Mr Cat, meet Mr Pidgeon

"Mr Cat, meet Mr Pidgeon...the rest I leave to you."

So goes the old saying, which indicates the strong order of things that seem to drive so much of the human condition.

Much like the laws of nature, so with humans, our likes, our reactions, our affiliations and our nemeses.

Or so I thought.

A few months ago I started seeing a new patient, an elderly Chinese man who was suffering from moderately advanced Parkinson's Disease. In the consultation was his daughter, a feisty, assertive but genuinely caring woman, doing all she could for her father, as well as the gentleman's wife, a woman in her eighties who could not speak any English, but seemed to be the decision maker in the unit.

This man was luckily very responsive to first line treatment, and at least for now many of his symptoms have come under control, resulting in a better quality of life for this man, and as is almost always the case, for his long suffering wife.

At our last appointment the wife expressed her delight that she could now go for long walks without worrying about her husband, who she previously believed needed 24 hr monitoring. In response, I jokingly mentioned that since they live close to me, that she could come and visit my mother-in-law.

Given all that they had in common, their age, their heritage, their language, the vicinity to each other's households, I thought this was a no brainer, and this would provide my mother-in-law an opportunity to mix with other people, and have broader interests and independent friends.

So naively, I arranged for us to meet one day over yum cha.

From where I was sitting, everything seemed to go smoothly. There was a lot of chatter, a lot of smiles. My mother-in-law and the elderly women seemed to talk the most, and why not after-all, they were so remarkably similar.

Well in the days and weeks after that lunch, I slowly noticed that there was no reference, no discussion about the new friend.

At first I barely noticed it, but I kept on asking my wife whether her mother saw her new friend today, in a way feeling chuffed that through my handy work, my mother-in-law had benefitted.

My wife would respond without asking her mother, with a bland "no".

After a few weeks of this, it occurred to me that this simply didn't sound right, so one night, while lying in bed with my wife, I asked her why her mother had not seen her new friend since the yum cha.

My wife said that the woman called 3 times, but her mother didn't want to see her.

I found this so strange. My mother-in-law has so few friends, so few peers of the same age, and she had such a burning desire for conversation, how could she not want to see her new friend?

After more prodding, my wife finally spilled the beans.

She said:

"My mother doesn't like her. She feels that she is below her."

My wife continued:

"My mother was a teacher back in China. This woman was just a commoner."

"My mother now has a son-in-law who is a doctor. This woman's daughter works in a factory. How could you think they would have anything in common. All you have done is embarrassed my mother."

Ditto! Maybe there are some things about the laws of nature that I have yet to fully understand!

Some cross-cultural problems in our marriage

I have been having some ongoing issues with my wife that unfortunately aren't going away.

It involves children.

Firstly, I have been hoping to having a second child, but it seems my wife is not receptive to this. She is of the view that another child will get in the way of her career. Although this may be true, I just don't think one child is optimal, and it is actually not fair on our first born either.

I keep telling my wife that there is no one-child policy in Australia, but she simply won't budge.

At the end of the day I have to respect her wishes, but what she told me the other day really upset me.

By way of explaining why she didn't want another child, my wife told me that she asked her mother whether she should have one, and then her sister in China whether she should have one. They both told her that it is too expensive to have another child, and for her to refuse my requests.

I became very upset by this revelation, because my wife should be discussing these matters with me, not her mother and her sister.

It seems that important decisions about my family are being made by an elderly lady whose view of the world is of a by-gone era, and by a woman who lives in China and was only allowed to have one child.

Well, what about my views? What about our child who has often asked for baby brother?

And regarding it being too expensive, well I am a medical professional for heavens sake. Money is simply not an issue.

What really bothers me is that she would not have told me this if I didn't push her. She simply decided, between herself, her mothera nd her sister, and I would have not even been informed of this very important decision had I not been persistent.

In her defense, she claims that Chinese women do not involve men in these decisions. I told her that I find that quite remarkable, that this is a human right, and that no father would willingly take no interest in the size of his family.

She keeps trying to explain things by saying that as a Westerner, I do not understand.

I think that's true, I do not understand. But that does not excuse her behaviour.

Attitude to Parents - part 1

Although this next post may not necessarily be culturally based, it does highlight a major difference between the way Ms B and I view our parents.

Ms B's mother is in great health and is a very intergral and active part of Ms B's life, and as a result mine and our son's. She is also quite elderly.

Although Ms B and her mother have on the surface a close relationship, Ms B has made it clear that as soon as her mother becomes a burden, through illness or age, she will send her back to China, either to her sister or to a nursing home.

This is a very pragmatic approach, and oddly, her mother is in complete agreement with this.

Now Ms B claims to have been raised in a very close family, and this is borne out of the ongoing contact she maintains with the rest of her family, but something about the pragmatism of these relationships doesn't sit well with me.

They tend to represent relationships of convenience, which in my world is the anti-thesis of the foundation for family. In any case, it has worked well for their whole family so far, and given that there has never been any family inheritence to fight over, the relationships have remained symbiotic and mutually beneficial.

Of course, this is the easy part. If or when her mother ages to a point where she herself needs ongoing help, the pressures on the whole famly will be compounded. Although I have some work colleagues who have easily transitioned their parent's into a nursing home facility, the emphasis on family within the Chinese culture, I expect, would make this a more difficult proposition.

Only time will tell, and although my mother-in-law is in great shape for her age, both mentaly and physically, she does have a worriesome tremor and increasing rigidity in her body, which is looking more and more like Parkinson's disease.

For those who know about this disease, it is progressive and insidious, and takes a terrible toll on the whole family in terms of the level of care that is required. For my mother-in-law's sake, I hope that this care, no matter how difficult, is provided by us, and not a nursing home. It just wouldn't be right.

The shower heat lamp

One difference between me and my wife is how we feel the cold.

She showers in luke warm water, leaves all windows open at all times and often sleeps with no blanket.

I am the exact opposite, so much so that when I shower the water is very hot and when I leave the shower I typically have the heat lamp on.

Well this heat lamp has caused a lot of ruckus in the house because it apparently wastes too much electricity, according to my mother-in-law.

My wife and her mother believe that such a device is an undulgence that no normal human should use, and just installing it was a household battle.

So anyway, last night I am in the shower and as I get out to dry myself I turn on the heat lamp. Immediately I hear a nagging voice outside the shower, complaining in Chinese. It was my motherin-law not happy that I turned on the heat lamp.

So what does she do?

She opens the shower door, slips her hand in and switches off the heat lamp. Yes its true, she did this!

Now this is my home, and I am happy for NaiNai to live with us as long as she wants, but it is MY home.

I paid for it and I am the major breadwinner, so one would expect that if I needed an indulgence like this, then it was my right, right?

Well, in practice this doesn't seem to be the case. Ms B and her mother have a different view and it seems that their view is that they call all the shots at home, whether I like it or not.

Sometimes I wonder who the real husband is in this relationship, me or my mother-in-law.

Married to the Mother-in-law

Well, my first genuine misunderstanding was that I didn't realise that getting married meant having the mother-in-law immediately move in with us.

She is an 86 year old lady but in quite good shape for her age, but as soon as we got married she flew out from China and into our home. She has not left since.

The woman is a widow and I know that its the right thing to do, but I simply was not expecting it.

My mother-in-law doesn't speak a word of English but she does all our cooking, and this has freed me and the wife to focus on our careers. Its not a bad thing, but it has some disadvantages.

For instance, the primary language in my own home is Mandarin, and given the language barrier, it means that I am left out of most conversations.