Dear Dr. Norquist:
I have been married for three years to a wonderful woman and we have a two year-old daughter. I came from a very close knit family and when I’m around my parents, I seem to be stuck in the parent/child relationship. My parents live out of town, but we see them about four times a year for about a week each time. Any time there is any friction at all between my wife and parents, like how we are raising our daughter, my inclination is to say nothing and hope everything works itself out. Naturally, my wife feels left out. I keep trying to avoid making anyone mad, but I’m making the person who means the world to me the most angry.
Enlivening Ourselves
By Dr. Sallie Norquist
Dear Dr. Norquist:
I have been married for three years to a wonderful woman and we have a two year-old daughter. I came from a very close knit family and when I’m around my parents, I seem to be stuck in the parent/child relationship. My parents live out of town, but we see them about four times a year for about a week each time. Any time there is any friction at all between my wife and parents, like how we are raising our daughter, my inclination is to say nothing and hope everything works itself out. Naturally, my wife feels left out. I keep trying to avoid making anyone mad, but I’m making the person who means the world to me the most angry. My wife says she’s sick of it and wants no part of me because she feels secondary to my parents. My parents will be visiting again next month I’m getting pretty nervous. Any thoughts you might have would be greatly appreciated.
Dr. Norquist responds:
One of the main tasks involved in committing to marriage and a family of your own, is that of making your marriage and new family your priority. This requires emotionally separating from your parents’ needs and expectations of you and working together with your partner to establish a new family life that is in alignment with the values and goals that you and your wife hold most dear. This is easiest to do when both partners have a lot of similarity in their background values, customs, and basic up-bringing experiences. It is also easier to do when both husband and wife have been able to establish their own firm sense of identity and values, and have been willing to differ from their parents ways, if necessary, in order to follow what feels most "right" to each of them. This means being willing to incur your parents’ anger or disapproval in order to be true to yourself and your new partnership. Remember that establishing your own life does not always require taking an angry, rejecting stance towards your parents, although that is often how it is acted out (especially during adolescence).
In an attempt to avoid anyone’s anger, you have been riding the fence, trying to please everyone, and abandoning your wife, yourself, and your new family in the process. For your marriage to be strong, you must make it your primary alliance. Talk with your wife about this well before your parents arrive, and decide how you can work to stay allied while your parents are visiting, especially when the friction arises. When your wife can trust that you will not emotionally abandon her for your parents, the friction between she and your parents is likely to diminish.
Dear Dr. Norquist:
I very much want to put my marriage back together and I wonder if you can help me. I am right now in the middle of the legal process of divorce. Even though I started it, now I regret it. I am still in love with my husband. He is the sweetest man I have ever known. For some reason that I can just not figure, I keep pushing him away. He told me when I left that I could came back whenever I wanted and that he would never stop loving me. I want to go back so badly, but now I am scared that he has changed his mind about what he said. I made a big mess of everything and have been acting like a spoiled child. During the last few months, I’ve started to realize so many things I have done wrong and I know there are aspects of me that I need to change, but I’m mostly not sure of how to put the pieces back together.
Dr. Norquist responds:
Putting the pieces back together may be possible, but it will not be fast or easy. If he is still open to a marriage with you, it will take awhile for him to trust that you will not pull away again. It’s easy to miss him when he’s gone. But will you be able to be close if he is again emotionally available to you? Fears of intimacy do not disappear overnight. I’d suggest that you contact him and let him know what you are feeling – however – you are probably not ready yet to jump right back into the same situation. It would be best to first seek professional help to assist you in being able and ready to allow emotional intimacy in your life.
(Dr. Sallie Norquist is a licensed clinical psychologist in private practice and is director of Chaitanya Counseling and Stress Management Center, a center for upliftment and enlivenment, in Hoboken.)
Dr. Norquist and the staff of Chaitanya invite you to write them at Chaitanya Counseling and Stress Management Center, 51 Newark St., Suite 202, Hoboken, NJ 07030 or www.chaitanya.com or by e-mail at drnorquist@chaitanya.com, or by fax at (201) 656-4700. Questions can address various topics, including relationships, life’s stresses, difficulties, mysteries and dilemmas, as well as questions related to managing stress or alternative ways of understanding and treating physical symptoms and health-related concerns. Practitioners of the following techniques are available to answer your questions: psychology, acupuncture, therapeutic and neuromuscular massage, yoga, meditation, spiritual & transpersonal psychology, Reiki, Cranial Sacral Therapy, and Alexander Technique Ó 2002 Chaitanya Counseling and Stress Management Center