Trauma Ward

No, it wasn't ever easy. But perhaps parenting was never as hard an assignment as it is today. Caught between two millennia, today's generation of parents teeter perpetually on the edge of doubt and dilemma like never before. The strain has begun to show.

It shows when yesterday's children sign on thriving Pre-Conception Support Groups on the Internet to learn to become tomorrow's parents. A role that will be made even more difficult by the radical redefinition of the ground rules on bringing up children: corporal punishment is out, shouting and screaming are frowned on, 'understanding' and 'sharing' are the new buzzwords and being a 'friend' is imperative. All this in a dramatically altered living environment-the emotional safety net of the joint family no longer exists. In chaotic urban pathways, where oppressive success ethics means everybody's looking constantly over the shoulder, parent and child are both lonely passengers.

And that's not all that has changed. Simple parental aspirations like wanting one's child to grow into a healthy, happy and relaxed adult seem as naive as wanting to change the world. Like wanting to turn the current stressful, competitive order of things on its head and create an artificial comfort zone for the child. That age-old desire to see your offspring have a 'successful life' now requires a whole lot more than simply helping with the homework. Today it's about going through harrowing, often humiliating, negotiations to secure admission into tag-worthy schools. After that, for most of the parents' life, comes the non-stop scouring for tutors and special classes that will ensure that exam after nerve-wracking exam proves that your child is an Intellectual Titan. And while you're pushing as hard as possible to ensure that your child scores that extra half-mark, don't neglect one essential-redoubling efforts to give your child a well-rounded personality. Cram violin lessons, drama sessions, karate classes, just about anything extra-curricular, into that tight schedule to hammer home the 'winning' edge.

Exhausted already? Won't do. There are innumerable sources of tension still. Agonise about the tiny tot's physical security at home, the baby's safety with the hired help, the child's bumpy ride in accident-prone school buses. There's little respite for already frayed parental nerves.Further along, strangle your adolescent offspring's probable flirtations with drugs and alcohol. Begin frenzied censoring of the beckoning sexual images that crowd the airwaves and do giddy rounds of the Internet. Pound dead the Brash Brat lurking in your child's inner recesses. Pray that despite news headlines crying themselves hoarse about the trend, the material world doesn't entice your child into the 'fascinating' world of crime. Get on with Panic Parenting. After all, everyone else seems to be worried sick for their children!

'Undoubtedly, there is extreme anxiety about parenting today. The reasons are varied. Nuclear families. Single parents. Working mothers. The absence of support systems. Fewer children, so the obsessive focus on them. Mounting marital problems. General high-stress levels. Collapse of solid, basic values. Both parents and children are becoming pawns in this confused game that they want to control,' observes Dr Neeru Kanwar, member of the Indian Institute of Family Therapy.

Adds Dr Vijay Wadhwa, a reader at Delhi University's I.P. College and the 56-year-old mother of three: 'In our time it all happened naturally. You got married and had children. Today, it seems to have become a part of intense planning. You marry at the 'right' time, have children at the 'right' time. By the time they come, you are so much into the planning mode, you strategise to raise them 'right'-here spontaneity is the real casualty.'

Real experiences confirm the death of the tackling-it-as-it-comes attitude in parenting. 'In my mind there is a continuous conflict between the desire to let my son grow up naturally and the wish to give him a headstart in this aggressively competitive world,' says Atul Khandelwal, 32, trader in fire-fighting equipment. Watching over their four-year-old son Raghav as he takes classes along with other three- and four-year-olds in a coaching school in the capital, Atul and his wife Meeta confess to pressurising their child far too early in life. As they sit amidst lisping children being goaded into mouthing trick phrases guaranteed to launch them into the 'best' schools, the couple sigh their mixed feelings: 'We know it's criminal to put Raghav through this at such a tender age. But just look at all these other kids being taught to elbow out everyone else. We are so tense about his future.'

The stress-and the bills-only seem to grow, keeping pace with the child. Bombay-based architect Bharat Gandhi spends over Rs 50,000 annually on tuitions alone for his 15-year-old daughter. First on the list of worries: she gets exhausted travelling three-and-a-half hours every day to attend these extra classes. Next on the worry list, therefore, are plans to buy a car for her; the office peon is already being trained to drive. Her 13-year-old brother takes classes in drawing, tabla and computers. Gandhi is on the lookout for a good cricket academy for him. 'It's crazy, but one just has to do these things for children today,' says the father.

