Nothing is more Precious than Life!
This is the photo of Mouna, a beautiful, intelligent and young girl of 16, who hanged herself. She was the second one I knew to commit suicide in 2009. The first one was my niece Chaitra. While Mouna hanged herself Chaitra drank an insecticide. Both killed themselves for their Love!
I wonder who is responsible for this, the parents, the lover, the society or the education system which has not equipped the students with the required coping ability. I feel it is not that they failed to live but the society and parents who failed to help them live.
Mouna was in the eleventh standard and Chaitra had just completed her graduation. Both had strong opposition from their families for their love. They were not at all trusted and accompanied by someone or the other wherever they went. They were often whipped. They lived the life of prisoners. They were desperately looking forward to some help and some understanding from their parents.
After their death, people said that they wasted their life without listening to their parents, did not make use of the precious life given by God and some even sympathized that they could have eloped and got married, instead of wasting their life. Mouna and Chaitra did know all these options. They did go through rigorous counselling. They were helped to understand the consequences of their love and the importance of life but finally, they resolved to die.
Sometimes I think about the reason which made them take such a drastic decision? Was it the fear of disapproval from society and the family or their incapability of withstanding the stress? Or was it the society that pushed them to this? I enquired Mrs Thangam the director of Vishwas. She said that it was the result of parents unwillingness to change and a mismatch of parental expectations. It could also be the result of parents failing to look from another person’s point of view. Lack of open communication might have restricted them from understanding each other. The present day’s too much awareness and too much protection would also make teenagers vulnerable. She feels that if the children did not get enough love and acceptance from their parents they may start looking for it from outside. Mrs Thangam insists on encouraging the teenagers to take small, small risks starting from a young age and the importance of allowing them to make their own decisions and the responsibility for the consequences thus followed.
Dr Thankachan Varkey, a psychologist says, “Love is care and respect with trust”. If the children get enough of that love and if their self-esteem is high, they feel good and worthy of themselves and treat love as a part of life but not life itself. Thus the chances of getting into immature love affairs are less. Even if they do, they value themselves more and thus the chances of going ahead in life are high.
Most of the time, “time” will heal these problems. I have seen this happening in four cases. All these four appeared to be grievous issues in the beginning and turn out to be passing phases. I believe that the onset of love in an adolescent’s heart is nature’s preparation for getting into a relationship and preparation for family life.
The statistics of suicide in India surprises me. According to it, three suicides are reported every 15 minutes in India only and among those three one is youth between 15 to 29 years. What startled me, even more, is the third cause of suicide is Love.
Dear friends, let’s not lose more Mounas and Chaitras. Let’s wake up and empathize with them. Help them understand the consequences of love both good and bad. Help them know about the organization like Banjara, Vishwas and Sneha which support the parents and adolescents go through this phase successfully. Help the parents understand it is only a passing phase and preparation for life.
Let us remember, nothing is more precious than life!