Marriage lessons from the older generation
All over the world, the concepts of ‘marriage’ and ‘family’ are held in high esteem. This, however, is no surprise because it is in the family that important lessons such as moral values, house chores, respect, honesty, forgiveness, love, among others, are imparted to children. For this reason, lessons learnt from the family unit should be taken very seriously.
Many parents may not know this, but the quality of their married life leaves an indelible impression on their children. Therefore, many young adults recall what their childhood is like, and fashion their own marriages around this model.
Doris Akande, a family counsellor with a local church, says most children unconsciously do what they see their parents do: “If a man’s parents were happily married, he too will grow to know how two different people can somehow manage to live a life together happily. But if he grew up wondering why his parents couldn’t be happy together, he might either grow into that unconsciously - finding fault with everything his wife does - or personally decide his own marriage will never be the same as his parents’.” She therefore counsels couples to take their day-to-day relationship seriously.
Amanda Phillips, a mother of one, learnt from her parents that marriage takes a lot of work. “When things got bad with my husband, I remembered my parents’ perseverance,” she recalls. “They taught me that marriage is hard work. I then realised that my marriage was going to survive; so my husband and I had to put in a lot more effort.”
Dayo Ogunlana, a businessman, joins Amanda in saying his parents’ marriage affected the way he dealt with parenthood. “My father and mother focused all of their energy on us, the children. So, growing up, we always did things together as a family, and had lots of fond memories of a happy marriage,” he recalls. “When I settled down, I improved on what I learnt from them - to always be there for my children. I included my wife in the whole package, and our home is one of happiness and bliss.”
However, not everybody feels that the relationship shared by parents has any bearing on the quality of their marriage later on in life. Amos Felix, father of two, for instance, observes that marriages are always different. “You just can’t compare your parents’ marriage to yours, because they can’t be the same. I was about 19 years of age when my parents divorced. What prevailed and what I remember most was their arguing and fights. And afterwards, they’d refuse to talk to each other for days, creating a lot of tension and repressed anger in our house as we grew up. So, I was not surprised when they decided to get a divorce after many years of marriage. However, I made up my mind never to let the silent treatment be a part of my marriage.”
But apparently, it is different strokes for different folks, since Abey Ayorinde unconsciously mirrored his parents’ marriage when he was newly married. “I realised just how much I was mirroring their relationship. I identified some traits of my father, such as getting angry easily and shouting a lot at my wife. Then one day, we both sat down and talked. We both knew that we wanted our marriage to be different from our parents’, so we had to get over that communication hurdle to set us on a path of appropriate and positive changes.
“I started talking with a low voice when angry, trying as much as possible not to raise my voice at her. It was hard but I tried and now, it’s over. We are happy because I was able to separate myself from my father’s bad trait.”
Lola Akinola, a businesswoman and mother, however has some words of advice for couples desirous of avoiding a replication of their parents’ mistakes in their own relationships. “What I will say is that partners should be their own friends. I learnt this from my own parents, who always joked about everything. That house did not have any sadness in it, and nobody was allowed to be sad. This taught me that playfulness is a vital part of marriage,” she says.
Peter Adigun, an author, feels the same way: “Both my parents always talked till late into the night when I was a kid. These nightly conversations made me appreciate how important it is to be able to talk to your spouse. They were always kind to each other too. My mother used to tell me that my father was smart, hardworking, and a quick learner. Her example of talking about my dad in a good light carried over into my marriage. My wife and I always compliment each other in front of our children. We don’t try to make our marriage look perfect, but we don’t berate each other either.”