The Delhi-based Agarwal family has embargoed all parties, get-togethers and outings till daughter Pallavi is through with the mother of all exams: the XII standard Boards. The girl studies about ten hours daily and says about fifteen students in her class of 60 are expected to score over ninety per cent. 'Eighty per cent won't get me anywhere,' she observes matter-of-factly. Father Ashok Agarwal, senior official with the Railway Ministry, says he tries not to add to his daughter's anxiety by being tense himself. Mrs Agarwal keeps a nervy vigil on every moment of Pallavi's schedule, ensuring that not even a minute is wasted.

Often, all the tension directly translates into psychiatrist's bills. Around examination and admission times, parents are increasingly seeking expert advice to deal with the stress. Dr Uttara Vidyasagar, counsellor at Bangalore-based Viswas, says that the parental rush begins around December and peaks during the academically strenuous month of March. Nothing short of topping the class is seen as sufficient, she says; unlike earlier times, there is no confidence that an average child might fit in somewhere.

Neuropsychiatrist Dr Avdesh Sharma in Delhi, too, gets his share of these clients: 'Failure sets the parents wondering why despite all their efforts, resources, pulls and coaching, their expectations are thwarted. Often it makes them feel their children are failures, and such failure is perceived as their failure as parents.'

For, the Parent is as much the object of evaluation today. Thanks in no small measure to the images that glut popular media, a new yardstick-the Hip Parent-is doing the rounds of upper middle class India. Current advertising, a rough-and-ready index of lifestyle aspirations, has us believe that 'successful' men who wear top-of-the-line suits and drive swank cars are achievers also because they skip power meetings to spend quality time with their child. Advertisements package the rich, powerful man today as a conscientious parent by choice. The Complete Man-as he is aggressively sold to us-is necessarily a Good Father because he 'does' things for his child. The New Age Mother too has progressed beyond good old mamta. She is articulately, sensibly, intelligently obsessive about her children. She too does things for them like no mom has ever done before-from buying toothpaste to floor disinfectants-but backed by well-thought out reasons, all this while trying to be a 'good mom'.

Pointing out that self-esteem is becoming inextricably linked with being a good parent, Dr Kanwar says that the emphasis has shifted to being a 'good' parent rather than on enjoying the experience of parenting. So, it wasn't enough that Vasavdatta Sarkar had opted to be with her three-year-old son Sanjit full time over her career as a teacher. She was constantly depressed, worried that he wasn't interacting enough with children his age. It was only after consulting a psychologist that she was able to believe that her son was going through a normal phase that was only part of growing up.

Dr Achal Bhagat, psychiatrist at Delhi's Apollo hospital, observes: 'The child is gradually becoming a symbol of validating one's role as a Good Parent, to oneself and to society. Simultaneously the standards of such assessment are getting higher and harsher by the day.' In a meeting of the parent support group that he conducts, says Bhagat, a young mother broke down and blamed herself because her three-month-old baby wasn't smiling enough. 'The desperate need to be successful means that the responsibility multiplies manifold. And so do fears of failure and guilt.'

Pearl Drego, author of Talk to Me, Mum and Dad, who also writes a parenting column in a daily, offers her perspective: 'Many parents today spend so little time with their children that when they do spend time it's too focused. And that's not natural.' Umang and Srilatha Verma, a Delhi-based couple, both busy bankers, are a case in point. The lures of five tricycles and ample toys are brandished by the two maids and even the chauffeur, all assisting the couple to feed their six-year-old son Himmat on a Sunday afternoon. Cajoling, coaxing, promising him the earth all so that he swallows a morsel of food.'Are we overdoing it? Or are we doing too little on other days? What will we do when the problems are about more than feeding him?'

Miles away, Bangalore-based Ajay and Era Goel are also tense anticipating future hurdles. Their daughter is in class II, and so far no problems have cropped up. 'But already, because of television and other things, she is ahead of us by 12 years! Will she ask for a car at 16? We'll say no, but will she listen?'

There are no easy answers. How can there be when a new set of parental goals are being churned out? Dr Bhagat pinpoints another shift: having children is no longer about just carrying the family name forward. It's also about the wish to have the child carry your ideologies and beliefs into the next generation. The result, he says, is that many parents are killing themselves to bring up The Politically Correct child. A child who takes for granted that a driver is at his disposal through the day but also learns to address such help as 'uncle'-not the easiest of tasks.

Maitryie Dasgupta, 31, visualiser in an advertising firm, says her mother was shocked at her pickiness when they were out on a shopping spree buying gifts for her nine-year-old daughter.

She recalls: 'Games that relied entirely on luck were out, so were the games that were 'for girls' and about kitchens, the Caucasian body-beautiful Barbie doll wasn't good either. My irritated mom pointed out that I wouldn't ever have grown up if she had harboured so many ideological quibbles!'

