Toxic in-laws
I used to think that family is sacred and blood thicker than water. That is until you start to drown in it. We have family everywhere and my daughter has cousins, second cousins and more aunts and uncles than she has fingers. But as much as I love them, I also need my space away from them. Even among my siblings, the closest family members, we have very different ideas about money, religion, politics and lifestyles. I often have difficulty conversing with them and as the family expands through marriage, conversations can sometimes be contrived as history and familiarity simply isn’t there. And when once fast families becomes fractured ones due to divorce, the arrangement can be even more awkward and potentially resentful especially if you are forced to deal with each other because of children. Although I don’t have huge grievances with my own in-laws, their passive interference with the way my ex-wife and I raise our daughter adds to unnecessary angst.
Up until the global pandemic, my in-laws used to spend alternating weeks at my ex’s house to assist in childcare and cooking. As my daughter grew older, her reliance on grandparent supervision waned. They rarely took her outside to play. They were stern when my daughter asked for help with math homework. Eventually, direct care dwindled. Most of the time, the grandparents simply parked themselves in front of the TV. Once my daughter went to her room to practice her cello and was told to stop as grandpa couldn’t hear the TV. She’s stopped bringing her cello to mom’s house. So rather than the grandparents helping out and spending more time to enrich their grandchild’s life, their stopovers seemingly became less about the granddaughter.
While it’s one thing to undermine the emotional stability of their daughter’s former husband who was once good enough to marry her, it’s another to launch a character assassination on the father of their granddaughter. These shrouded undercurrents, however benign, off-hand and sarcastic they might be are inappropriate especially for a 10 year-old to hear. The only way to neutralize the tartness is to pour on the sugar.
The old adage when a boy marries a girl, he marries her family as well has long-live implications. With increased time at my ex-wife’s house, the grandparents have naturally gained more insight into the lives of their daughter, granddaughter and me, the outsider ex-husband. This opportunity simply allowed for greater scrutiny and judgment of every decision made. It would be naïve of me to think that my parenting would not be questioned and the uncooperative co-parenting with my ex-wife not be interfered. Since nobody wants to be the bad guy in their own narrative, I am the natural excuse for all of my ex-wife’s unhappiness and the target for all her anger. My in-laws simply amplified this and unquestioningly allied with her regardless of whether it was good for the granddaughter or not. Unfortunately, my daughter’s extra-curricular became a battleground. In the 5 years since my daughter first picked up her cello, or the 7 years since my daughter has been swimming (now competitively), the in-laws have attended a grand total of one music recital. It is really unfortunate that my in-law’s capacity to embrace their granddaughter’s life interest is confined by their blind loyalty to their daughter’s derision for the ex-husband. As grandparents, the invitation is to make anew old decisions, not to staunchly repeat emotional ones by picking sides.
Probably the most damaging of toxic behavior by my in-laws is that of gaslighting. This came in the form of insinuation and whispers of suggestions. Even a failure to correct a falsehood can be damaging gossip. I get the fact that it is unfashionable to side with the ex-husband, but it stopped being about me years ago. And while it’s one thing to undermine the emotional stability of their daughter’s former husband who was once good enough to marry her, it’s another to launch a character assassination on the father of their granddaughter. I am not incompetent because I take my car to the mechanic. I am not a town drunk because I go out with my social father drinking club. And I am not in financial ruin because I owe the bank money and make mortgage payments. I was even once called a thief for wearing the same t-shirt that the grandfather also had. These shrouded undercurrents, however benign, off-hand and sarcastic they might be are inappropriate especially for a 10 year-old to hear.
Both my grandmothers died when I was very young and I have never known either grandfather. I wish I had a chance to know them better. Even my own father died before my daughter was born and notwithstanding the relationship I had with him, I wish they had met. Our relationships are the tapestry of our existence in the brief time we have. Kids don’t want things; they just want to be loved. We all do. If we’re very lucky, we’ll all become great parents, but only some of us are lucky enough to be grandparents not simply because we have lived a great number of years, but we have become wiser and recognize the opportunity to remake and relive what is truly important. And as a man, I will not undo the contempt my ex-wife has for me or the disapproval my in-laws hold. But as a father, the only way to neutralize this tartness is to pour on the sugar.
