Week 12: Transitions in Marriage: In-Law Relations

Creating and maintaining meaningful relationships with your in-laws can be critical to the success of your marriage. The first thing that needs to happen is for the newly married couple to leave their parents and cleave unto each other. When a couple marries they have now created a new family unit that needs to be nourished. Part of that includes the newly married couple creating a marital identity.  The first step is to separate themselves from the family they grew up with and share everything about themselves with each other. A new couple needs time to adjust to their new life without the intervention of their parents. Parent’s can stay close to their children but shouldn’t intervene in their child’s new phase of life. Parents should be encouraging their child to discuss the problems and concerns with their spouse and not them.

               

Next a new couple needs to realize that there will be differences and accept that. Yes, marrying into a family that is different from yours or has different values can be challenging. Try to exercise patience, demonstrate humor. Overlook small irritations, and look for the positive. One positive look can be that the children-in-law will be bringing new perspectives into the family, and they could learn from the differences. And one important thing to remember is that any new spouse needs to be included in the extended family. They need to feel accepted and not like an outcast. No one likes feeling that way in his or her family. This can be a major cause of marital conflict at the beginning of a marriage. During this new stage of being a newly wed couple the parent also need to realize that they also need to make adjustments that may not always be comfortable. Try to be inclusive and get to know your in-laws or children-in-laws better, make an active effort to bring them into your family.

Week 11: Transitions in Marriage: Power Realtions and Children

The family is a unit that has to work together. The family isn’t just the parents and then the children. They have to rely on each other and allow each other to help, lift, and nurture. In the article “Who is the Boss? Power Relationships in Families” by Richard B. Miller he discusses multiple functions of a good functioning family. One, parent’s are the leaders. Two, parent’s must be united in their leadership. Three, the parent-child hierarchy dissolves when children becomes adults. And four, the marital relationship should be a partnership: including that husbands and wives are equal, husbands and wives have different responsibilities, but they still function as equals, a husband’s role as patriarch gives him the responsibility to serve his wife and family, husbands and wives work together as partners.

Parent’s have to responsibility to teach their children and their children should respect them as their parents. But a couple can not be successful parent’s if they are not unified themselves. In an address by Henry B. Eyring of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, he says “…at creation of man and woman, unity for them in marriage was not given as hope, it was a command! … Our Heavenly Father wants our hearts it be knit together. That union in love is not simply an ideal, it is a necessity”. If you can not work together on normal every day activities then it will be impossible for you to work together on big life changing decisions. Unity in a marriage is vital to it being maintained and strengthened over time. And as Richard B. Miller says “…issues about power is predictive of marital problems” but also that “ happy relationships are most likely to occur in marriages where the couple shares power and has a true partnership”.