When Parents Tear Down What Their Children Have Built
Married life is one of the most important human and social bonds, founded on affection, compassion, and mutual respect. It is a relationship that requires a considerable degree of understanding, dialogue, and tolerance in order to face the challenges and disagreements that may arise between spouses. It is only natural that no marriage is entirely free from differences of opinion or variations in temperaments and needs. However, the danger of such disagreements does not always lie in their original causes, but may instead lie in the way they are handled, particularly when family members intervene negatively. A minor disagreement can then turn into a complex family crisis that may ultimately lead to the separation of the spouses and divorce.
There is no denying the important role parents play in their children’s lives. They are a source of wisdom, experience, and psychological and social support, and their intervention may be necessary in certain circumstances, particularly when its purpose is reconciliation, bringing viewpoints closer together, and protecting the family from disintegration. However, this positive role may become a factor in undermining married life when it goes beyond advice and support and turns into interference in the details of the marital relationship and the couple’s private decisions.
Negative parental interference in their children’s married lives becomes evident when parents side unconditionally with their son or daughter, without listening to the other spouse or attempting to understand the true nature and causes of the disagreement. Such interference may take various forms, including exaggerating mistakes, interpreting actions that were carried out in good faith as deliberate offences, sowing doubts, bringing up past disagreements, inciting one spouse against the other, or pushing them to make hasty decisions in moments of anger and emotional distress. More dangerously, some parents treat marital disagreements as though they were battles in which one side must emerge victorious, rather than problems that need to be resolved. At this point, the disagreement loses its private nature between the spouses and turns into a conflict between two families, entangled with feelings of dignity, pride, and family sensitivities. Consequently, backing down from a position or offering an apology becomes more difficult than resolving the problem itself.
Furthermore, constantly sharing the details of married life with parents, particularly in moments of anger, may lead to the formation of a lasting negative impression of the other spouse. The couple may reconcile and put the disagreement behind them, but their families may retain feelings of resentment and reproach, bringing up past incidents whenever a new disagreement arises. This makes moving beyond the past increasingly difficult.
Another manifestation of negative interference is making comparisons between spouses, interfering in financial decisions, child-rearing, and household management, or imposing conditions and demands that do not arise from the couple’s actual needs, but rather from the parents’ own wishes and perceptions of married life. As a result, one spouse may feel that they are not simply living with their life partner, but are also subject to constant scrutiny and continuous interference from their own family or that of their spouse.
As these circumstances persist, mutual trust declines, the sense of security and independence weakens, and dialogue between the spouses becomes less effective. Matters may eventually reach the point where divorce becomes an option, not because of the original disagreement, but because of the accumulation of external pressures and the loss of hope that stability can be restored to married life.
Negative interference may stem from concern for one’s son or daughter, or from the belief that parental experience gives parents the right to manage their children’s lives even after they marry. It may also result from fear that one of their children is being treated unjustly, from the influence of previous personal experiences, or from difficulty accepting their children’s independence and their decisions when these differ from the family’s convictions.
In some cases, love becomes entangled with the desire to control, and defending one’s son or daughter becomes more important than seeking the truth and achieving stability. Parents may believe that they are providing the necessary protection, while the actual result is increased tension, deepened disagreements, and a diminished ability of the spouses to resolve their problems on their own.
It is important to emphasize that the responsibility does not rest with parents alone. The spouses also bear responsibility for setting appropriate boundaries on the involvement of others, including their parents, preserving the privacy of their married life, and not allowing every disagreement to become a wider family issue. A successful marriage requires both spouses to understand the importance of independence in decision-making, while benefiting from their parents’ experience without compromising the privacy of their marital relationship.
Protecting married life does not mean severing ties with parents or diminishing their standing. Rather, it means regulating this relationship on the basis of mutual respect, so that parents retain their respected role while the spouses preserve their right to manage their own lives and make their decisions together.
This requires spouses to make every effort to resolve their disagreements through direct dialogue and to avoid sharing the details of their problems with others in moments of anger and emotional distress. Each spouse should also establish clear and respectful boundaries against external interference, without offending their own parents or those of their life partner.
As for parents, their true role at this stage is to listen impartially, calm emotions, encourage dialogue, and help the spouses see the problem from different perspectives. It is neither wise for advice to turn into incitement, nor for protection to become control, nor for family allegiance to become the reason for losing a marital relationship that could otherwise have been repaired.
Finally, marriage is not merely a relationship between two people; it is the creation of a new family unit that requires independence in managing its affairs, as well as family support that strengthens its stability without compromising its privacy. Therefore, parents who truly love their children are those who help them build a mature married life, not those who make them prisoners of disagreements, pressures, and entrenched positions.
Not every intervention is a sign of love, nor is every act of defending one’s son or daughter necessarily a wise one. Likewise, standing by one’s child does not necessarily mean standing against their life partner. Perhaps the greatest gift parents can offer their children when disagreements arise is to give them room for dialogue and remind them that married life deserves a fair opportunity for reconciliation whenever this is possible and safe.
Judge Fares Halasa
President of the Court of Appeal of the Greek Orthodox Court
