Because the struggle she described hasn’t gone away, this conversation, from a 2007 episode of Koffee With Karan, still resonates with many parents today.
She shared that Amitabh Bachchan had once told her he didn’t want a wife who worked fixed office hours. When Karan Johar once asked Jaya Bachchan why she walked away from acting at the peak of her career, her answer was far from simple. As his own career grew busier, Jaya felt someone needed to be around for their children full-time. She even remembered a moment when her daughter Shweta asked her not to leave for a shoot and to let her father go instead, a memory she described as painful. It has simply taken new forms.
A stay-at-home parent can genuinely love their children and still miss parts of the life they had before, and that doesn’t make their love any less real, according to psychotherapist and relationship coach Delnna Rrajesh. Modern parents, no matter what choice they make, often end up carrying some form of guilt. Working mothers can feel torn between being present at home and being present at work. Even parents who choose to stay home aren’t spared.
Fathers today often want to be hands-on parents while still being expected to provide financially.
There’s a big difference between saying “I gave this up because of you” and saying “I made the best decision I could at that time, according to Delnna. The first puts the emotional weight on the child. The second keeps the responsibility with the adult, where it belongs. Every family will go through phases where one person sacrifices more, whether it’s sleep, career growth or personal time. That isn’t unhealthy on its own. What becomes harmful is when that sacrifice is quietly kept as a debt to be repaid later. Delnna points out that children absorb far more from watching their parents than from any lecture. A daughter who sees her mother chase her own goals learns something valuable about self-worth. A son who watches his father take on cooking and caregiving learns a broader idea of what it means to be a man.