Surge The Love by Sharing The Load! Sounds like a familiar tagline doesn’t it?
Surge The Love by Sharing The Load! But it isn’t just a tagline it has become a much chanted Mantra! It is a known fact that together we can do great things. This lockdown has been a traumatic one for all of us. But one good thing has emerged; the males in the family have pitched in to share the chores. The woman-only homemaker tag has been shattered. Couples with blooming relationships have begun to function as a team. The need of the hour is to sustain and be self-sufficient without the help of housemaids. It is not time to think of what other people will say (“log kya kahenge”)
“Mere Paas Maa Hai”
Let me share my experience. My husband belonged to that typical era of “Mere Paas Maa Hai” ; this still echoes the haloed gender typecast roles we have in India. The sons are ‘Mamma’s Boys’ forever and expect the wife to don the mama role even after marriage. He was conditioned to think that he will marry a woman who will take care of him and his house just as his maa did. It was dinned into his head that “men do not do housework” “khana banana, jhadoo, kapda, bartan, sab aurat ke kaam hain! mard ke nahi!” They just bring home the money. Even if he wanted to help out he would hesitate in the joint family set up. But, I am glad to say that once we were a nuclear family, he would fry the best puris and turn out the best dosas!
Gender-Based Chores no More- Surge The Love by Sharing The Load!
Being the mother of a son and a daughter, I saw to it that there were no gender-based chores in the house. Today, I can proudly say that my son shoulders all the housework with my daughter-in-law. She doesn’t like to cook and he is a MasterChef, so he does all the cooking while she does the dishes. Laundry is solely his forte again. Now that he has two sons it is a pleasure to see the little ones pitching in and #sharingtheload.
‘Papa is a better cook than Mama!’
He lives in Mexico and is stuck in India, due to the lockdown. Just before the lockdown, at a family gathering, he mentioned that he did most of the housework and also changed the kids’ diapers. This statement was greeted by a sudden silence and his cousins looked at him strangely. There is nothing “phoren” about this stance, is there? But then within two months, I see that these same cousins where the traditionally allocated roles ‘belong to ‘maa, biwi, behen’ of the family were now dusting, swobbing, helping with the laundry. The best part is my food blog has reached the Top 14 thanks to all the men who have taken up the ladle in the kitchen. The legendary phrase of “maa ke haath ka khana” is going to change to ‘Papa is a better cook than Mama!’
Adversity brings out the best in people and gets them closer. Corona has pushed us to play unforeseen roles. In the current challenging times, most of us have been doing things that we hitherto never did. I can see role reversals in most urban nuclear families which had house help till date.
The Family That Works Together Sticks Together
Instead of allocating every chore, it is fun to do the chores together, isn’t it? Kids are finding it stressful that they cannot go to school, meet friends or go out to play but then the family that works together sticks together and can fill that gap in their lives. We can take this period as a homeschooling class of household chores and make them stand on their own two feet.
Start Them, Young to Surge The Love by Sharing The Load!
I am giving age-appropriate chores for my grandsons aged six and three and they are mastering them. These are children that work hard and are not spoilt brats. We have made cookies and cupcakes, popsicles and ice creams, all are cook without fire recipes, of course. My grandsons love to wash their own clothes manually and it is such a joy to see them soaping, rinsing and hanging them on the clothes stand. They even use the pegs!
This lockdown has been a wake-up call for each family member to add to the household activities. And about time, that the men young and old enhanced their non-existent household shore skills and master them and Surge The Love by Sharing The Load!
‘I will #ShareTheLoad and help in household chores in association with ‘Ariel and BlogAdda‘ is the slogan being chanted in my home. Make it yours too.
This video below shows how to Surge The Love by Sharing The Load! #ShareChoresMultiplyLove #ShareTheLaundry #ShareTheLoad
Alone we can do so little, together we can do so much!
Family needs good health as well so do check out my post “How do you ensure that you stay stronger and healthy as you age”
And after all that hard work check out “What to Watch and Where to Watch Great Movies During Lockdown”
