The Metamorphosis #NuptialNarratives

The cab was moving towards the high-rises, picking up speed on the expressway. I slide the window down a little to let the wind ruffle my hair and ease some tension off my head. I We are returning from our fancy foreign honeymoon trip, the most awaited trip of anyone’s life, I guess. But a different kind of feeling has started to grip my heart as we near home. This is, of course, the first-ever trip when after a trip I am returning to a place my mind is yet to recognize as home. My mind keeps going back to the number of places I have called home in more than the past two decades of my life. This feels different, this feels new and inexplicable. Weird thoughts I know!

My perfectionist mind quickly does the checklist:

Pre-wed Ceremonies –check

Wedding –check

Photoshoots –check

Reception –check

Honeymoon –check

The actual new life begins now, I think to myself. As we get down from the cab and take the elevator to reach his our home. A new set of parents that I have been blessed with are waiting for us at home and so is the beginning of a tussle. Every bride goes through this awkward phase of life where she struggles to accept and be accepted by her new family and surroundings. Though things have changed a lot in the last few decades there still a long way to go. This acceptance doesn’t come easily and is often preceded by a ladder of various expectations.

So I thought the same too.  As one gradually picks up the little rituals of the family, tries to remember faces of the new extended family, learns the habits, likes and dislikes of the new family members; you realize you are yourself on the road of becoming a new person in this process. It almost feels like a metamorphosis. There are days when all of it feels so new and exciting that you begin to give all of you while running on the road to acceptance. Then there are days when even after giving in all of yourself you feel so low, almost feeling like an outsider whose efforts to blend in will never be successful. Although knowing very well in your heart that it gets easier with time. You know it well that it is just a phase when your mind is overthinking and play tricks with your mood. 

Sometimes, if I do manage to squeeze out a few moments amidst the housework and office, strange fleeting thoughts try to grab my attention. These highs and lows continue and make me wonder if we, the women, are brought up traditionally to behave like this – catering to expectations, gradually giving ourselves into building relationships, transforming ourselves throughout life and never complaining a word. At times this scares me what if amidst all this I lost myself? What if I became a person I myself don’t recognize? How do I keep in touch with my real self? And the questions flow on and on!

This might sound like a rant post but I am not complaining. Being welcomed so warmly in the family, in a few days itself I have found myself settling in comfortably. But to be really honest, these changes do scare me and get the better of me at times. These changes also bring back the memories of the anxiety of settling in a new city. So, I know this won’t last long, but the current time feels a bit intimidating and surely a mix of a lot of emotions. Little love, little trepidation, little celebrations and a lot of confusion, is what metamorphosis is all about, isn’t it?

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Above mentioned thoughts are merely an expression out of various experiences of many married women including myself. This is not to offend/demean anyone’s views about married life.