Can unchecked extended families spoil marriages?

[Beachumbrella]

I'm worried that my family's ongoing/increasing dramas are starting to affect my marriage.

As a family unit DH and I have our own life challenges, but we essentially loving, honest and respectful to each other. My DH is amazing at keeping boundaries with his dysfunctional family and I'm so grateful for that.

So I feel I am failing him by getting swept up in my family of origin dramas - this includes abuse between them and secret keeping (I'm told stuff then asked not to say anything within the family). It really ends up affecting out moods. I worry a lot about them, feel distressed, and he is starting to worry about me and it gets him down too.

I've worked really hard to find a loving relationship, having not been given the tools to do so from my family. I feel like I can't enjoy it because they keep dragging me down with their dramas and sob stories, which of course they are not prepared to take any significant responsibility for I.e. make changes, seek professional support (that they could afford).

Am I right to be worried about the long term impact of this on my life (what is left of it) and relationship?

I don't want to blame them, but I want to take responsibility for my choices about how much space I am giving them in my life.

Has anyone else had to deal with similar?
Any advice from kind places welcome.

What is a "Family of origin"...?

Surely you just mean, 'my family' ..?

Please clarify @Beachumbrella

Allow me to clarify on OP's behalf.

Yes, she means her family.

Yes.
My ex husband didn’t do that properly with his family cue lots of interfering, demands, drama etc. It’s not the whole reason why we divorced but it was a sizeable part of it

@Beachumbrella If you haven't already, talk to DH about these concerns and address them together.

It's your responsibility to ensure your family's dramas don't negatively impact your marriage, so tell him that you recognise this is a possibility and work on it.

You've done well to build a different relationship, but you've only done half a job. Keep going. Good luck.

Sometimes it's hard to recognise difficult (or indeed toxic) behaviours in our family unit. I mean Family Of Origin, being the family we are born into.

We are forced into "roles" and conditioned to accept whatever behaviours are normalised within the family.

After being raised like this, it can be very hard to break patterns, or to enforce new, healthy boundaries. The family unit will often turn against a family member who tries to change the status quo.

Not entering into drama is a good first step. Do look up and read about the Drama Triangle and Triangulation which is very helpful in explaining this dynamic.

You might have to go further and limit your contact and/or availability until you can make a plan with your DH about the best way to go about re-setting your relationship with your family.

Be prepared for them to push back, but stick to your guns.

My DH is amazing at keeping boundaries with his dysfunctional family and I'm so grateful for that.

this is a really important statement from your OP. Your Dh has done this. So talk to him about your family and how your are struggling.
Together work out where the boundaries could be that would protect your marriage. Get him to help you understand what he did to set those boundaries so that you can work on setting them for yourself.

You can set boundaries. You need to work on the skills to do it. YOu need ot be committed to things like saying no, turning off your phone/not replying to messages etc etc.

You say in your OP that you don't want to blame them. It isn't ablame game, but it is about choices. You can choose how much you let the drama in.

’Family of origin’ is generally used to refer to the family you grew up in (parents, siblings, wider family) as opposed to your current family unit (spouse and children).

@Beachumbrella I think it can add extra stress to a marriage, which can affect the health of your marriage. I had a similar situation with DH’s family where there was a falling-out between his siblings that lasted for a few years. DH felt put in the middle, family gatherings were affected as the siblings wouldn’t be in the same room, etc.

DH tried not to be involved but got dragged it at times. I was grateful that we didn’t live nearby and had that distance between us and his family, so didn’t get more involved.

What kind of issues/ family secrets are they involving you in? You may be reacting to stuff that most people would ignore and distance themselves from, simply because that’s what’s normal in your family.

For example, the issue with DH’s siblings was due to their spouses falling out because one spouse felt the other spouse didn’t like them. To me, this was a complete non-issue - I don’t need to like my in-laws that much, as long as we can all be civil to each other and get along at family gatherings. It’s a fairly superficial relationship to me. But to the offended spouse, it was a huge issue and caused a lot of drama 🙄

Thanks so much everyone for your intelligent and thoughtful comments. I really needed to hear these things. I realise I have done a lot of boundary setting over the last 10 years, but I am still vulnerable to being recast into the caregiver/confidante role I hoped I had escaped. There are new factors at play - innocent children I care about and struggle to see in the mess, aging characters using worsening circumstances to draw sympathy, new relatives by marriage who I've had to get my head around. New features that have thrown me, but the core dynamic remains the same. More healing and boundary setting to do.

Thanks also for those who clarified family of origin meaning.

@EllieQ no not talking about petty dramas. Things that would ruffle anyone's feathers. But that others who weren't cast as family caregiver from childhood could likely separate from more easily.