Amidst countless mother-in-law horror stories, one woman's story stands as a testament to the possibility of a beautiful new family.
A video posted to TikTok by Gurpreet (@itsgups) has gone viral after she shared the moment her mother-in-law surprised her with a culturally meaningful gift on her wedding day. Kaur, 29, spoke to Newsweek about how she felt receiving the surprise gesture, and how she feels about life with her new mother-in-law.
In the video, Kaur shared a clip of the moment her mother-in-law gifted her gold jewelry. "I heard Indian brides are gifted gold from their moms on their wedding day," Kaur's mother-in-law said to her.
Kaur told Newsweek that gold holds cultural significance for South Asians—especially between women. As a Punjabi Sikh, Kaur grew up being gifted gold for big milestones. Her birth, along with significant birthdays, saw her receiving a gold Sikh bangle and other jewelry. The gold represents a form of wearable savings, Kaur said.
But even beyond that, the relationship in which gold is given is especially meaningful.
"The tradition of a mother giving her daughter gold on her wedding day is seen as an unspoken act of feminism," Kaur said. "Gold is financial security, which provided daughters with financial independence and could be used in an emergency."
Kaur said she never anticipated a gift this meaningful and traditional from her White British mother-in-law—but she and her husband had been working hard to make their wedding culturally representative of both their backgrounds.
"My husband and I worked very hard at making our wedding a fusion celebrating both of our cultures, so we ended up with a three-day wedding with lots of Punjabi pre-wedding celebrations leading up to our wedding day," she said.
Despite the volume of festivities, Kaur said everyone around her made it remarkably easy to be a calm bride. It didn't last that long, though.
"All calm and collectedness went out the window when on my wedding morning," she said. "My mother-in-law came into the bridal suite to give me what I thought was a morning hug and boost, but she presented two black boxes to me whilst trying to hold back tears...I instantly burst into tears.
"I only managed to open one box and put on the most beautiful, engraved gold bangle before I fully broke down in tears."
Kaur said her mind was racing imagining the research her mother-in-law must have done beforehand to present her with this gift. She said it proved a powerful counterargument to the idea that a mother-in-law from a different background wouldn't "understand your culture."
"I was imagining the generations of women that came before me sharing the same precious moment," she said. "It all hit me even harder as the unspoken message to me became clear: she thought of me as her own daughter."
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