Lately, I’ve been noticing a curious pattern in the behavior of many parents from Kanyakumari, particularly mothers. There’s a recurring tendency to project emotions—anger, sadness, happiness—onto their children, not because the child is actually feeling that way, but to communicate something about the parent’s own desires or discomforts.
It’s a subtle form of gaslighting. For example, if a mother doesn’t want to accompany her husband on a social visit, she might say, “Our son is in a bad mood today, let’s stay home,” even when the child is perfectly fine. The child becomes an emotional excuse, a buffer used to influence someone else's behavior without direct confrontation.
Sometimes, these projections go deeper. If a mother-in-law dislikes her daughter-in-law, she may subtly portray her own son as short-tempered or unstable. The goal isn't to protect the child, but to create distance between the couple—without ever saying so explicitly.
Why do I frame this as a Kanyakumari-specific pattern? In this region, unlike many other parts of Tamil Nadu, there seems to be a strong social undertone that encourages parents to manage their grown children’s public image—or use them to navigate family dynamics. It's less about nurturing, and more about subtly using the child as an emotional tool in adult relationships.
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The following ChatGPT prompt is used in this blog post:
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