Back in my dating days -- this is easily 15 - 20 years ago (gosh...
) -- Mainland Chinese girls had the unspoken cultural custom of girls getting married in their 20's. Typically, the parents would start laying on the pressure after the girl turns 25 -- gently at first, and progressively getting worse as the girl gets closer to 30. In my time, I've dated / known a few Mainland Chinese girls where even though they mostly grew up here since high school / post secondary, they still showed varying degrees of this sensitivity to parental pressure to get married. In fact, I knew at least one girl where she didn't really love her husband, but she married him anyway just so that her parents would find peace / take comfort in knowing that she is now married.
My MIL, who was from Hong Kong, actually tried to lay the pressure on me to propose to my then-gf as well. But I mostly either just ignored her, or joked about it because I never believed she should have any say or influence on me and my then-gf's relationship, or our timeline on things.
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I am a scientific and logical person but the way she pleaded with me so emotionally and the fact that I am easily swayed by other people seeded doubts in my mind if this could possibly be true. I became extremely stressed
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Your incident here reminded me of the time when le wifey first gave birth to our newborn, and was going through a really tough round of baby blues / breast feeding difficulties / sleep deprivation and general postpartum stress. At the time, the MIL was chiming in a lot, usually in some form of unsolicited advice and typical Cantonese criticism. I had to step in to cut her off because what she was doing was adding even more stress for le wifey. In haha13's case, I would also encourage you to stick to your guns and set your boundaries with your parents if they are going to be irrational about anything.