It is never easy to tell Asian parents that you want a divorce.
But in my case, the Ogre hadn’t exactly been subtle in his level of selfish, unpleasant and aggressive behaviour over the years. He used the marriage as a means of free accommodation, free bills, free cars, free phones, free holidays, free cooked meals and it got to the point where there was absolutely nothing he was contributing to my life at all, except control and abuse. My parents and family were fully aware of his behaviour and had started asking me to leave. The problem was he was wasn’t exactly easy to leave. As he was benefitting so much from this arrangement, he wasn’t in favour of ending it.
By now, his mother had permanently moved to the UK, and he had bought a house in which she was staying. She would stay in my house for a few days per week and then go to her own place the rest of the week. She was positively loathsome in her encouragement of his disgusting, unacceptable behaviour – in the way that most brown mums are.
Anyway, so after me finally gaining the courage to ask him to leave, his mum arranged a meeting with my parents – who she had deliberately ignored and snubbed since the wedding. She sat like a monarch on a throne in my own front room and started telling my parents that I am ‘too modern’ and don’t understand a ‘woman’s role’ and should just accept her son’s behaviour and at ‘least he doesn’t beat her.’ My blood was boiling as I listened to her. My father called me into the room.
I went in, expecting her will tell her to fuck off, as he had been asking me to get a divorce for years.
“Your mother in law is right. She is like your own mother. You need to listen to your elders,” he said.
I was horrified. In order to be liked and please others, he had completely thrown me under the bus.
My mother in law turned to look at me smugly.
“Any man you move on with will be exactly the same,” she said. “Not just my son. They are all like that. We are not like these white people who just divorce.”
I stared at my father nodding along, wanting her approval, and in that moment, I felt nothing but disgust for the whole bunch of them.
Who Fucked Me? 