was clearly the right way.    

I quickly learned that My Leading Man had a different approach to spending, family relations, decorating, dinner parties, vacations and just about everything else than I did.  His approaches were largely based on his experiences living with his family, watching his parent’s marriage and watching the marriages of his sisters.  This did not mean his way was wrong (which I would have preferred his ways to be) but just that they were different from mine.

Over time, I came to understand that just because I grew up doing something one way did not mean everyone did it the same way. I had to learn to understand My Leading Man’s varying view points from the context of his life experiences.  And I had to learn to truly discuss and understand his perspectives before coming to a decision together as a couple about the best path forward. 

So next time you push your belief system on your spouse, try to understand how they feel about the topic at hand and the frame of reference from which they are saying it.  You never know what you might learn from the other person (or preferably, what you may be able to teach them).

Skydiving, reading, yoga, running marathons, cooking, sewing, painting, rock climbing, gaming These all seem like hobbies.  Housework does not.  So when MIlji said to make housework my hobby I laughed out loud.  “How can housework be a hobby” I asked.  What she explained made perfect sense.  She said instead of resenting your housework and getting angry that there are dishes in the sink, that the floors need scrubbing or clothes need to be folded and put away, take a deep breath and say keeping a clean home is my hobby.  It is not a requirement for a home to be clean and tidy. Just like it is not a requirement to go on a hike on Sunday mornings. Rather keeping a clean home, just like going for a hike, is simply one’s preference on how they choose to live.  So when you start to dig into your housework, when the tasks seem overwhelming or undesirable, just say to yourself “this is my hobby”.  Since I incorporated these pearls of wisdom my entire approach to housework has changed I am a much happier homemaker than ever before.  Thanks MILji.

Today I introduce a new feature on The New Indian Wife that I call “Advice From MILji“  That is, Advice From Mother-In-Law-ji. 

My Mother-in-Law is bubbly, high-spirited lady who embodies a world of wisdom in her 4 foot 11 frame from raising six children and being married for over 50 years. Despite her age, and ailing health her face radiates a youthful exuberance. “I feel as young as ever on the inside. I just look old on the outside” my Mother-in-Law often quips in Punjabi.  Her youthful spirit is perfectly complemented by the fine lines from her years and experiences.

While my Mother-in-Law lives in India, we do speak at least twice a week.  Our conversations vary from short and quick check ins to deeper spiritual chats about life, relationships and the perspective all of us need to face life’s many challenges.  Her advice to me at numerous points throughout our young marriage has made a world of difference.  She brings perspective, humour and love to all those happenings in a marriage that seem all to difficult to navigate when you are in the thick of them. 

I hope Advice From MILji will resonate with each of you as much as it does wiith me.

By a margin of one million to one, living together was the single biggest challenge of my first year as a Mrs.  If you are like me, and didn’t live with your spouse before marriage, get ready for a huge dose of WTF.  I grew up with a brother and he had all the characteristics typical of a boy – he had that locker room boy smell pervading from his bedroom and a messy pile of stinky clothes all over the floor.  My brother was one of the two men I lived with prior to marriage (the second being my father) and while I was occasionally annoyed by his messiness, it was contained primarily to his bedroom and didn’t impact my life much at all. 

I, on the other hand, acquired my Mother’s views on living.  A CLEAN and orderly home were a basic requirement of inhabiting the earth.  Anything short of extremely clean should send you into a cleaning tizzy.  Mr. Clean, Ajax and a good bottle of bleach should be on hand at all times.  Dishes should not pile up in the sink. Mail should be sorted and organized upon arrival. When cooking, clean as you go.  Scented oils, candles and air fresheners should be used liberally.  If you see a spot on those floors get it now.  Don’t wait until later.  Laundry should be folded and put away in its designated places as soon as the beep of the dryer indicates the load is done.   

As I grew into my adult life I emulated my mother’s habits even though my level of cleanliness didn’t match hers. Her home was the gold standard but I was at least a bronze. 

Fast forward to my first few weeks of co-habitation with My Leading Man when I quickly discovered that his way of living was drastically different than mine.  He didn’t seem to believe in the concept of closets or hangers as his clean clothes either lived in the laundry hamper until he was ready to wear them or lived sporadically on the bed, on the couch, in the bathroom or on the floor of whatever room he decided to disrobe in.

What to do?  Pick up after him constantly until he gets the hint.  Organize a closet for him and hope he uses it or simply throw your arms up in frustration and complain (or argue) loudly at how his messiness is disrespectful to our habitation of the earth! 

I did all three.  Sometimes at the same time. 

Eventually I gave up any hope that his messiness would change and stopped complaining, or at least stop complaining as much as I did at first.  I also had to learn to not let it bother me as much.  As much as I take pride in a clean and organized home (just like my mother taught me too) it isn’t worth the constant battle and the disruption to my home life to continue to make this an issue. 

