in-law trouble--possible trigger

[SAR]

My boyfriend and I do well as a team around his parents. When he's there, most of my anger at them gets channeled into concern for my boyfriend, and when I'm there, he does a better job of maintaining his boundaries with them (not getting walked over, not having to answer 800 personal questions) and not getting so upset about all the rest of his family's personal problems (which they have always expected him to "fix" either by getting in spectacular trouble and distracting them, or more recently by rescuing his siblings from their bad choices). They are his family, and I respect that, and I am friendly to them and I let him make the decisions about how and when he sees them.

But because my boyfriend and I have different schedules sometimes, and because his family is close by, and because my children love their grandparents, lots of times it's just them with one of us and the kids. He comes home from seeing them a wreck every time, whether it's church, dinner at their place, or accidentally at the gas station. And I have an increasingly hard time being civil and making conversation when he's not there (when he is, they mainly talk to him and just talk to me about my work and the kids).

***Possible Trigger***

WHAT KIND of superhuman patience does it take to make small talk about how my day has been with this woman, when not 24 hours before, I was holding her grown son in my arms, him sobbing on my shoulder, too ashamed to look me in the eye, asking me why NO ONE CARED ENOUGH TO STOP IT? What am I supposed to SAY? "Oh, well, your son is convinced that he never earned the right to have his parents keep him safe and intervene on his behalf and possibly pay attention to the self destructive behaviors of a ten year old, so I haven't been getting much sleep, but everything else IS JUST FINE!?!?"

It is the truth, and it is devastating him. The more I learn about his childhood acting-out the angrier it makes me. He spent years and years doing things on purpose trying to get caught, trying to make someone notice. You would have to have lost at least 3 out of 5 senses not to notice what this kid was doing. They noticed, for sure, and decided not to deal with it. My boyfriend knows this and believes that it's because he never did anything to deserve the help, he was never a good son, everyone's been able to tell what a terrible person he was from Day One and the fact that they didn't respond to either the signs of abuse or the acting out is because he was already a lost cause.

Around my boyfriend I can be sad with him about it, and supportive and reassuring, and I can keep telling him that he deserves my love, he's always deserved love, he is a good man, a good father, etc., but when I'm alone it's devastating to me too, and when I'm alone with those terrible parents of his, it's all I can do not to blow up in their faces. (They, of course, don't "know" about the abuse or any of the non-school related acting out, and give themselves lots of credit for all of his successes even though they all happened after he moved out. And of course I respect this and would never actually break his confidence. But last time I checked you didn't have to break anyone's confidence to break someone's knees)

Avoiding them when they are so close (and F-ING PERSISTENT) is difficult, and actually getting them out of our life in any significant way right now is not an option for him, and probably won't be until he can start blaming them and not himself for their crappy parenting.

How do you guys do this--deal with the destructive people in your partner's life, keep it away from the kids, help him cope with the aftermath of spending time with them? ANY help at all would be appreciated because I'm going to have to start screening my calls to a level that can only be considered obvious and rude.

Thanks all
SAR

 

[theo]

sar,
i really don't have any words of help. i try to place myself in that situation, hypothetically of course, to try to determine what might work. in the past, i have had to bite my lip to avoid biting their heads off. what finally worked for me, before i cut off all contact with the past, except for my sister and her kids, was to simply respond with curt, noncommittal phrases to any shallow dialogue they would instigate. i made myself a promise that i would never, ever "play the game" again of ignoring the past or pretending that nothing ever happened. i would not lie to myself, and i would not dishonor lady theo by pretending everything was just fine. i would not seek out a fight, i would excuse myself from the premises or immediate area of the moron in question, but if pressed, i would also succinctly tell them exactly what i think of them. what works for me is that i ignored them until pressed for some inane question. if it was a personal question i would give the noncommittal grunt, or its equivalent. not sure if this is making sense. the bottom line is being true to yourself, honoring his integrity, and the emotional safety of your children. i personally managed this by ignoring detestable morons (my blood and in-laws), superficial politeness in noncommittal responses, and wishing they would really press me for what i really thought of them. the last never happened, much to my regret . honesty, integrity, and safety...all else is details you need to discern. one last thing i decided to do. i made it perfectly clear that if at any point things got out of hand for myself, lady theo, or another innocent, the kid gloves came off...period. if either lady theo or myself hits that point where it is too much before it blows out of control we signal the other and just leave, no questions, no discussion. if i see she is in danger emotionally, i step in, and the same for me if she sees what i can't. you need to honor his wishes and his point of recovery (not being able to face his parents), but if it is taken for granted that you are supposed to pay lip service to a lie then that is detrimental to yourself, your kids, and him, and no one has the right to ask such a burden of you. if a person lies by action, or inaction when time is appropriate, the lesson is still the same, as is the result. this is why i decided to never lie again about things being hunky dory. i can speak the truth, or act out the truth i carry without going for the knees, as you opined earlier (i smiled at that one ). it has to be your call, sar, along with straight up talk with him. i know you have discussed this straight up with him, but the point is that it is wrong to expect you to play the game of lies. find the balance that will work for you both. take care, sar.

 

[PAS]

Yah this is a hard one particularly as I'm the type to wear all my emotions on my sleeve.

It sounds like you are dealing with two problems here. 1 that you are still processing what happened in the past and 2. you need some kind of a strategy or some guidliens on how to handle these people in the present.

