Real Struggle…
— — — — — THE HEART BREAK’S.
Love and relationship issues are seldom completely straightforward. Every couple experiences a relatively easy first few months of dating. Every day you learn something new about your lover, and romance is at its height. The best days of your relationship may very well be during this lovely stage of life. The true battle begins when you have to put out the effort to maintain the flame of love for your lover after discovering a few reasons not to like him or her. Making a relationship work naturally requires ongoing efforts, dedication, devotion, and love. There would be good days that would make your connection stronger, and there would be horrible days that would put your relationship to the test. It would be possible for those who are resolved to hold each other’s hands in every circumstance to float their boat.
These two powerful ladies are battling for their love with their hopes, and I want to share two of their hidden stories with you today. But after seeing each of their life tales, you could think that at least theirs might have been resolved. As the three of us exchange these.
With my cousin, I experienced love.
(Names changed to protect their identities)
Nobody has written the definitive guide to choosing a partner for love. You are unable to change how you feel. You might be thinking that it’s wrong, repulsive, and against nature. You can be sure that when I first fell in love with him in 2008, I had the same thoughts. I initially dismissed it as a childish little crush because I didn’t know that, in today’s society, admiring a relative in that way is wrong.
I was an adult when I realized I couldn’t hide it any longer. As our relationship has between cousins. I had fallen for him desperately, I always got butterflies whenever I saw him. I purposely made chances to talk to him and be with him whenever we met at Nani's house. He never voiced his feelings. But I guessed it was mutual from the way he stared at me for no reason and cared for me as if I belonged to him. It felt painful when we were separated from each other from Nani's home. In 2010, I saw him staring at other girls, and I used to feel jealousy, thus when I decided to tell him and When I told him he was shocked and admitted he felt the same way. We both agreed that was fine but we could never do anything about it. But we had to, we honestly liked each other immensely. We liked being with each other, we spoke for hours. We met every year after that. If for some reason, I couldn't go some year to Nani’s home then he made up the chance to come and meet me at my home. He made up reasons like growing hair and praying to god to travel to Tirupati with me., that way his parents would agree.
Our laughter would grow even louder the minute someone mentioned how, given our nature, we could definitely survive a long-distance relationship. You may wonder how it felt the first time, it felt natural, it didn’t feel evil or wrong. We met every year We managed to hide it, scared of how our parents would react, scared of how society would react. Slowly his family found out that there is something fishy going on between us and they warned Rohit not to talk to me but he wouldn't stop that, he always told me I loved you not to leave you. And whenever I visited Rajasthan, his siblings warned me to block him and to stop talking to him, but I never did listen to them anyway coz I dint love him to end this, I loved him in a hope that we will be together happily.
But still, there were times when for his goodness I thought of stopping this, I felt it was okay if I suffer, but maybe his name would get saved from society. Somehow I convinced him that let’s stop this now, we tried to end it every time, but I always told to myself, No, this isn't correct. He is my brother. I should not think about any other relationship with him but I don’t know how we end up together again. And each time this happened, I felt god doesn’t want us to lose hope, we believed that God is with us. It is incest. I wished I could go back in time and change the lives of our common ancestors. I could sense he had similar reservations. I started shying away from meeting him. God supports true love, he sees the true feelings of each person, and he observes if our love is strong or not, unlike people. People differentiate in everything, caste religion, whom we love, and all things. People always create problems no matter who we love. Even if I loved a man in intercaste, they would tell me, this would get success if it was into the same caste. If we love someone from the same caste, then they would still differentiate it with family status. No matter what we do, people will always judge. So we stopped thinking about society and focused on ourselves.
As the days passed, my parents started looking for a match for me. But my feelings towards Rohit were getting firm rather than weak, with every passing moment. Somehow I managed to reject matches from my side till the date. But as days pass, pressure upon me is increasing at home. Parents started making emotional blackmails, regarding health issues, comparing me with other girls of my age, my grandpa is putting all serious pressure on my dad. They even tell that if you like someone in intercaste too, we are ready for that but please get married. I feel scared to tell about the guy I love, not that I am ashamed of it but that how would they react to it and it makes me scared, my heart breaks each day thinking about how will I convince them of this, this kind of love story hasn’t happened in our samaj yet that we could openly tell about it. But Rohit doesn't want to give up. When he heard that my parents were looking out for the matches, he then had never spoken about his feelings for me. But he was a volcano waiting to erupt. He couldn't stand the thought of the love of his life not being part of it.
Both of our families were aware of our friendship. And when Rohit overheard their parents talking about me and my parents looking out for the matches. His reply to his parents bewildered them. He said I want to marry Anjali. Without waiting for their reaction, he picked up his phone and sent me a text. “I have made an announcement at home today. I’ve never asked you about it but I know this is what you want in your heart too. I guarantee a lot of struggle before we reach there but I am ready to face it if you are willing. I want to marry you.”
I knew that lacked the guts to do it. I made a phone call to him then and there after locking myself into my room. He explained all the things that happened and poured our hearts out about our mutual feelings. But decided to do a huge amount of work to seek the blessings of both our families. It’s a mess right now. There is no solution to the social stigma. Nonetheless, we don't intend to give up either. Rohit’s siblings told everything about us to my mom. Communication between our families had abruptly stopped in every way after his announcement. We were aware of the dangers of inbreeding. Our hearts, however, could not understand the math and science involved. We only knew that we desired a lasting relationship.
Right now, things are a mess. My parents are quite upset with Rohit and me both. We are so much in love that being married to each other without having children is something we would never regret. We are aware of this fact, and it is perfectly fine for us to adopt a child and start a family. I’m sure that if we brought this up with our parents, they would strongly disagree. We are willing to face any obstacles that come our way. Because falling in love is not a sin, many South Indians have married their relatives. Nowadays, even gay marriages are accepted, so why would our love be wrong? People have the freedom to express their opinions to me, and I am aware that some people are narrow-minded and would judge others based solely on what they have heard.
Consider how many well-known people have married their relatives before you criticise me. Just a few examples are Albert Einstein, Charles Darwin, Jerry Lee Lewis, H.G. Wells, Sir John A. McDonald, and Samuel F.B. Morse. If Einstein, Darwin, or Morse hadn’t existed, just think how different the world would be now.
It’s not like I look at him and am immediately reminded that he is my cousin; in fact, most of the time I don’t even think about it. We are regular people who work and pay taxes. We keep our relationship as cousins a secret, but we are not embarrassed by it. Families being opposed makes it seem as though the entire world is opposed to our love, yet I can’t leave him. Without him, my life is solely filled with darkness. I feel as though my life has come to an end. That is why I made the decision to support him throughout this battle and not give up at any cost. We know that family animosity will reach its peak during this fight, but as long as we both don’t give up, no one can separate us.
Another story in the next blog……To be continued..!!
