Have you ever looked closely at a blanket or throw and seen how the fabric is made up of so many threads or yarn all intertwined? That’s how I’ve begun to see our lives with a day or moment in our past or present connected in twists and turns in ways we barely see. Recently I was speaking with a girlfriend who said that she couldn’t understand why her husband’s family didn’t celebrate holidays like Easter. She felt that instead they’d get together almost every weekend for a barbecue and this was too much for her. It had begun to feel like a chore especially since he’d always invite them along anytime she made arrangements for herself, husband and their child to do something fun! I guess what she saw when she looked at the fabric of her life were big nubby balls [his family gatherings] crisscrossed with lines of inconsequential, tiny little knots which were activities she and he would do in their new family.
I remember being annoyed by my husband’s mini-summits with his mom about everything including when, where and how he and I were going to get our first house. My appreciation for some direction from mom in law was great because he and I were uninformed, just-out-of-college newlyweds. But my feeling was that I didn’t leave my family home to create another home in which someone else ran my life! It took a long time for me to see that it was my youthful insecurity which was feeding my ego to the point that I felt my husband had to choose between me and her. How insane was that?? I didn’t talk about it but just stewed about it which was as bad as what my girlfriend was beginning to do, constantly bringing it up to her husband as a major issue.
It is a major issue or can become one if you don’t figure it out before it’s too late. She couldn’t see the lines and lines of yarn surrounding both the nubby balls and the little knots in their new family fabric… but they are there…and as important as those nubs and knots. These lines of yarn bring the framework, pattern, and potential strength to the fabric. So this analogy of fabric got me thinking about what my family looked like…. My family was my mom, dad, and brothers or what you’d call, your family of origin or orientation, the one into which you were born or adopted. Our family of origin is where we learn, many times without knowing it, how to communicate or express opinions/feelings [cold war silence, tears or screams, loud fights followed by hugs], whether conflict will be avoided, confronted or resolved or how the family space will be used [ each one in their rooms or laughing at the dinner table/around a board game]. These conscious/unconscious lessons from our family of orientation take shape in how we manage financially [spend or save], ways we spend our time [barbecues vs cruise ships] and with whom and how we make life decisions [discuss with mom or via a girlfriend conference call]. It’s no surprise then that the patterns continue into adulthood and other relationships like our nuclear family or family of procreation. Unfortunately, many times those patterns are invisible to us because they’re familiar ….and comfortable to us. But they’re the ties that bind us, literally to how we think, act, even how we love.
This is why people say when you marry someone, you marry their family. More importantly, it means really doing your homework 
as to who you are and where you come from so you know where you’re really coming from in any interaction, especially an intimate one. Ditto for him. It helps if you figure it out why like my girlfriend, who came from a small, church-going family who rarely had large holiday gatherings, would feel that her husband preferred spending time with others. It would also help you figure out, for example, that her husband was acting on his family autopilot. He just didn’t see that he could carve out new traditions with his wife and child by switching up the pattern and adding yet another rich texture to the fabric of their lives. It may take some time but we could gain a lot if we repeatedly remind ourselves that how we are or how we see things is just one side of the issue especially in relationships. If we understand that simple fact or try to, then those “traditions” which we import from our families really can enrich or strengthen the fabric of our lives rather than wear it thin.
Sallye Forth is a mom working outside of the home, a co-parent, life coach and writer. She’s a citizen of the world who she shares her world view on varied topics of interests on her blog, Blogstown; a cybercafé for grown-ups.