As far as the past, I guess my way of looking at what happened to my partner is that I have to hang on to the belief that my partner's parents did NOT neglect him and they did not do the things that they did out of malicious intent. I know it may seem incredibly hard to believe, but I truly do believe that his parents really just didnt have the capacity, education, knowledge, experience or awareness to do anything diffent than they have done with him. They have massive limitations, serious emotional baggage of their own. I *have* to hold on the the notion that they did the best they could but for whatever personal limitaitons, emotional scars, inability to be compassionate due to pain of their own, lack of education, whatever, they just didnt know how to do any better, how to figure out what their son was doing (acting out, drinking, smoking, dropping out of high school) was an cry of pain, they just didnt have the CAPACITY to know what was really the problem behind all of it. And they didnt have the capacity to stop his molestation either (it was by someone outside the family). HOw the hell *could* they have known? If I *even* start to think that they had any inkling that they were doing what they did out of malicious intent, or they really did know what was going on and did not stop it, I start to get unbelievably blind with anger as well. I have been around that block a few times believe me!

Sad to say but there are a whole lot of people out there with pretty poor parenting skills, who have been neglected and abused themselves and just continue to pass it on. Todays abuse and addictions and all of that shit is the result of long long, unholy inheritances that start well before our generation came along, and it can take many generations to finally stop it.

For your in laws- for them to be "puffing themselves up" dont be fooled by that - my parents do that and it is a thinly veiled attempt to cover up the inadequacy I truly feel that they have about what went on in their families. I have long learned that the bigger the bragger, the more insecure the person. Its all a big smoke screen. I would bet ALL my money that deep down inside they DID know what happened and they DID feel powerless to stop it and they have a whole shitload of guilt they are managing through a whole lot of ugly and ineffective ways. And they just cant admit it, so they are just building one lie on top of another, they just cant face the truth. I feel a lot of pity for people like that that they just dont have the spine to stand up and admit what is wrong and do the right thing - that they have to be so trapped in such lies because they dont have the backbone for the truth.

Now for the second issue: On the practical side of dealing with these people TODAY, you may wish to have some kind of a "strategy" each time you see his parents.

For us, we are starting to learn how to protect each other when it comes to dealing with BOTH sets of our parents - we help each other set up boundaries of acceptable parental behaviour that we will tolerate/not tolerate, we start to think about what might happen, we take time out to check in with ourselves about what is going on during the visit, and we discuss our feelings afterwards. We also make "escape plans" before we spend any time with them - we establish a limit to their behaviour and make a pledge to each other that if they go over that line and things get too ugly that we will agree to just walk out the door. And we will support each other for that decision even if our parents get ugly and emotional and try to lay guilt trips on us after.

Remember, nobody is FORCING either of you to see these people. And your comment about screening your calls may not be such a bad idea. Maybe they need a smack upside the head with a dose of reality.

Your first priority is to YOUR family, not to them. Always remember you DONT have to see them. And if you choose to be with them you dont have to put up with any of their shit. They can TRY a lot of shit but you call the shots.

I for one will say that its easier said than done as its DAMN scary to start to stand up for yourself after a lifetime of manipulation and control. Although we almost feel like puking each time we do it.. both my fiance and I know we HAVE to do it if we want to start feeling like we are healing, growing, and moving forward. It is a rewarding and empowering experience - after all the scary feelings and second-guessing subside that is!

I found a lot of support for learning how to change ugly family dynamics through a book - "the dance of anger" by Harriet Goldhor Lerner -its all about people who start to assert new boundaries (particularly women) in messy, dysfunctional family systems, and the type of behaviour that can result. Chances are pretty good that if you do start standing up, making changes, starting to screen them out, they WILL start to act all controlly and weird and wild and wooly and do a lot of things to try and rope you back into the way things were.

I *really* urge you to read this book before you start to make any changes in your family dynamics. It has done wonders for me and my own family dynamic - even long before my fiance came along. It is important to be armed with objective information as you will need to understand objectively what is happening in order to stay the course and not be sucked back in through emotions (very powerful) into a situation that was not healthy.

P

 

[SAR]

theo, PAS, thank you... PAS I am going to read that book I think, it's one of those that he'd probably pick up if I bought it for myself (though I haven't tried that one yet)... I think there is a confusion between past and present, and I hadn't thought about it before. I think what it is, the past keeps me angry enough that I'm always sort of vigilant and on edge around them (and although I want this to be irrational, fixable behavior, I think it might just be good common sense), and every damn time, dealing with them in the present pushes me to the limit (since I'm already so close).

I am angry at them. I do believe they were capable of doing much more than they did. I also believe they're immature, have their own pain, etc., but I don't believe that would have kept them from doing more if they'd wanted to enough. I think the way people (not you, PAS, but the people you're kind enough to let off the hook) use "could" as a relative term is sickening. And, to the extent that it's at all conscious, pretty malicious as well. Maybe one day HE will be able to forgive him for what they've done to him. For me, I've forgiven HIM for the consequences of their bad choices, and the rest of it, I keep to myself.

I do sort of feel the way you described, theo, that I'm playing a dishonesty game by NOT saying anything--not about the past, but about the present. We don't have the problem of them trying to bring up the past or get him to talk about anything now--it's the way they continue to treat him that makes me so angry about all of it, and the past gets thrown into my anger, because I know that it's part of it for him. If that makes any sense.

My boyfriend and I talked about it a little bit today-- I was thinking along the lines of damage control, or ground rules, but I think he is ready to cut them off totally for a while, until he can sort out how he feels about them and their part in his abuse--I was sort of surprised to hear him say this since they are very big on FAMILY being so important, the most reliable, the most supportive, etc--all b.s. of course... anyway he told me he wants some time to think about it on his own so we've set a time for next week and he can tell me what he's decided to do.

Guess I'll go turn on my answering machine.

SAR