Asking Eric: Husband has a rocky past with his family

Dear Eric: My husband has a rocky past with his family. He is close with one sister and doesn’t enjoy being with the other (“Lisa”), especially since she started dating (now married) a guy that is very awkward and makes our family get-togethers much less fun.

Additionally, their mother “Betsy” has been cut out of our lives, but not Lisa’s. Betsy was physically and emotionally abusive to my husband’s family growing up.

When we had our first child 10 months ago, my husband asked his dad to wait to tell Lisa until we were out of the hospital, in case Betsy tried to come to the hospital (we all live in the same city). When Lisa found out five days or so after the birth, she was furious and cut the whole family off.

Lisa has recently made amends with other parts of the family, but we have not seen her. My husband doesn’t care about connecting with her, partly because they aren’t close and partly because he doesn’t like her new significant other. I haven’t reached out because I’m not that close with her either and the new baby keeps me busy. I don’t have anything against her, and I want her to be in my son’s life, but I fear I’ve waited too long and don’t know how to mend the relationship. I don’t like being at odds with someone, especially family, albeit not my blood family. My thought was to text her and apologize and start that way. What do you think?

– Want to Mend Fences

Dear Fences: You’re stuck in a tricky position because you’re not responsible for any of the hurt in this situation (and it seems like there’s a lot of hurt to go around). Nevertheless, it’s obviously impacting you. Because this is your husband’s family and the estrangement from Lisa is connected to the estrangement from Betsy, it’ll be best to follow his lead here. There’s harm in the past that he’s, rightfully, put an internal barrier around.

There are also some slightly confusing complications in the present, namely the aversion to Lisa’s new husband. I can see not wanting to spend a lot of time around a person one finds awkward but letting that aversion snowball into a family fracture seems extreme to me. I’m left with the question of whether this awkwardness has been understated in the letter (and is therefore more of a concern) or if it seems like more of an issue because of your husband’s already complicated history with Lisa.

Whatever the truth of the situation is, he and Lisa have some things to work out. You can talk with him about your desire to bridge the gap and ask him how you can best support him, but you’ve got to let him make the decision. There are old wounds here, so you’ll want to exercise care around them.

Dear Eric: This is regarding “Worried Grandmother”, who was trying to help her 17-year-old grandson navigate his parents’ contentious divorce. My parents got divorced when I was in third grade. Our parents never asked us kids to take sides.

It wasn’t until I was in college that I heard the term “broken home” and asked the teacher what that meant and he said “divorce”.

As it turned out dad was a good dad just not a good husband. He had a drinking problem. My dad would bring Christmas gifts and he and my mom would wrap them together. He died from a brain tumor at age 43 when I was 14.

It makes me feel sad when parents cannot behave better. Life is too short. Just wanted you to know that some parents get it right.

I have been stepmom to my husband’s only daughter since she was 5. This Valentine’s Day she sent a card that said “For My Parents on Valentine’s Day “so I know I did it right, too.

– Unbroken Home

Dear Unbroken: Thanks for sharing. Divorce can be so hard for parents and kids. Sometimes we’re not able to keep our worst instincts at bay. But it’s wonderful when the greater good of a family unit wins out, even as that family is changing shape.