Should I let her marry someone else?

Question: I am a 22-year-old man, have just completed my engineering and now, am awaiting my joining letter from a respectable IT company. I have been in a relationship with a girl since past 4 years. We have had our share of ups and downs but lately, the problems have seriously increased. The misunderstandings are going to a whole new level and I am not able to take that. Differences have started creeping in. I love her and she loves me more. But somehow since couple of months, things are not going fine. There is another aspect of my relationship too. She is Muslim and I am Hindu. However, we have come a long way together. All these years, we had a long-distance relationship and there was not a trust issue ever. My problem is that I don't want to leave her, but now I am just not able to calm things down. We get aggressive over phone during our conversations. Her family is going through a tough time and all these things are making it worse for her. She is getting a lot of marriage proposals and her parents are also not open-minded. Thus, we cannot break the news of our relationship. I need at least 2 years to settle down, but it seems that things aren't in our favour, at least presently. Should I leave her over uncertainty of our future together, so that she can have a good life? On the other hand, my inner self doesn't want me to leave her. She is my first love and I want her to be my last too. But with the things happening between us lately, I've started getting negative thought. Please guide me, sir.

Answer by Dr Samir Parikh: There are a number of issues that both of you are grappling with, in terms of your relationship, and it would be a good idea to address each of these concerns in their individuality, knowing what can and cannot be fixed. Fights over trivial matters often break out, when there are deeper concerns that are being ignored or postponed, as is probably happening in this case. Understandably, getting a job in a reputed company will still take a few years and is an uncertainty, such matters cannot yet be foreseen and therefore, need not be a reason to stay in or end the relationship in itself. However, concerns about the family and your girlfriend's prospective marriage do need to be addressed more urgently. If you both are serious about getting married in the future, then delaying that conversation with your parents is no longer prudent - you both need to muster the courage to talk to your parents about this relationship and your plans for the future. It's essential for you both to know whether getting married to each other is a possibility, and if yes, what the repercussions of that would be for both of you and your families. To stay in a relationship or not is as much about the present as it is about the future; given that you cannot predict what will happen two years down the line, there is still a lot you can do today to secure the future you want for yourselves.

​​​​​​​​​​​​​- Dr. Samir Parikh is a Consultant Psychiatrist with Fortis Healthcare

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