Carolyn Hax: Healthy families don’t lay guilt trip
Dear Carolyn: My spouse and I are on the cusp of what feels like the next phase in our lives. Our only child is a senior in high school and is going off to college next year. My spouse is finishing up his MBA in January and looking for a new job. I am a contract teacher, but I could look for another position at any time.
My spouse has been yearning since his teen years to leave the Southeast. I felt the same need for “escape” in my 20s, but I feel less that way now, mainly because I make my home wherever I am.
My issue is that my parents are now in their mid-60s, and I feel guilty for thinking of moving hours or states away at this time in their lives.
I want to be adventurous, but I know my parents and sister will freak out and lay the guilt on hard and heavy. – No Place Like Home
I have a problem with seeing this as a problem.
Your being an adult, spouse, parent, child and sibling means your obligation chart reads as follows:
Top: Serve your child.
Close 2nd: Serve yourself, spouse and marriage with equal regard.
Distant 3rd, unless and until they need you: Serve the emotional blackmailers you call a family.
Meanwhile, “mid-60s” means your parents could truck along just fine with no extra care besides your quarterly visit for another 15 to 20 years. Do you really want to look your husband in the eye and say, “I realize you’ve spent the last two or three decades desperate to escape this region, and the past few years re-educating yourself to enable this mobility, and I realize I’m easy-peasy and can be happy anywhere you want to go – but I might have to visit my parents eight times a year instead of four sometime in the next 20 years, so you’re [poop] outta luck”?
That’s a rhetorical question.
Healthy families are sad you’re leaving but ultimately invest in your needs and happiness. Unhealthy families are sad you’re leaving and ultimately invest in their own needs and happiness. They’re leaving you no choice – that is, if they selfishly force you to choose.