Creating Healthy Ties with In-Laws and Extended Families

I’m finding that I have a lot to say about this weeks study on creating Healthy Ties with In-Laws.  My husband and I have been married for 12 years, and the things I would say about this topic have grown and evolved over the years.  Not to say that I know more now than I did ten years ago, but experience has given me a very different view over the years.

My husband and I were both born and raised in the city that we currently live now, and we both have a very involved extended family.  We’ve never moved away except for when my husband left for his mission.  We dated for two years before we married, so we knew each other and our families very well.  My husband is the oldest in his family, and he was the first to get married as well.  Once we got engaged things changed in some ways with his family, and by the time we married we got the full taste of sharing every holiday, going to every birthday party, celebration, and Sunday dinner.  To say is was exhausting is an understatement, and to say it was hard is laughable!  We choose as a couple to create firm boundaries as far as it goes with both sets of In-Laws.  We were united in this but it did not make the situation easier.

Over the years siblings on both sides have gotten married and other members have joined the family.  Children came and once again changed and dynamics throughout the family.  I have witnessed relationship struggles due to many things that are mentioned by James and Harper in their chapter about Healthy Ties.  One thing that was mentioned that I completely agree with is, “Daughters-in-law who use husbands as mediators with mothers-in-law often make their own marriage and their relationship with the mother-in-law worse”.  Over the twelve years of marriage, I can attest to this most!  I spent many years saying, “it’s your family, you deal with them” but in reality I expected him to deal with them exactly the way I wanted him to, not the way he wanted or needed to.  I would tell him what I wanted done, and I’d ask detailed questions about how it went and I’d say what I thought of the situation (that I choose not to be “involved” in).  My poor husband, he tried to make everyone happy, but it just simply wasn’t happening, because he was the only one trying, everyone was complaining and blaming the other.

I’m not sure what exactly happened but the last few years have changed for me.  I now place a greater importance on the fact that my husband loves his family, they will always be his family, and I needed to show my love to him by putting an effort into my relationship with his family.  Having children has helped this experience with my In-Laws as well, but the biggest thing that has helped both my marriage and my relationship with my In-Laws is not pushing my husband in the middle of us all.  It is far better to be next to him in as many things that we can.  It gives us strength, gains unity, and shows each other respect with in our marriage.