Help! My In Laws are Ruling My Marriage // Hump Day Q&A

Foreign. You know what time it is, sweetie?

It's hump day. Q and A time.

Hump day.

Q and A. Hump day Q and A.

Welcome to the Naked Marriage Podcast. Hump day Q and A. We love answering your questions. So every Wednesday we're dropping a special podcast episode focused on one of your questions. You can submit your own marriage related question online@nakedmarriagepodcast.com or by sending us a message on Instagram aveandashleywillis. We've got a great question today, so let's dive in.

All right. It says, hi, Dave and Ashley. First off, thank you so much for what you guys do. I love listening to you guys and so does my husband. Role models like y' all are. I love the y'.

All.

Thank you for saying that. It's so great. Role models like y' all are so needed in today's world where people seem to think marriage is easily disposable. My question is regarding toxic in laws. My husband and I have had issues with his sister and his parents since about a month after we started dating. His sister and I were friends before we met, but she turned into a completely different person once we got serious. Even though she said she wanted us to date, I soon discovered that she was a pathological liar. She has been insanely mean to me on multiple occasions, and she has completely ruined my relationship with his parents. After almost 10 years, my husband and I have finally decided it's best to have no contact with her unless absolutely necessary. I also believe she is a narcissist. His parents have been extremely harsh and do not understand boundaries at all. But we're getting to the point where we can tolerate. We can tolerate each other. My question is, how do I keep this from eventually ruining my marriage? Essentially, his sister blames me for everything and so do his parents. To them, I pretty much run their family. I keep picturing that someday something bad will happen, like a funeral, and my husband will resent me for the boundaries we've set. But I cannot be mistreated for the rest of my life just because they're family. Wow, that's heavy.

Yeah, great question.

And I can see, you know, in her heart she wants to have a good marriage. She really does wanna have a good relationship with her in laws and with her sister in law. But, you know, like we've said before, we have a whole podcast on setting boundaries, actually probably several, and even on toxic in laws. So, like, if you. If this is your issue, please go back and listen to those. But the bottom Line is, you know, in the word, it talks about how we need to do our best to be peacemakers with everybody in our life. But it also follows it up and basically says, you know, it says, like, do whatever you can.

Right. As far as it depends on you.

On you. But that's telling me that there are some people in your life who tragically refuse to have peace with you for whatever reason. And so if you're doing your part, which this woman is, you know, it's a really hard situation because they're family.

Yeah, it really, really is hard. And it sounds like that you guys have gone through the long and painful process of trying to reason with this person and trying to build bridges and. And like Ashley said, there'll be some people in your life that you do as much as you can to live at peace, but because of their toxic behavior or narcissism or whatever it might be, or pathological lying, which obviously you can't have any kind of healthy relationship with someone who's a perpetual liar, it puts you in a position where you cannot win. There are gonna be some people in your life where you just cannot win. They will refuse to let you win because a healthy relationship, everybody wins together. And this person is not in a healthy place right now. And I hate that you've been put in this lose, lose of feeling like no matter what you do, you lose. But I will say that it sounds like you've made the wise decision to protect your marriage. First and foremost. Yes. Which is the first step. The Bible's clear about where our priorities should be. God first, our spouse second. For this reason, a husband will leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife. The two will become one. God gives us a clear pattern of letting us know where our loyalties need to lie. And from the moment we marry, our primary loyalty, it's always God first, but then right under that, it's our spouse and, and the family unit we create together as husband and wife. And then you continue to honor your parents, you continue to honor those other people in your life and when possible, work to have a healthy, ongoing relationship with them, but never at the expense of your own marriage relationship. So the boundaries you've set are helpful, it sounds like now, just to give you a follow up to make sure that these boundaries are healthy and also are promoting the opportunity for future healing in this relationship. Because God's desire is always for healing and reconciliation to happen in family relationships when possible.

Right.

A book that we recommend often in addition to the Naked Marriage Book, which I hope you've read already or downloaded the audiobook. And we appreciate those of you who have, but a book called Boundaries by doctors John Townsend and Henry Cloud. It's been around for years, and it's helped literally millions of people with these very difficult family dynamics. I would encourage you to read that book, follow what it says, if it's challenging you to do things differently than maybe you've done right now in terms of the boundaries you're setting. And then I would encourage you to send that book to his parents to let them know, we love you, we want a relationship with you, but we also want to have a healthy marriage, and we want to do things God's way. And we sadly feel like that this sister has prevented that from happening and has created some division. That's not our desire. Our desire is for there to be peace in his family. This is a book that was recommended by us that is based on the Bible and on research. This is what we're trying to follow. And just so you can understand where we're coming from, I would love for you to read this, too. And then for all of us together to discuss what it can look like for us to have a healthy, thriving relationships, understanding what clear and healthy biblical boundaries are supposed to look like. And it could be a path that sparks some healthy conversation.

So true. I mean, Boundaries, it's helped in our marriage. We've been married almost 20 years, and we look back to that book all the time. It's awesome. And it's not just for family relationships. It could be for others who are listening. And maybe it's not a family member who's causing some trouble in your marriage, but maybe it's a friend. It'll help you set boundaries with all kinds of different relationships. And so definitely check that out. I also want to say this. I could tell at the end of that question, she said that she's just worried that deep in her husband's heart that he kind of doesn't feel totally on board with these boundaries. And I think, again, just be honest with each other. Ask him how he's feeling and say, like, listen. And just be compassionate and say, listen, I know this is probably even harder on you because these are your parents and this is your sister. You know, how can I make this better for you? Is there anything I am doing or not doing that is causing you to hurt more through this situation? And I think just being honest about those feelings and owning the fact that. That this is his family. And so even though these boundaries do need to be in place, that it probably affects him a little bit more. And certainly it's hurting you as well. But I think just being sensitive to that will go a long way in keeping your marriage really open and honest and stronger, ultimately.

Yeah, that's so good. And I would just, you know, add to that. And don't, don't complain about his family to him. You know, I think that you putting the clear boundaries in place and establishing why they're there is important. But don't, don't just huddle up and use it as a time to just kind of talk in a toxic way, even though you might have those feelings. But you've got to find a way to rise above that and to pray for these folks and to pray for healing. Praying together for this situation instead of just always talking negatively about it could not only help change the situation, but change your hearts in the process.

And I just want to say this too, real quick, and then we're going to have to wrap this up. But I really believe in Christian counseling. We talk about it all the time, but there is such a thing as family counseling. And, you know, when somebody is a narcissist and a perpetual liar, odds are they may not think they need it, but it doesn't hurt to ask or to go yourself. Even if his parents are willing to go, it can go a long way. I mean, it really can go a long way to create more peace in the family dynamic, because a lot of times both sides don't really fully understand how much they're hurting one another or the real story of what's going on. And, I mean, his parents probably don't even realize all that the sister has done to hurt you. And so it's good to have a neutral person to help have these conversations, get everything out on the table, and to really kind of have a fuller picture of what's going on and to be able to pray specifically about where healing needs to be taking place. Thank you all so much for listening to today's episode of Hump Day Q and A. We love getting your questions, and we want to answer your question. So if you go to nakedmarriagepodcast.com you can submit your question right there or you can follow us on Instagram aveandashleywillis and you can give us your questions right there by giving us a dm. So we'll catch you next time on Hump Day Q and A.