Creating a Marital Identity. Creating a Family.

In this post, I want to be candid with you about why I've been writing here. Yes, it has been partly for a school assignment. I'll be honest that indeed I'm out to get a grade. But more importantly, this has been a space for me to assimilate and process information I am taking in and learning about marriage and family life. I have been grateful for the instruction to do so, as I haven't formally journaled (in the handwritten form) for several years.
It's been a year and a half since my husband and I married. It is a remarriage for me, and a first for him. The number of overwhelming, life altering experiences in our short marriage has been astounding for me. My head is still reeling from all of the change and transition.

• Blending our family in our small, fixer upper home 
• Kitchen, bathroom, and living area renovations
• My (step) father dying of cancer (being with him in the hospital and planning his out-of-state funeral)
• 3 pregnancy losses and emergency ectopic surgery. 
• Our son's diagnosis of juvenile rheumatoid arthritis
• 2 demanding church callings
• Starting a new business
• Going back to school (and final internship in April!)

And most recently, (this week) my best friend was diagnosed with breast cancer. 

These are the bigger things. But the little things add up too. Things like, volunteering weekly in our son's classroom. Getting our boys in dance, sports and music lessons. Planning and carrying out family outings. Ministering to the women in my church congregation and all the family meal planning and preparation. Honestly, just listing this all out is simultaneously validating and overwhelming. I know my husband and I can't survive in this marriage, without the tools we've sought out, and are continuing to learn. That might sound depressing, or hopeful, depending on how you look at it, but I know it is true. We live in a different day and age than our parents' and grandparents' generations. The demands on families is increasing and we MUST be diligent in applying correct gospel principles and evidence based practices in our relationships, if we want to thrive in our families. For me, simply surviving is not an option. Who wants to survive? That sounds terrible to me, to just exist, and to barely eek by. I have witnessed and experienced for myself that family life can be beautiful and fulfilling WHILE we are in the trenches. WHILE we are experiencing challenges and trials. In fact, those experiences can pressure us to draw closer and bond more deeply with our partners, and our families. 

This week, I read documents talking about the importance of creating healthy ties not only in a marriage, but with in laws, and extended families. I can testify of this importance. Were it not for the support of our families during all of the above trials, things would have been exponentially overwhelming. Much of the support was not in person. It was through prayers and fasting. It was through phone calls and texts. We need people to help us find the light at the end of the tunnel sometimes.

Being close with our extended family, is different from being enmeshed, and this difference was clearly taught in the book Till Debt Do Us Part, by James M. Harper and Suzanne Frost Olsen.  

"Closeness, on the other hand, is different from enmeshment. Parents who are secure in their relationships with their children understand that married children can be emotionally close without always having to be present. These children, in turn, have a sense of their parents' own security so they don't have to always be near them to take care of them emotionally." 

"Parents who try to create a climate of safety in which children can express their feelings about how involved they want to be will have the greatest potential for positive influence in their children's and grandchildren's lives. When married children are treated with respect and love in this matter, they are more likely to want to spend more time with parents (page 330) and extended family. Demands, expectations, manipulations, ultimatums, threats, and emotional blackmailing tend to strain or destroy relationships."

I have seen that either extreme (shutting family out completely or enmeshment) are both damaging and are not helpful in sustaining marriage and family relationships.