The Outsider

I'll be honest: I'm someone that doesn't usually like change. I know it's inevitable and a part of life, but it's disorienting, and that makes me uncomfortable. I like to always have a plan, and change tends to throw all your plans out the window.

This Christmas was a big change for me. Since I was a little girl, I've always spent it with my family, immediate or extended. Since my parents divorced, our celebrations have been much smaller than they once were, but there has still always been a comfortable familiarity about them. Until this year. This year, instead of my mother doing a Christmas Eve party, she asked my father if he was okay with her doing Christmas with my sister and I instead. Normally, my father does Christmas with my sister and I, since Christmas is also his birthday. Because my father is in a serious relationship with a woman whose family does a big Christmas Day celebration, he told my mother that would be fine. It took the pressure off of him to cook, and he's very comfortable with his girlfriend's family, most of whom neither my sister or I have ever met. So, on Christmas Day, he went off to his girlfriend's mother's house, and I went off to my mother's house.

Every Christmas Eve, my mother throws a party for her boyfriend's fiancé's (they live together and have been engaged for a few years, but there's no serious talk of a wedding) family. Her own family is not invited, except for my sister and I and our significant others, if we want them there. So, this year was no different, it was just that everyone was coming on Christmas Day instead of Christmas Eve. No big deal, right?

Except in some ways, it was a big deal. I had become accustomed to the new normal: seeing my mother Christmas Eve, and spending Christmas at home with my father, having a really low-key day with good food, lots of time to relax, and being in the company of only those people I'm closest to. It allowed me to continue winding down from the day before, which was undoubtedly stressful. You see, I have never liked my mother's boyfriend fiancé. He and I are civil to each other, but we will never have a familial bond - I accept that he's a part of my mother's life and important to her, but that's where my regard for him begins and ends. He has done things that have had a direct, massively negative effect on my life, my sister's life, and my father's life, and as far as I'm concerned, the actions he actively chose to take - the things he chose to do - are unforgiveable. So... it's really quite awkward for me to be around his whole family.

His family loves my mother. They love my sister. They're civil to me, but they treat me like the daughter time forgot - even though I've been spending Christmas Eve with them for the past eight years at least. They all exchange their gifts for the holidays at my mother's house. My mother and her boyfriend buy everyone gifts. My sister and I never do. When it comes time for them to hand out their gifts, at least two or three of them always give something to my sister. I never get anything. And I realize that Christmas is about giving and not receiving, but I can't say it doesn't sting that my sister is always included, and I'm... just not. It doesn't help that it took most of them years to remember my name, and even now a few ask my mother what my name is when they walk in the house and see me.

This Christmas, I felt like an outsider, which is something I don't think I ever expected to feel on Christmas. Even when I realized, after my parents split-up, that someday it was likely Christmas would be celebrated with whoever they chose to be with, I had hoped anyone either of my parents chose to be with would at least try to make my sister and I feel comfortable during the holidays. I didn't expect gifts or to be considered part of the family, but people remembering my name after eight plus years and treating my sister and I the same as far as gifts/no gifts would be nice. I am my mother's daughter, not a stranger or a guest of my mother's they've never met before. I've thought about what it would be like to be in a relationship with someone who also celebrated Christmas and to celebrate with their family instead of my own - even if I felt like an outsider, that would be a situation I chose.

Have you ever felt like an outsider at a holiday celebration?

On Being an Adult Child of Non-Amicably Divorced Parents

I am an adult child of divorced parents.

That fact is neither surprising nor particularly noteworthy. With the American divorce rate being as high as it is, often estimated at about 50%, I am far from alone. The statistics are depressing, but for many people, they're just a fact of life. So, out of all the topics I could write about, why am I writing about something so unremarkable?

Well, because I had what seems to be a non-traditional divorce experience, namely that for the longest time, I considered my parents' divorce to be one of the best things that ever happened to me. It's only recently that I've come to realize the effects my parents' divorce had on me and how it will inevitably affect my future.

My parents originally split up when I was 13, and their ensuing divorce was anything but amicable. Their break-up was preceded by years upon years of fighting; I remember thinking once, when I was little, that they seemed more like brother and sister than husband and wife. Neither of them really ever seemed happy, and displays of affection between them were few and far between. My initial mental reaction to their decision to get divorced was, "Finally! It's about time." It didn't surprise me, and I honestly thought it would make everything So Much Easier.

A lot did get easier, at least for me. I was able to live full-time with my father, and I was happy about that. My mother and I had always had issues, and I felt it would be healthier for us both not to live together. I believed it would allow me to limit the amount of emotional baggage and stress I'd carry around on a daily basis, and that was liberating.

Of course, a lot also got harder. The dissolution of my parents' marriage led my younger sister to move in with my mother two years into their divorce negotiations, which left me feeling like someone had dunked me in a pool of ice water, punched me several times in the face, and then hit me with a bus. My mother got serious with someone I was acquainted with, and who was close enough in age to me to have been my older brother. My father seemed to get hit with emotional negativity at every turn; he took the divorce hard and both of his parents died in the midst of the negotiations.

I was never plagued by the normal questions kids of divorce ask. There was no, "Is this my fault? Do Mom and Dad still love me? How are my friends going to react?" or "Why is this happening? Will I ever see Dad/Mom? What's going to happen on my birthday and holidays?" Now that I'm older, I feel like all I have are questions. When I started dating my boyfriend, it was, "How will he react to me having divorced parents when his are still together? Will his parents think less of me because my parents are divorced? How do I explain that I live with my father and have for years, when most people in my situation live with their mother? How is my mother going to react to my boyfriend being only a year younger than hers?" As we've gotten progressively more serious and some of our friends and peers have started getting engaged and married, it's been, "Oh f***, what am I going to do in a few years if we decide to get married? How do I incorporate my parents into my wedding and put them in the same space with each other - not to mention each other's new significant others - when they can't stand each other? How do I deal with their significant others, one which I'm okay with and one I don't like at all?" Recently, as two of my cousins cousins have started families, I've found myself thinking, "How is my parents' divorce going to affect my future children? Will my kids call my parents' partners their grandparents? Can I give the title of grandparent to one of my parents' significant others and not the other? Are my kids going to be confused? Are they going to be worrying that their father and I might break up? How are my future spouse and I going to deal with holidays? If we split the time 50-50, is that unfair to one of my parents? Is it unfair to his if we don't?"

When my parents first got divorced, not one of these questions occurred to me. I figured that after they were officially divorced, they wouldn't hate each other anymore; neither of them would be holding the other back and each would be free to pursue their own happiness, so what was the point of staying angry at each other? Surely they knew that my sister and/or I would be in situations in the future where it would be important for them to get along. Surely they knew that they still had two kids together who would need them both, at times. Surely the animosity and the bitterness would fade with time.

I'm old enough to know now that it's not that simple. I'm going to be put in uncomfortable situations, and I'm not going to be able to make everyone happy. I'm going to have to figure out the answers to questions I'd never thought to ask myself before, and talking to my parents about the answers is not something I look forward to. But while it isn't going to fun, that's life. This is the hand I was dealt. In the end, I can only do the best I can do, and in the future, that's going to have to be good enough for both of my parents.

Are you an adult child of non-amicably divorced parents? Are you trying to figure out the answers to any of these questions?