Lately I have had a slew of clients talking to me about ‘Easy on me’ the new song from the album 30 by Adele. After a 6 year hiatus, during which time she went through a divorce, Adele uses her music to share her emotional journey as a mother, a parent, and a single woman in her 30’s.
In an interview with Vogue, she opens up about how she confronted emotions from her childhood, and her seven year old self… how she had to revisit herself as a child to gain some perspective on being a parent to her own son. She even speaks about her relationship with her father, which was largely strained, and how she felt upon his recent passing.
Asha, a client (names changed for privacy) is a divorced single parent. She had just started dating when her daughter discovered pictures of her with another man. The anger and confusion she needed to absorb from her daughter echoed in the song ‘Sometimes the woman in me apologies to the mother in me.’ Adele confesses how hard it was to explain to her son why she chose her own happiness even though it meant making things uncomfortable for him she felt a little less alone. It made her feel like a ‘bad’ mother, but did it really make her a bad mother?
This questioning is a recurring theme in my work as a family therapist- parents are still individual human beings, whose feelings, needs & desires deserve to be addressed, not blindly sacrificed in the name of “good” parenting.
I know there is hope in these waters
But I can't bring myself to swim
When I am drowning in this silence
The society we are in today has very exacting standards. I call it the “Great Indian Sacrifice.” Work hard, study hard, marry well and take care of your duties and responsibilities. The missing elements? Have fun, enjoy yourself, make mistakes, pause and forgive. You might be a parent now, but you are still you!
Priya is a parent who just received a recent diagnosis of neurodiversity for her child. Priya is struggling with wanting to support her son and do everything in her power to get him the right intervention, but is also wanting to run away and take a break, because she is exhausted and the pressures around her are not helping her recharge her constantly draining supply of emotional and physical energy. She says, ‘I feel like Adele is a friend who is understanding what I am going through,’
You can't deny how hard I have tried
I changed who I was to put you both first
But now I give up
Shalini recently contacted me. She has been on dialysis for 5 years while working in a high pressure environment. When her teen is struggling with anxiety she said, ‘I understand what she feels, but I am not able to do anything about it. Please help me help her.’
In each of these stories - Shalini’s, Asha’s and Priya’s too - there is a parent, but ultimately there is a human being, a fallible human being, just like the rest of us- who deserve kindness, not criticism. So when a celebrity like Adele comes out with an album that’s simply asking for forgiveness, it speaks to parents world over, because it speaks the truth that most parents keep tightly locked away. Can parenting be unapologetic in its imperfections- “I agree I fall short, but I don’t need you to call me on it or blame me for it.” So, there is no surprise that Adele is in my therapy room, because there are parents everywhere feeling these feelings, and finally, someone, very bravely, wrote a song about it.