I was raised in a very functional, loud, hard-working, faithful LDS family in Oregon. My husband was raised in a boarding school in Mexico, and saw his mom twice a year during school breaks beginning when he was 8 years old. His father was never in the picture. I remember thinking when we were engaged, This is so great! He doesn't really have parents, and anyway they're in Mexico! I don't ever have to deal with in-laws!! Unbeknownst to me, at the same time he was thinking, Finally! A family! He started calling my parents mom and dad before we even got married, and assimilated really well into our family dynamic. Now fast forward a couple of years...
Once we'd been married for a little while, we began to see my parents differently. He constantly wanted to be with my family - every Sunday for dinner and games, vacations, temple nights, holidays, Tuesdays, you name it. I really wanted to separate from them, because enough was enough! Surprisingly, this hurt his feelings. He loved having a family to have fun with, but was spending a little too much time with them and not enough time with me, as a couple. I began to pull away from all of them, my husband included. Now fast forward a couple of years...
Through a series of life experiences, my husband began to drift away from me. We had a couple of little kids by then, and the roles with my parents began to shift. I was spending more time with my family because their help, support, and advice was very comforting to me as a new mom. But he saw it differently - the parents that were once just fun to hang out with were now interjecting their opinions on us about our jobs, life goals and decisions, parenting and discipline, etc. I relished in the knowledge they were imparting on us, but he was getting offended. I started listening to my parents more than I listened to him, and it began to erode our communication and relationship.
After reading about in-law relationships (even though they are my own parents), I now realize that there were some elements of triangulation with my parents during these different phases of our early marriage - even though we were each triangulated in different ways and at different times. I know that our situation is kind of unique, because we are only dealing with one set of parents - mine. However, there were a lot of lessons to be learned. I spent a lot of time during this period of our marriage trying to encourage my husband to strengthen his relationship with his own mom. Even though she was far away, I "gently" reminded him to call her, Skype her, and send her emails or letters on her birthday. The language barrier prevented me from establishing any real relationship with her, but I tried to at least say hello and send her pictures of the kids to keep in touch. With my parents, it soon became clear that we had to set some boundaries. It didn't help that we lived in the same ward as them, so our contact was constant! We didn't have any real part of our lives that was just ours. So how do we set boundaries, when it seems like there is no place to start? Honestly, it was really difficult. We both had developed the instinct to run to my parents whenever something was hard. This inability to make decisions on our own was the opposite of the scriptural counsel to cleave unto each other (Genesis 2:24).
Over the past few years, we have really had to make a constant, hard, sometimes painful and awkward effort to define our own space in our relationship with my family. I have learned to respect my husband's innocent need for the love of a family. He has truly needed the love and support of my parents, especially my dad, as he has become a father and tries to be a good dad. He needs to be their son. I needed to learn to stand on my own two feet and rely less on their advice and more on my own instincts and the counsel of my husband. Sometimes I wish that I had more of a mother-in-law figure in my life, at least so we could both roll our eyes at the weird things my husband does. What I have really learned and come to appreciate is that family, no matter what form it comes in, fulfills a need in each of us. We just had to spend a little more time nurturing our own growing family in order to strengthen our own eternal covenants and bonds.
We now have a much healthier relationship with my parents. We don't live in the same ward anymore, and we don't need their stamp of approval on every decision we make. My own relationship with my husband is much better, too, because we now have boundaries that we don't cross. Having a great relationship with the in-laws is important, but the marriage relationship has to be the first priority. I wish we had figured out that balance a lot sooner!
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