“If you insist on not getting married, just pretend I didn’t raise you. On the night of New Year’s Eve, Zhang Qing’s mother finally said these words to her. Born in 1990, Zhang Qing is 31 years old, and in her mother’s eyes, her boyfriendless daughter has become a disgrace to the Family. The family war suddenly broke out, “I don’t get married because I want you to live a few years less! Zhang Qing violently got up and kicked the chair to the side, the words came out without thinking, the mother in front of her said froze, the argument stopped.
Faced with the constant pressure to get married, Zhang Qing was hardly able to be calm and clear-headed. Her emotions are irregularly immersed in the pain of not being understood and the hope that as an independent woman she can plan her own future and Life. However, the reality is not so simple and clear. Once the matter of Marriage is involved, the relationship between children and Parents becomes sensitive and fragile, and resistance accompanied by confusion and entanglement becomes the norm in the lives of “30+” unmarried women. “The life of unmarried women has become the norm.
Forced marriage has long been a social topic. Data from the “Survey Report on the Status of Forced Marriage in China” shows that the rate of forced marriages across the country is above 70%, with the greatest pressure on young people aged 25 to 35 among respondents, with a forced marriage rate of 86%, and a 6% higher rate for women than men.
With the gradient effect of mate selection, “30+” unmarried women face the crisis of missing their prime childbearing age, and their parents feel a stronger sense of crisis as a result. Under the bundle of anxiety, parents do not hesitate to launch personal attacks on their daughters and try to get their children to enter the marriage stage.
The reporter contacted a number of women who encountered the rush to get married, some of them are determined not to get married, and some are looking forward to love. The reasons for not getting married after 30 years vary, with some people finding their boyfriends cheating near the wedding date, others having long distance feelings fading, and others having emotional crises when it comes to the house bride price issue. Most of them are women in the workplace is increasingly important, economic independence gives them the confidence that they can live a good life without relying on marriage.
But outside eyes and voices are still there, and “30+” unmarried women are still trapped in the wave of marriage rush.
“You’re a pig, but you need a match.”
Hu Qing knew it was her mother again, and her mood hit rock bottom, as she was still single at the age of 29, having been urged to marry by her mother for three years in a row.
Since Hu Qing reached marriageable age, the previous relationship between mother and son slowly deteriorated, and the most loving mother image in Hu Qing’s heart no longer existed, she escalated from daily nagging and flirting to personal attacks on Hu Qing.
Your Auntie Liu’s daughter got married at the age of 20 and now she has a baby. Can you look at yourself in the mirror and see what kind of virtue you have? What qualifications do you have to pick and choose? “”I sent your information to the dating group, but no man is willing to meet with you. “”Do you know what the situation is now? You’re 30 years old! What feelings are not feelings, there are men who want you will be burning joss sticks. These conversations open anytime and anywhere during New Year’s Eve, and in most cases are the mother’s vocal monologue, stir-fry with a spatula poked into the face, the morning bedtime directly lift the covers to stand at the head of the bed, and even rub mahjong with the spit when the tiles are played.
The mother evolved from a resentful woman mode to a shrew mode, she cried about how she worked hard to provide for Hu Qing’s adulthood, study, said her health is deteriorating, her daughter did not marry her daughter died in peace. From tears to tears, looking at her aggrieved mother, Hu Qing felt that she had become an unforgivable sinner.
Hu Qing tried to calm down and retort to her mother, trying to tell her how good she was at her job and promising to keep her filial piety so that her mother could enjoy her old age. What followed was an even more frightening outburst, “Do you remember the old bachelor who died at the age of less than 60 in his hometown? Never married in his life, who in the village looked up to him? The last fracture lying in bed with no one to take care of, not long before he died. Every word was slammed into Hu Qing in a roar, and she couldn’t control her emotions and fought back loudly: “But why should people live in the eyes of others? I want to live for myself. “
The next scene that got out of hand was something Hu Qing didn’t expect, as her mother threw vicious and obscene words at her daughter: “Don’t you see? You are already a cabbage rotting in the ground that no one wants. You’re a pig, and you need to be paired up. “”But I’m a human being! “Hu Qing slammed the door on the night of the fifth day of the Lunar New Year in slippers and pajamas. “I so want to be an orphan. She sent a message to her best friend on the street, squatting in front of a rare supermarket in a small county and crying loudly.
In Hu Qing’s future planning for the Time being there is no marriage this item, after graduating from college she joined an Internet company in Shenzhen, monthly income of nearly 20,000. She is not short of suitors, and has had several relationships, but has not yet met the person who gives her the courage to walk into the marriage hall.
In Shenzhen, with Hu Qing’s situation is not uncommon for women, few people around them to make a judgment on the status of their unmarried. But for her mother, who was 700 kilometers away, her daughter had been eliminated as a leftover.
