Chanceforlove.com
   future peers in this Russian brides board

Essentials archive:
Resources archive:
Articles archive:
Facts on Russia:


Kenya: No Dating Allowed

Date: 2007-01-18

Twenty four year old Achieng' is dying to move out of home.

"My parents won't let me bring any male friends over, let alone allow me to date, and I'm an adult!" she laments.

You would think that my parents would not want me to wind up in a boring marriage like theirs," she continues. "They have nothing to talk about other than how much it is raining upcountry, mother asking my father if he would like to eat, or my father passing a message through mother to the workers in the farm! You would think they want me to cultivate a good relationship with my husband-to-be by first being friends with him. But this is not so."

Her parents have been like this for as long as she can remember. A last born in a family of six, Achieng' has witnessed and sometimes borne the brunt of her parent's strictness. When her older sisters brought boys home, the boys were told to leave. A few times, her sisters were also made to move out of the house for a while. Achieng' herself has colluded with her sisters to bring boys home and has been humiliated when her mother chases them away so she is now afraid to bring males home.

Risk of making mistakes

"I do not know if old age has softened them (parents). I know my mother is much more approachable nowadays, but I am not so sure about my father. Maybe one day I will bring a man home just to find out," she says. A while ago, she got into an argument with her mother about the same issue. "It was quite a friendly chat, as arguments go," she explained, "and I got the chance to communicate with my mother."

"I told her that the way they look at things could easily lead to me making the same mistakes as women my mother's age, who probably married the first man they saw because they thought these were the only men in the world." For the first time in a long while, Achieng's mother agreed with the girl. Her rules could easily cause her daughter to make the same mistakes she did.

Yet this is hardly the reason parents attempt to shield their children from members of the opposite sex. The executive director of the Maranatha Professional College of Counselling and Training, Dr. Catherine Gichutha, acknowledges that parents do not actually mean harm to their children. Most of the time, the parents are reacting out of past insecurities they have not dealt with.

"Perhaps Achieng's mother is still affected by what happened to her when she was Achieng's age," Gichutha ventures. As she has noticed, many people of Achieng's generation come from dysfunctional families whose parents are carrying the weight of their past hurts. Thus the parents become obstacles to their children's healthy social development.

Living in self denial

What is worse, these parents are not honest enough to admit that their archaic parenting techniques are both irrelevant to today's youth and harmful to their future marriages. Gichutha maintains that if parents can be humble enough to acknowledge and admit their weaknesses, they can reconnect with their children and have the fruitful relationship they want.

Jennifer, a mother of three, is one of the few who has a good relationship with her children. They are all aged over 18, and she actually prefers having them bring their friends home. "I would not like my children to sneak in their boyfriends or girlfriends without my knowledge," she explains. When my daughter had a boyfriend in her teens, he was like a son to me. I would invite him over for tea, and baked cakes for him. We talked freely."

Jennifer maintains that wise parents should actually be concerned if their children do not have friends from the opposite sex. In her opinion, loners suffer from a mental deficiency of some sort.

This might be so, according to Gichutha's studies and experience. She says that teenagers and young adults are at that stage where intimacy with outsiders is of paramount importance so it is harmful to withhold friends from them.

"Teenagers and young adults are looking to form deeper relationships with both sexes," she clarifies. Through deep sharing with their peers, young people form their own identity. "Watching their friends and receiving feedback helps young people develop." She adds that these people are developing sexually, thus the interest in dating and courtship.

Sexual connotation disturbing

Herein lies the problem, because, for some reason, parents feel that approving of children's relationship with the opposite sex will inevitably lead to promiscuity and pregnancy. Says Achieng,' "I feel that my parents assume that all my friends are sexual partners. This really disappoints me. They should know better."

Though she is a relatively "modern" parent, Jennifer also seems to think that all men are secretly in love with their platonic female friends. She attribute this thinking to our culture, which was much more stringent in her day. Traditional Kenyan culture puts a sexual connotation in all dealings with the opposite sex. "If I was seen to be talking to a boy when I was younger, I was beaten," she explains.

Yet she regards this attitude as foolishness. "Parents who do not want to see their children with members of the opposite sex are living in denial and should style up," she remarks.

According to her, children will not hide much from their parents if their parents become their friends rather than dictators. Moreover, stopping friends from coming home won't stop the children from going out to meet them.

"It is better for friends to come home than for our children to meet them in Carnivore," Gichutha remarks, adding that it is dangerous to shut out your children's social group because you will never know whose advice these children take.

Parents must be level-headed

Even though the parents are clearly on the wrong, both women caution adolescent children and young adults against tactlessly attempting to change their parents' attitude. Gichutha advises Achieng' to continue talking about her need for male friends with her parents.

At her age, she belongs more to the society than to her parents. "Achieng' needs to explain her need for autonomy consistently," she says. She should also be open with her parents when she is going out to meet her male friends. "Her parents might attack her for this, but she has to rise above that," she says. And she advises Achieng' to make a conscious decision not to repeat her parents' mistakes.

Jennifer adds that if young adults refuse to dialogue with their parents, there will be clashes that will injure both parties.

However, the buck still stops at the parents. Gichutha, the Vice-chair of the Kenya Counsellors' Association admitted that family therapists like herself handle such conflicts on a constant basis. She has noted that many parents subconsciously know that they have done a bad job of enabling their children to grow into fully functional people.

This is one of the reasons they cannot trust their children. It is up to them to sit down with their children to rectify their wrongs. It is up to them to be honest and admit that they do not know how to relate with their children beyond the do-as-I-say stage. It is up to them to examine what unfinished business in their own past makes them obstacles to their offspring. It is still their responsibility to be more level-headed than their children.





Your First Name
Your Email Address

     Privacy Guaranteed



GL52081962 GL52080057 GL52081914 GL52074692


  

      SCANNED March 28, 2024





Dating industry related news
"Spouse," "partner," "husband," "wife" - or... ? Civil-union approval opens a new debateWomen choosing not to marrySome bad dates go down in history
Wary of shocking people, Christopher Bellis used to introduce the men he was dating as his "friends." Now, he and Eddie Bennett, who have been a couple since 1995, are considering replacing the word they usually use for each other - partner - with spouse or husband. New Jersey's new law establishing civil unions, signed Thursday by Gov. Corzine, gives same-sex couples many of the rights of marriage. Now, gay couples are weighing not what civil unions mean, but what to call them. Some gay coup...From celebrities like Oprah to professionals like Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, many successful women these days are deciding not to marry at all. Why the trend - and is the institution of marriage in any danger? The role of women in America has changed dramatically since the 1960s and 70s. Before the women's movement raised fundamental questions about the role of women in American life, two-thirds of adult women were married. By 2005, that number had dropped to a little more than half....I was talking with a woman at 10 Mercer the other night and, as often happens when I mention that I write about dating and singles issues, she began to regale me with stories of past bad dates. One guy was too rude, one guy was too married (after a while I swear it's like listening to a dating version of "Goldilocks"), and another guy asked her to meet him at a grocery store where instead of buying her a coffee, he tried to sell her vitamin supplements. "It wasn't a date; it was some kind of py...
read more >>read more >>read more >>
ChanceForLove Online Russian Dating Network Copyright © 2003 - 2023 , all rights reserved.
No part of this site may be reproduced or copied without written permission from ChanceForLove.com