Negotiating Family Meet Ups with Husband

My husband and I have been invited to a golden wedding celebration for my second cousin for whom my sister and I were bridesmaids. My mother, sister and family went to the same couple’s silver wedding celebration but we did not. I desperately wanted to go to the previous celebration but we had a 4 month old daughter and my husband refused to go (tired/didn’t want to do the 3 hour round trip on the weekend etc). At the time, I considered going with the other members of my family and my daughter and without my husband but eventually decided not to go without him (too “embarrassed” that he wouldn’t be there with me) but felt bitter and left out – and still do today, even if to a lesser extent. Perhaps I wanted to go so much because I felt so left out at a very vulnerable period of my life and had wanted to prove by going that I was coping with having a young baby and that my life hadn’t really changed. I also felt under a huge obligation to go as I would be the “only bridesmaid not attending”.

This time, my husband – for his own valid reasons – does not want to commit to a date in 2 months’ time. It feels like groundhog day, especially as at another meet up with this part of the family in 2018 I went without my husband (but with my mother, sister and brother-in-law). The difference this time is that my mother, sister and brother-in-law would not be able to go so I really would feel on my own as I rarely meet up with/don’t really know the rest of that part of the family.

There are lots of strands that I want to look at in this narrative (my husband’s commitment or lack thereof to events with friends and family; my need to say yes to every invitation and over-commit to my own detriment; my lack of being able to accept a decision I make and rather blame someone else for it; acceptance that other people have the right to make up their own mind; what it means about me when I say no to an invitation etc) and hope to come back with more of this but right now I want to look at the following models:

Unintentional Model
C: We are invited to my relation’s Golden Wedding anniversary party
T: Here we go again (husband is not going to want to go/to want to commit to going)
F: Anxious
S: Nausea
A: Think about how to sell the situation to my husband/how we might possibly squeeze it into our diaries; wonder if I can commit for both of us and then cancel for my husband nearer the time; anxious that I can’t please everyone: I will either have the embarrassment of refusing another invitation or going alone; feeling obliged to go (family is important, I didn’t go last time); feeling out of step with the rest of the family (last time I was the “only one” not to go, this time I would be the “only one” to go); torn between the guilt that I “should” make the effort and could make the effort to be with my family (narrative: family is important) and the fear that actually I would be quite out on a limb if my husband didn’t go and would/could feel very isolated (closest relation at the party would be second cousins whom I have seen a handful of times in the last 40 years); knowing that I have to push myself to go to these sort of evets but I generally enjoy having gone (or is this programming?); fearing (knowing?) that if I refuse the invitation, it will “reflect badly” on me because I could have gone and that I will still blame my husband for the decision not to go even if this was in fact my decision; worrying that I was only invited because I was a bridesmaid and in fact they will be relieved that I cannot come so if I do accept it will be embarrassing all round; not wanting to accept the responsibility of refusing such a kind invitation; ruminating, ruminating, ruminating.
R: History repeats itself.

Intentional model
C: We are invited to my relation’s Golden Wedding anniversary party
T: How lovely to be included in the invitation
F: Grateful
S: Open
A: Feeling thankful for the invitation and happy to be included; able to make my decision from a place of ventral vagal rather than stress response.
R: Grateful for my family

The trouble is, I’m having a hard time staying in my IM and not ruminating. Any suggestions?

 

 

Answer:

Sometimes we get stuck in a spiral of ruminating because we are outsourcing our emotions and trying to find a perfect solution.

You are already aware of this, but keep exploring it some more. In what ways does your brain believe that your circumstance creates your feelings in regard to this event?

What if you allowed for it to be 50/50 no matter what you choose? What is good and what would be uncomfortable in different scenarios? What can you do to support yourself in the uncomfortable parts rather than trying to get rid of them?

What suffering do you have to power to let go of in this story? Sometimes we can find this by looking at what is clean pain and what is dirty pain.

We always get to choose our hard. What sounds the most fun to you, even if parts of it are hard?