Just when I gave up guess what I saw?  Dishes were suddenly put away in the dishwasher and clothes magically found their hangers.  It doesn’t happen all of the time but it does happen enough to make me think “times are a changin.”  When you leave the argument behind things manage to magically sort themselves out.

There are guest to invite, flowers to pick, food to taste, colors to choose and outfits to select.  Planning a wedding involves decision after decision on varying scales of importance.  But most importantly the entire process of planning a wedding foretells how you and your Leading Man will interact as a married couple.

This New Indian Wife started out as The New Indian Bride.  For those of you who followed The New Indian Bride you know all about my daytime garden wedding and all the details that surrounded my big day.  What you don’t know is how My Leading Man and I interacted in the days and weeks leading up to our June 2012 wedding.  There are countless blogs by brides-to-be-describing how their husbands don’t care about the wedding details and countless blogs and articles by grooms-to-be on how to survive when the women of your dreams turns into a completely unbearable, obsessive bridezilla.

Our situation was no different.  While My Leading Man was cool and collected without much concern over wedding details (he was much more concerned with buying our first house), I was constantly frazzled with details of catering, clothing, guests lists and centerpieces.  As the wedding day got closer and closer suddenly My Leading Man got more and more interested in the wedding plans.  After months and months of planning, you can imagine my fervor by last-minute tweaks just weeks before the wedding when My Leading Man suddenly realized a wedding, in fact his own wedding, was about to take place.

The way a couple interacts during the planning of a wedding is very indicative of how the relationship will flow thereafter.   I am the long-term planner, the one who wants to know what is going on and when, the one who wants to make a plan and stick to it.  For My Leading Man, he knows the direction he wants to head in but isn’t going to trouble himself with the details of that future place until it becomes more imminent.

As you reflect on your relationship with your Leading Man, think back to how you interacted with one another as you planned your wedding?  If he was all about making your dreams come true, is he still that way with you on a day-to-day basis?  If he was interested in all the minute details of the wedding, does he still take a detailed interest in your day-to-day life?  If he let you handle the wedding planning, does he let you handle the planning of other major events in your marriage too?

Tell me what you think.  Comment on this post or join the conversation on Twitter @newindianwife.

It’s been over a year since I married My Leading Man but I am still not able to fully distance myself from all the years as a singleton, dating, searching, longing, hoping and praying to find love.  I was single for 12 years before I met my now husband (16 if you count high school).  There were lots of fellas along the way but my one true love eluded me until my thirties.

I did it all in the hopes of finding Prince Charming.  I doled up in short skirts and low tops hoping HE would pick that one random night to find ME at that one random club.  I let Indian Aunties set me up with their teetotaler nephew working in “computers”.  I visited pundits to tell me my fate.  Showed the lines on my hands to anyone who claimed an iota of knowledge.  I wrote a witty profile and posted it on all the Indian dating sites.  I dated friends of cousins, friends of colleagues, friends of enemies, enemies of friends.  I did it all.  But I realize now that I did it all wrong.

Perhaps my 12 years of single life (or 16 depending on when you start counting) would have been shorter if I knew what to look for.  As The New Indian Wife I now realize there are lots of qualities a husband should have that we don’t always look for when we are dating.  As a singleton, I cared more about superficial stuff – how hot, how tall, how much money, how he dances, is he cool, do my friends think he’s cool, do we go to amazing restaurants and does he take me on over the top “The Bachelor” worthy dates.  I didn’t care about reality.  I cared only about the fantasies that Hollywood and Bollywood projects about dating and romance.

Now that I am married, I realize the dates with helicopter rides over the Golden Gate Bridge are fun but what I really need is a guy who knows how to make each and every day of our lives special.  A guy with whom I can enjoy life’s simple pleasures. Someone to have fun lazing on the couch watching sports or HGTV with.  Someone who I can cook with, garden with, roam through the farmers market with, enjoy my first cup of coffee with, pick out furniture with, sip a glass of pino grigio in the backyard with on a hot summer day, someone who blends with my family and I with his, someone to solve problems with, to deal with life’s struggles with, to make shared goals with.  Someone who can make day-to-day living just as enjoyable as running away to Paris for the weekend.

Being married is more like The Amazing Race than The Bachelor.  There are obstacles, challenges, roadblocks, do overs all through life.  Who do you want by your side when you have to climb the mountain?  Will you carry him? Will he carry you?  Will you go hand in hand together?  That is life.  That is married life.

So on your next date, instead of gazing into the person’s eyes fantasizing about exotic vacations try to gaze into your date’s soul to see if all the superficiality were stripped away, is this someone who you can live a life with for all the good and bad that it brings.

*This post was originally featured on the Two Mangoes blog.