The one who had it all…

The one who had it all …. at least to begin with ..

A kind who had luck smiling on her for the most part of her life.

This is the story of Bindu’s journey, the firstborn of her parents. Both the parents doted on her and never had the heart to say no to her for anything. Whenever she asked for something she got it without a question. And even though their financial means at times did not allow them to fulfil her demands they still managed to go ahead and fulfil them. They never wanted her to feel deprived in any way and wanted her to be always happy. As a result all her life she always had it all and never had to struggle for anything.

But all this love and affection ended up getting to her head and she started developing a stubborn and mean streak in her. She always wanted her way and since she always managed to get it , she started to take things as a matter of right .

When it came to getting married she chose Samir, a boy who lived in the neighbourhood and belonged to an extremely well off family. The difference in the financial backgrounds of the two families did not really sit well with Bindu’s father or with Samir’s parents but she was adamant and hell-bent on marrying him. She pushed Samir to convince his parents and her own in any case did not stand a chance. Thus she got married to the man of her dreams.

For her, it was vital to get into a family which was financially much better off than her own and when that happened she couldn’t believe her luck. Since Samir was their only son, her in-laws also showered her with a lot of love and affection. All this pampering, the affluent lifestyle made her even more arrogant and self-centred. She couldn’t care about anything, anyone or any relationship.

Thus marriage did not bring about any change in her. On the contrary she went from bad to worse. She was used to getting her way and this did not change in the new surroundings. As luck would have it Samir was a mild guy who loved her too much to get affected by her bossy ways . In fact he was happy to put up with her indulgences.

He never questioned her on anything, whether it was money, outings , friends or the house . She continued to get her way . She started feeling that she could control everything and everyone. It was as though she was so important that no one could do without her. This supreme confidence and the feeling of being all powerful had the effect of making her an extremely unpleasant person.

She felt she could never go wrong and the world was at her command. Even when the children came along she never ever lost control or her confidence. She had to have the final word in everything. When her elder son was to go to school she chose the most expensive school in the city only because it was considered to be an elite school. Even though there were better schools in their neighbourhood with proven track records she just didn’t want to consider them . All of Samir’s attempts to make her understand that it didn’t make sense to spend so much money fell on deaf ears.

In this desire to be in control of everything she didn’t care about the emotions or feelings of others. She was clear that she always wanted her way no matter what. If in the bargain she had to tread on other people’s toes, it was their bad luck. Even with her children, she was the same. Her daughter in particular had to bear the brunt of her over bearing nature very often. Once when they were out with some family friends and Bindu who was upset with the daughter for not having scored well in the exams got after her in front of everyone. She did not consider the fact that her daughter could feel insulted and the discussion could have taken place at home.

As time went by Samir began to resent her behaviour and her high handedness but now it was too late. He was unable to do anything. He could not muster up the courage to confront her as that meant her flying off the handle and starting to scream and shout . And once that happened there wasn’t anything that anyone could do to stop her . He wanted peace in the house and so mostly kept quiet . She, in any case, did not care about his opinion on anything and so couldn’t be bothered to even hear it.

What she could not understand was the fact that slowly but surely Samir was getting frustrated and switching himself off from her. He was moving away from her. He could not relate to her in any way and was sick and tired of giving in to her all the time. It seemed to him as if his entire life had been taken over by her and he could not have a say in anything whether it was in matters related to their children, the house, friends or finances.

He was just supposed to earn enough to support her in every possible way . The children sympathized with him but did not respect him much as they felt he was gutless. Many times when they wanted his support on an issue vital to them he could not take a stand for them and give that support to them.

This frustrated Samir even more. He was in a fix. He did not want to be with Bindu yet didn’t want to leave because he did not want to admit to his family or friends that by marrying her he had made a huge mistake. Also he felt that it might affect his children in an adverse way. Moreover he was terrified of how Bindu would react to any bold step on his part. So taking the easy way out he just withdrew from her and everything in their lives. He was just there to fulfil his duties and that’s it….. He was extremely unhappy but not wanting to fight to change the situation. And so life went on…..physically they were together but mentally, emotionally…. they were far apart….

Do we blame any one person in particular in this story or was this how the two of them were meant to be???

Should the parents have been more firm with Bindu when she was a child???  Did Bindu really have it all?

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