Then there are parents whose concerns make them opt for even more extreme corrective measures. Troubled that their 11-year-old son isn't in sync with his environment, the Thakurs take him to a child psychiatrist every alternate week. The provocation? The boy was taking punches at the house pets. Uncomfortable about being quoted and portrayed as oddball animal-loving loonies, the parents make a succinct point: 'Why not? Being kind to animals is very important. Anything to make him grow up right.'

Yes, anything really. Even having detectives stalk the kid to soothe the panicking parental heart; sometimes only to discover things that make it palpitate more. Dr Bhagat talks of a case where the parents of a teenage girl set a spy on her and discovered she was having an affair with a married neighbour. But sometimes these exercises in detection also reveal the claustrophobic effect that parental paranoia engenders. Kalyani Saha of the Calcutta-based Blackboy detective agency followed a 14-year-old girl for three days because her parents wanted to know why she was consistently returning late from school. Only to find out that the privacy-starved girl would sit for hours in front of Victoria Memorial and sketch away to her heart's content.

Indeed, the children are suffering. They, after all, are at the receiving end of this panic parenting. Just seven, Meghna Dutta is out of her Calcutta house for nearly eight hours on some days of the week. She spends this time cramming lessons at school, picking up computer skills at an upscale institute and taking drawing classes. Her parents plan to put her into music school, gym, Hindi tutorials and a chess academy. Father Indranil Dutta confesses to feeling the pressure but also feels the need to keep his daughter updated: 'All this is necessary to keep pace with the times. We don't want her to be left behind.'

A few, a very few, opt not to be scared of 'being left behind'. Delhi-based couple Rekha and Himadri Moharana don't want their six-year-old daughter Anusnigdha to suffer the cramming and competing.Having admitted her into Mirambika, an alternate learning school, they have decided to present her with all the opportunities that she requires to do what she enjoys most. Since Anu is 'physically very able', Rekha joins her daughter in learning Odissi dance and skating. The child is already quite a pro at swimming. Observes Himadri: 'I don't believe in a system where the computer is telling you how a seed grows into a plant. I want her to experience, to see, to touch and grow.'

But opting out carries its own strains, and the fear that the choices you're making for your children might not be the best ones. Having admitted their children to philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurthy's alternative school in Chennai, T.V. Ramanathan and Seethalakshmi are now planning to shift their 12-year-old son into a mainstream cbse school. Says Ramanathan: 'We wanted the first school because, in theory at least, it breeds the spirit of cooperation and coexistence. But now we are gripped by the fear that our child might not get into a good college later.'

Aware that they are discarding a 'Utopian dream' for a 'nightmare called the cbse regime', the couple observe that they stand as a metaphor for the times: 'We do not have the inner strength to fight society's demands.'

And there is so much to fight against, often literally. Saleha Singh, mother of two daughters, one five and the other 10, is self-admittedly a 'hyper' parent who won't trust her daughters alone even with male relatives. Her house a virtual fortress, the working mother says that no security precaution seems sufficient for children. It didn't help much that a neighbour's child was kidnapped just some months ago. 'I keep telling my daughters to confide in me even if they feel slightly uncomfortable about anyone touching them. Reports all show that it's mostly the known few who are the molesters. I worry.'

And there are new frontiers for parents to patrol. At 15, Sumaitri Gupta's daughter chats for hours with strangers on the Internet, dimming the monitor whenever her mother approaches. Much prodding later, Sumaitri's daughter confessed to having 'made friends' with a 24-year-old male. Sumaitri now worries that her daughter could arrange a clandestine meeting with her new 'friend'. Earlier, she only had to worry about switching the television off at the right moment; now, this mother feels obliged to monitor computer time as well.

It's all new, and almost all frightening. And many parents don't quite know where to stop. Journalist Nimi Pahwa takes her seven-year-old daughter to the dentist regularly because she wants her child's new set of teeth perfect: 'No, I am not overdoing it. You have to give them the best in life. You have to ensure they feel and look the best they can.'

And it's in this assumption that the problem lies, feels Raj Dagur, head of the crisis intervention cell at Sanjeevini, a Delhi-based counselling centre. 'Everything has become a debate between Doing versus Being. Self-esteem accrues not just from just 'being' a good parent but 'doing' things to be a good one. Parenting has become a fad-to be done and therefore to be learnt. From being about the child, it has become an issue of performance.'

Editor of the personal growth magazine, Life Positive, Praveen Chopra, suggests an interesting way out: 'Spiritual Parenting'. It entails treating your children not as your own but as tomorrow's children: 'It might do away with some bit of the possessiveness, competitiveness and paranoia.' A tall order again. Here's something new to worry about now-your role as a spiritual parent!

(Some names have been changed)