I desperately need advice.
My wife adamantly hates my parents. We have been married for ten years now, and her hatred towards my parents has progressively worsened over the years now to the point that her anger and hate alienates us from my parents and threatens the stability of our marriage. Her hatred towards both my parents and my others siblings is so extreme, I don't know what to do about it anymore. My wife is a Japanese citizen whom I met when I was stationed in Japan in the U.S. Navy. We got married and had two kids, and then shortly afterwards I was had to leave the U.S. Navy because it was downsizing, and we moved to America. We had no home and no job, so I asked my parents and they reluctantly allowed us to move in with them, along with my two other younger college student brothers whom were also living at home at that time. That is when we started having major problems between my wife and I, and my other family members. For a year and half our two households routinely avoided each other due to huge differences and complaints we had against each other, ultimately with my wife completely avoiding contact with everyone in the house towards the end. My wife suffered from a mental breakdown during that horrible experience. After I graduated from Junior college a year and half later, we immediately left my parents' home and moved out of state to start a new life.
After we moved, the Great Recession began, and we struggled horribly over the next five years, simply trying to survive and maintain my employment, unable to prosper or afford to buy a house. During this time my marriage was very strained due to finances and stress. During those years, my Parents would often contact me on the phone, and they would ask to come visit us, mainly so they could visit their grandchildren, sometimes as often as 3-4 times a year. My wife totally despised their visits because she was still greatly offended by our previous experiences living with them from before, but she silently allowed and endured their visits but minimized conversation during the visits. My parents have always acted as though everything was fine between all of us, despite the major problems we all had living together in the past that were so apparent to everyone.
It was until just recently that my wife and I have had big fights over the fact that my parents want to visit us yet again.
This time my wife refused to allow it, even though she agreed to it a few months ago, and I had to cancel the visit and make up another excuse to give to my parents. I have become utterly frustrated with this entire long-term family feud, and recently tried to resolve it and finally fix things between my wife and my parents by writing my parents a letter expressing to them our hurt feelings all these years. My intention was to be honest and clear and patient with my parents, explaining to them that my wife's and my feelings were hurt many years ago during the time we all living together, and we had never gotten over those hurt feelings. I asked them to please try to understand us and acknowledge that we had been hurt, so we could move past those painful memories.
But to my dismay, my parents reacted very harshly and judgmental to our letters, calling us two-faced and ungrateful people. After several emails back and forth, they ended up attacking my wife in an email, calling her an unloving and cold person, and they wouldn't acknowledge the fact that our feelings were hurt, saying they don't remember things being hostile and uncomfortable between our two families during our stay with them years ago. They lectured me for waiting "years" after it all happened to bring it to their attention. My wife and I are offended and even more hurt now, because it was obvious there was much tension between our families, and over the years everyone simply avoided a fight and was silent about it, to keep the peace. To be honest, I don't think my parents or brothers ever liked my wife, and I suspect there are even a little racist towards her because she is Japanese. My wife thinks they have always been unfair to us, racist, egotistic, living too comfortably, and showing favoritism to my other brothers, whom we both think are very spoiled by my parents as well.
Now, my wife is completely full of hate and bitterness towards my parents and brothers, and refuses to ever allow them to visit our home ever again. She insists she will never forgive them for what they have said recently to her in their emails, and for how they have offended her years ago. She doesn't want to allow them to see our children anymore either. She believes that when I die, they will attack her to get their grandchildren back. And now my parents are saying that I have betrayed them, and am a terrible person for waiting this long to express to them our "True Feelings".
This dysfunctional family feud is torturing and tearing me apart from inside, and I am losing much sleep over it all. I don't know what to do at this point. I tried to facilitate communication, honesty, and healing by writing to my parents but it appears to have backfired on me. If you can help me, please give me advice.
My wife adamantly hates my parents. We have been married for ten years now, and her hatred towards my parents has progressively worsened over the years now to the point that her anger and hate alienates us from my parents and threatens the stability of our marriage. Her hatred towards both my parents and my others siblings is so extreme, I don't know what to do about it anymore. My wife is a Japanese citizen whom I met when I was stationed in Japan in the U.S. Navy. We got married and had two kids, and then shortly afterwards I was had to leave the U.S. Navy because it was downsizing, and we moved to America. We had no home and no job, so I asked my parents and they reluctantly allowed us to move in with them, along with my two other younger college student brothers whom were also living at home at that time. That is when we started having major problems between my wife and I, and my other family members. For a year and half our two households routinely avoided each other due to huge differences and complaints we had against each other, ultimately with my wife completely avoiding contact with everyone in the house towards the end. My wife suffered from a mental breakdown during that horrible experience. After I graduated from Junior college a year and half later, we immediately left my parents' home and moved out of state to start a new life.
After we moved, the Great Recession began, and we struggled horribly over the next five years, simply trying to survive and maintain my employment, unable to prosper or afford to buy a house. During this time my marriage was very strained due to finances and stress. During those years, my Parents would often contact me on the phone, and they would ask to come visit us, mainly so they could visit their grandchildren, sometimes as often as 3-4 times a year. My wife totally despised their visits because she was still greatly offended by our previous experiences living with them from before, but she silently allowed and endured their visits but minimized conversation during the visits. My parents have always acted as though everything was fine between all of us, despite the major problems we all had living together in the past that were so apparent to everyone.
It was until just recently that my wife and I have had big fights over the fact that my parents want to visit us yet again.
This time my wife refused to allow it, even though she agreed to it a few months ago, and I had to cancel the visit and make up another excuse to give to my parents. I have become utterly frustrated with this entire long-term family feud, and recently tried to resolve it and finally fix things between my wife and my parents by writing my parents a letter expressing to them our hurt feelings all these years. My intention was to be honest and clear and patient with my parents, explaining to them that my wife's and my feelings were hurt many years ago during the time we all living together, and we had never gotten over those hurt feelings. I asked them to please try to understand us and acknowledge that we had been hurt, so we could move past those painful memories.
But to my dismay, my parents reacted very harshly and judgmental to our letters, calling us two-faced and ungrateful people. After several emails back and forth, they ended up attacking my wife in an email, calling her an unloving and cold person, and they wouldn't acknowledge the fact that our feelings were hurt, saying they don't remember things being hostile and uncomfortable between our two families during our stay with them years ago. They lectured me for waiting "years" after it all happened to bring it to their attention. My wife and I are offended and even more hurt now, because it was obvious there was much tension between our families, and over the years everyone simply avoided a fight and was silent about it, to keep the peace. To be honest, I don't think my parents or brothers ever liked my wife, and I suspect there are even a little racist towards her because she is Japanese. My wife thinks they have always been unfair to us, racist, egotistic, living too comfortably, and showing favoritism to my other brothers, whom we both think are very spoiled by my parents as well.
Now, my wife is completely full of hate and bitterness towards my parents and brothers, and refuses to ever allow them to visit our home ever again. She insists she will never forgive them for what they have said recently to her in their emails, and for how they have offended her years ago. She doesn't want to allow them to see our children anymore either. She believes that when I die, they will attack her to get their grandchildren back. And now my parents are saying that I have betrayed them, and am a terrible person for waiting this long to express to them our "True Feelings".
This dysfunctional family feud is torturing and tearing me apart from inside, and I am losing much sleep over it all. I don't know what to do at this point. I tried to facilitate communication, honesty, and healing by writing to my parents but it appears to have backfired on me. If you can help me, please give me advice.
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