Yours, Mine, And Ours--or, "There Is No Normal"

I have previously confessed my sick fascination for the Real Housewives of Wherever. I don't know why the shows intrigue me so much. Maybe it's because their lifestyles are so different from ours. Maybe it makes me feel normal to watch their dysfunction. Anyway, it was through watching Real Housewives of New York that I was first "introduced" to this tiny package of inappropriateness, Bethenny Frankel.

Bethenny intrigues me because she is one of those people that always has a witty comeback. She seems to know how to respond in the face of confrontation, which is so fascinating to me. My wittiest response to any type of confrontation is usually, "Uhhhmmm....." She's irreverent and crass, but darn it, she's pretty funny sometimes.

The hubs and I caught an episode of her latest show, "Bethenny Ever After," thanks to Bravo's policy of re-airing episodes 1.3 gazillion times. To make a long story short, I guess she didn't grow up with much of a family, whereas her husband is very close to his parents. They're having a hard time finding a happy medium between what he wants and what she wants now that they have the family's first grandchild.

I got really into the episode because I really wanted to see what kind of compromise they came to. My family lives two hours away from us. They are SUPER, and my husband gets along with them so well. He hangs out with them when I'm not around and he'll call and talk to them on the phone just to have a conversation. We really enjoy spending time with them and wish that we could do it more. His family lives in a different state, so it's a lot harder for us to see them. It's caused us a few bumps in the road, but nothing too major. However, our baby is going to be the first grandchild in his family, and I forsee problems ahead.

I don't want to punish my family by saying, "Well, we can't see his family this much, and it's really not fair for you to get to spend more time with the baby, so...let's just cool it." I don't think that either of us wants to do that. Part of the reason I wanted to not move farther away from my family is so our baby could spend plenty of time with them and vice-versa. I did not grow up with extended family around, and I missed it and wanted my child to have it differently.

HOWEVER.

I don't see that going over well with the other side of the family, and I truly do understand where they would be coming from. I get it. I'm wondering about Thanksgiving and Christmas already. I don't want to scrap it all and say that we're doing it on our own, just a family of three....the best part of the holidays is being around family! But there's no way it's going to be split equally, and there's no way there will be peace in the valley on this one. My husband's in the ministry, okay? He can't take off and jetset around at Christmastime. Nor do I forsee his family coming down here. His other job has him working all major holidays anyway. Now, from the outside perspective, it's easily solved. "Well, you can't go to them, and they can't come to you, so it is what it is. Just arrange to see them at another time."

Yeah, no dice on that one.

Even if we're stuck here and they're stuck there, my family CAN (and SHOULD) come to see us. Why shouldn't they? There's no good reason in the world. Yet what it comes down to is my family getting to spend Baby's First Thanksgiving, Baby's First Christmas, and Baby's First Everything Else with us, while the rest of the family misses out. You think I'm dreaming up trouble before I've even popped? Nope. We've already dealt with situations like this with just the TWO of us.

It would be easy if I thought the other side of the family was being really unreasonable, but they're not. I can sympathize with them, I really can.

*Sigh* Something tells me I need to work on my Mama Bear territorial skills.