The next day after packing her bags and leaving Home, Hu Qing set her mother’s WeChat to Do Not Disturb. The continuous voice messages tore at her mood, and for a while she even felt depressed. Hu Qing sent a message to the “Family Help Qing Find a Date” group “The message was quickly swamped by a large number of emojis, and was brushed aside as a joke.
“I slit my wrists on New Year’s Eve and wanted to die.”
The night of New Year’s Eve, Wu Shuang was sent to the emergency room, she slashed her wrist to kill herself, but fortunately the wound was not deep, the suicide attempt. She looked at her anxious parents expressionlessly and said coldly, “I just want to get back at you.
In the first half of 2020, Wu Shuang, born in 1988, broke up with her ex-boyfriend after he cheated on her with a tough attitude and no room for redemption. Less than a month after the breakup, her parents started looking for a blind date for Wu Shuang, their anxiety clearly more than understanding their daughter. Wu Shuang is 170cm tall, less than 100 pounds, looks and figure are not bad. Her previous four-year relationship had ended without a hitch, and it was difficult for her to commit to a new relationship in a short time. The conflict between the children and their parents was immediate.
“After my ex-boyfriend cheated on me, my mother told me to reflect on whether it was my own problem. “Wu Shuang does not know how to express to make her mother understand herself, she also can not say whether it is a generation gap or cognitive problems, “she said a lot of words like a sharp knife, without She said a lot of words like a sharp knife, no cover up to hurt me. “
In order to get out of the shadow of lost love as soon as possible, Wu Shuang also tried hard to follow the advice of her parents, she took time off from Guangzhou to return home to accept the blind date arranged by her parents. In the eighteenth line of the small county, 33-year-old Wu Shuang has been difficult to find a normal marriageable young man. Several of her relatives and friends are divorced young men, Wu Shuang really can not accept, her parents also see the reality of “daughter is difficult to marry out in the hometown”, let her back to Guangzhou.
I thought the marriage matters so smoothly reached a consensus, Wu Shuang did not expect is that her parents used her information to register a dating site, someone kept sending her messages, and even someone directly to the company downstairs to meet. In the family group of three people, her parents took turns sending messages to introduce her to new blind dates, and after being rejected began to intensify their invitation to aunts and uncles to join the wedding front.
Their words became more and more sarcastic, “You are 33 years old even if your conditions are good, and the best age to have children has passed. The best age to have children is past. ” “Good work ability is useless, you need to spend some effort on men. ” “Not married women are very poor, life is incomplete. “
Wu Shuang automatically ignored those remarks, she thought she was already strong enough inside to not care. But the breaking point was still ignited during the New Year. Relatives introduced Wu Shuang to a local doctor, married with a child. Parents felt that the other party was in good condition and was quite satisfied with Wu Shuang, and wanted the two to settle the marriage. “But I really do not have the confidence that I can do a good job as a stepmother, so I refused. “Wu Shuang did not expect to make a decision after the parents in return for ridicule, and even to death.
Wu Shuang went back to her room and closed the door, and searched once again for “how to deal with parental pressure to marry”. A “young man was urged to commit suicide by his family” message appeared, Wu Shuang did not click on the content, stunned for a long time. The fruit knife on the bedside table is still there, she did not think too much to pick up and slash her wrist, shouting at the parents outside the door: “Is my death you will be satisfied? “
The parents who noticed the abnormality crashed the door and sent Wu Shuang to the emergency room, and the parents who were “retaliated” by their daughter never mentioned it again. The word “marriage” was never mentioned again.
I did not marry out, there is no room for me at home.”
From 2019 brother married, 31-year-old Zhang Qing home for New Year’s Eve, can only sleep on the sofa in the living room. Two-room house, parents live in one, brother and sister-in-law live in one.
After graduating from graduate school she went to a good company in Shanghai, which at first was the pride of the family and slowly became a burden to the family.
“If you insist on not getting married, just pretend I didn’t raise you. On the night of New Year’s Eve, Zhang Qing’s mother finally said these words to her. Born in 1990, Zhang Qing is 31 years old, and in her mother’s eyes, she has become a disgrace to the family for not having a boyfriend. The family war suddenly broke out, “I don’t get married because I want you to live a few years less! Zhang Qing violently got up and kicked the chair to the side, the words came out without thinking, the mother in front of her said froze, the argument stopped.
The rush to marry has been going on for four or five years, Zhang Qing had previously been two years in a row without going home for New Year’s Eve, “do not meet as if you do not hear”. Zhang Qing is not resistant to marriage, she feels that she has not met love. She knows her own conditions are not so good, in an interview flirting with their own “short and ugly”. She couldn’t get past the hurdle in her heart and wanted to find someone with a common language.
