Family and Boundaries

You can't make everyone happy

Mille Fiori 2012

I hear cackles in the background. Thousands of pages of ink have been spilled on this topic. Yet still. Yet still.

I’m in recovery from a family vacation. In this case most of my husband’s side of the family came to visit us last week, from the Midwest. We were a motley tribe of ten, ranging in age from eight to seventy-five. I spent a lot of time preparing. I cleaned the house, my car, the dog and purchased a lot of junk food from Costco. I planned excursions and dinners, and tried to provide an environment where everyone would have fun.

Highlights:

Both my adult kids showed up for all five days and were wonderful, charming, and it is so cool to see them as separate yet connected. My niece and nephew love them and the feeling is mutual.

I gave my sister-in-law a good tarot reading, meaning we talked about meaningful stuff.

I swam in the pool and lake with my niece and nephew.

I sat on the deck with Chris and my brother and sister in law for hours talking after everyone went to sleep.

We got out ALL the Playmobil which Chris insists on keeping for the grandchildren I’m not sure we’ll have. The kids loved it as they don’t have it at home. It was exciting and special for them.

I dislike Dale Chihuly less after going to his glass museum. It is actually quite magical.

I kept my massage appointment.

I maintained my boundaries (for the most part).

Lowlights:

My in-laws don’t talk or smile much. It makes me uncomfortable because I can never tell if they are enjoying themselves.

My husband feels stressed because he wants to make sure his parents are okay and can’t tell because they aren’t talking.

My mother-in-law is allergic to cats so stays in a hotel but is nervous to drive in Seattle so Chis drove back and forth twice a day.

Creating an activity plan that everyone finds fun is impossible, at least for this family. No matter who you please, someone will be displeased. I decided to focus on the kids. That was the right choice.

What It Means

Now don’t get me wrong. This is not Hanna’s bash the family newsletter. It is really important for me to map it out because it clarifies for me, and I hope for some of you, what you can and cannot expect on a family vacation. It also helps me to see all the good, versus having a complete venting fest about the negative.

What You Can Expect From a Multi-Generational Family Vacation:

Everyone will enjoy some parts of the vacation.

Everyone will not enjoy some parts of the vacation.

What You Can’t Expect From a Multi-Generational Family Vacation:

Everyone will enjoy every moment of the vacation.

To put a twist on Laura McCowen’s nine things: It is not your fault. AND it is NOT your responsibility. It really isn’t. I realized that I spent a good part of my adult life trying and actually expecting everyone to have fun and be happy, and if they weren’t it somehow reflected poorly on my planning and execution, as if I in fact could control the way other people felt. I would then have a bad time myself because I felt as if I had failed somehow. If I had only bought the right soda flavor, or made sure that she actually wanted to go to the waterfront, or checked in on every person’s feelings every day, I could fix it all.

But hey. There are decades of dynamics which rear their ugly heads when large groups of family get together. People fall back into childhood roles which aren’t necessarily healthy. People hold their tongues (I sure did!). People break down under the stress. It just happens.

Boundaries

I created some boundaries over the past five or so years which have served me well.

I can create an environment which is clean, safe and healthy. But I can’t control what happens in that environment, other than what I choose to do in it.

If someone is grumpy I can choose not to engage, to do something different.

I can ask for help. Some people actually like to help, to contribute. Those that don’t are a little bit sad.

I can go to bed before other people—they’ve been putting themselves to bed for years.

A Tarot and An Enneagram Connection

Of course I can’t leave you without a little tarot and enneagram.

The enneagram was incredibly useful to me this week, as I was able to understand where people were coming from in terms of their core fears and desires and how they can show up in a family setting. An example is my type seven son. He arrives and the mood immediately becomes lighter, the fun begins, as he play fights with his cousin and complains about nothing. He lets others do whatever they want and focuses on having the best time he can. My type three sister-in-law wants the trip to be a success and feels it deeply if someone isn’t happy, as if it reflects upon her actions, which it doesn’t. Knowing this helps me to support her. My type four kid can feel depressed if everything isn’t just right, and if I let him just be, he usually comes out of it, which he did.

The Ten of Cups captures a moment in time. It is that idealized notion of everyone being happy at the same time. It is possible, but I would venture to say it’s not incredibly realistic (note the previous paragraphs). We do have times in our lives where that emotional cup is so full, feels so perfect, as if life could not get better. But these feelings fluctuate and not every moment can be the Ten of Cups. I don’t think I’d want that anyway.

The seventy-seven other cards show us the variety of human experience, the devastation, the elation, and everything in between. This the meat of life, mundane, exciting, exhausting, rewarding. I tried to think of a card to contrast with the Ten of Cups and I realized that I could pick one but I like the idea of all of them, in their combinations and positions in spreads, and the way they always represent change.

It was a rough week. It was an awesome week. It was a family week.

xo Hanna

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