“Maybe I’m not that lucky, never met love. Zhang Qing said her parents apparently only saw her as “short and ugly “She personally heard her mother complain about her father: “Can you remind your daughter to see what she looks like, to put it nicely she picked, the reality is that no one wants. Zhang Qing did not think that her own mother could hurt her with such words.
Zhang Qing grew up in the countryside, she knows the blank stares her parents endured at home. Neighbors and relatives comforted her mother with sympathy and jokes: “How good it is that you can’t get married and only be filial to you two old people. “She realized that her parents’ anxiety was much greater than their children’s when it came to their children’s marriage, “Every day I don’t get married is torment for them. “Her life is lonely and pathetic in the eyes of her parents. These comments were not only dripping out during the Spring Festival marriage rush, but even throughout every one of their exchanges. The label of an independent woman vanishes under the impact of the marriage rush, and the fashionable appearance and good income are ruthlessly ignored, “as if a woman does not realize her own value without getting married.” .
“But I can’t help it, I really can’t find one. “Zhang Qing said, in Shanghai she spent almost all her time on work, home from work just want to fall asleep, no social, it is difficult to meet new boys. The family also chatted about the introduction, usually within a few days to talk about marriage, she did not dare to take the rest of her life as a gamble.
The family war on New Year’s Eve was the first time she said “harsh words” to her mother, and she regretted it afterwards. The whole night Zhang Qing did not sleep, she wrote a very long letter to her parents, the letter about her respect and love for her parents, the leadership of the work and the admiration of colleagues, the consequences of the unfortunate marriages suffered by people in the same village, the end of the attached several press reports of being rushed into marriage into tragedy.
The next few days, no one mentioned what happened on the night of New Year’s Eve, the family became slightly restrained. On the high speed train back to Shanghai, Zhang Qing received a message from her mother, “Marriage is still a matter of concern”, to which she replied. “I’m not worthy of being a woman if I don’t get married? “
Can not get out of the predicament of forced marriage
The data of “China forced marriage status survey report” shows that the rate of forced marriages across the country is above 70%. Forced marriage has long since broken out of the family and become a social issue.
The anxiety of parents seems to be much greater than that of children when it comes to their children’s marriage. Once the “marriage rush” is involved, the relationship between parents and children starts to become fragile and sensitive. Under the influence of the gradient selection effect, older women who are unmarried face the crisis of missing their prime childbearing years, while men can somehow upgrade their weight as their age, experience and economic conditions grow.
Parents’ concern for their unmarried daughters in their thirties comes more from the “threat of age to fertility”, those who Behind the rhetoric of “no one wants you when you’re old” lies the logic of “not being able to have children. The logic behind those “old and unwanted” arguments is the “inability to have children”. The embarrassing thing is that even those who are being pushed can unscrupulously make a series of declarations of independent women on the internet about the act of being pushed into marriage. But the real Spring Festival home when encountering marriage rush, most of them can only be obediently taught in front of their parents and relatives from all walks of life.
In the interview, the reporter contacted a number of 30-year-old unmarried women, who are excellent and have their own ideas, but often full of contradictions and tangles in the face of the rush to marry. Some people show their resistance to their parents through fierce confrontation, even at the expense of destroying their relatives; others are still entangled with their parents and want to “lie down and try to find real love”. The parents are still struggling with their parents, wanting to find true love and let their parents “smack them in the face”.
Hu Qing does not intend to go home again next New Year, she began to plan with friends about to go to Harbin to feel the ice and snow world, the plan has been on the agenda. The face of the information sent by the mother of the matchmaking male guests, she added each other WeChat, a few pleasantries to cope with the matter.
After Wu Shuang confronted in such a drastic way with self-harm, her parents haven’t sent her a message urging her to get married, except for their daily concerns. Wu Shuang felt guilty, she booked tickets and hotels for her parents and let them go to Hangzhou and Nanjing for a few days. She wants to find a chance to talk to her parents, and has not yet figured out how to reveal her heart in order to be understood.
Zhang Qing is already planning to buy a house, from the countryside out of her childhood frugal, the down payment has been saved almost. “I want to buy myself a small house, married and have their own home. “
However, women’s economic independence and independence of thought are difficult to change the views of the outside world, older unmarried women are still difficult to resist the pressure to get married. Especially the Spring Festival back home, parents and relatives of all kinds of words let them once doubt themselves, struggle and confusion squeezed the long-built inner confidence and ideas.
The climax of the marriage rush slowly fell after the Spring Festival holiday, and before the next peak came, Hu Qing returned to the big city to get a respite, and the moment the plane landed in Shenzhen, Hu Qing secretly told herself: all the labels could be torn away, and the independent women returned.
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