Family Matters: Q & A 

Question

My son, let’s call him Eli, is the only boy among several girls. 13 years old. He’s a charming boy, likes to help, likes to laugh, and is very sensitive. He’s smart and talented. And he spends most of his days and nights doing nothing. This situation has created much friction with my husband. Eli feels his father is not interested in him to the extent he likes to say he’s adopted (to point out: my husband loves him very much). 

My husband is always the first at davening, while Eli arrives at the last second (at best); my husband wants to see him learning in his spare time, while Eli prefers to ride his bicycle; my husband davens at hanetz hachamah, while Eli prefers to sleep in and daven at the last minyan. I should note that when my husband is there, Eli gets up with him to daven, but when he’s not there, he doesn’t. On the one hand, I tell Eli to behave nicely with his father; on the other hand, I tell my husband to cut him some slack.

I don’t know what to do. The two of them go headlong into endless ego wars, that’s how it looks to me from the side. My husband is very rigid, straight as a ruler. He knows how one should behave and doesn’t accept that Eli behaves differently. In contrast with his seriousness, Eli is light-hearted and enjoys laughter and nonsense. My husband simply doesn’t understand him. 

What do I do? How can I close the gap and prevent these unnecessary fights? How can I restore Eli’s trust in his father? When I intervene on his behalf of him, my husband demands that I not intervene. I think Eli knows his father loves him, and Eli also loves his father, but it’s very hard for him to accept refusal, anger, and lack of acceptance. Eli tells me that Abba doesn’t say a single kind word to him but just hates him.

What do I do?

Response

Very dear mother,

I read the question, reread it, and feel the heavy responsibility you carry on your shoulders. Justifiably, you want all parties to be satisfied; you want to bridge gaps, understand all sides, to restore family harmony.

You feel that your husband, Eli’s father, is stuck in his own way concerning how a thirteen-year-old should behave. On the other hand, the 13-year-old has chosen a different path for himself, one that includes playing, riding a bike, laughing, and enjoying nonsense. This hardly suits his father, but Eli’s also “stuck,” as it were, on his own path. And there is you, standing between them, taking on the self-appointed role of mediator.

I won’t go into educational theory here; it is not the right place for it, and might only serve to widen the gap between father and son or between yourself and your husband. You don’t need any written documentation that you’re right in your flexible way and that your husband’s rigidity is damaging. You know this on your own, and this knowledge isn’t helping you. Therefore, I would like to offer you a different type of avenue to walk.

In the same way that it’s clear to you that your husband and son are stuck in their own ways, I would suggest that you are also “stuck” in your self-imposed role of mediation. You have adopted a role for yourself in which you seek to explain the father’s intentions to your child, soften the actions that infuriate him, and try to bring them to love each other. The ambition and desire are, of course, worthy and positive, but the question is: what is really your place within your reality, within existing circumstances?

A vicious circle has developed wherein a child performs some act that isn’t right in the eyes of his father, the father gets angry, and the mother tries to soften and mitigate. Someone needs to stop circling so that the rhythm is broken and the flow stops. Tell yourself and truly believe that Hashem, in His wisdom, gave the child two different parents. It is abundantly clear that even if they reconcile all possible positions between them, there will be differences of opinion between them due to the fact that they are two different people. Moreover, both (and not only your spouse) are imperfect. Everyone has a process they need to go through to find the right path for them.

One of the most important (and hardest) elements in a relationship is giving your partner the respect to make mistakes and fail. Nobody is perfect, and everyone has their own work to do, which belongs to their personal sphere. Ideas and principles that you know to be true could be unintelligible to your husband. Coming back to your own words, you write that your husband is “very rigid, straight as a ruler,” and it’s certainly possible that you are far more flexible than he is. As a couple, this will be part of your marital work: you’ll have to internalize that your partner isn’t perfect and that he is not supposed to be like you. A relationship is between people who are not the same. These different people are tasked with the labor of rapprochement and connection. It is in this labor that we find the joy and bliss of a beautiful partnership.

How can the vicious circle be broken? As long as you assume the role of mediator, you somehow take responsibility for the situation instead of allowing father and son to find a way to move forward within their own reality. You need to believe wholeheartedly that your son has the strength and love to get along with his father, and that even the father has the love and desire for the child to progress and flourish. How will this happen? They’ll find the way.

Of course, there is a “problem” in your son’s getting up later that his father expects or riding his bike instead of learning, and so on. But changing this reality is not up to you. Your role, first and foremost, is to refrain from taking responsibility for their behavior – otherwise, they will rely on you and become entrenched in their ways. As soon as the responsibility falls on them, everyone is responsible for their own work. By taking a step back, you open a door for them to examine their own reality, understand it better, draw conclusions, and move forward.

Secondly, I would recommend learning from Aharon Ha-Kohen, who loved peace and pursued peace. Yes, there is a labor to be done in assisting them in loving each other, though without the dimension of taking responsibility. For example: hang a happy picture of father and son on the refrigerator; tell your husband how your son spoke about him with appreciation and admiration; remind your son how much his father respects and loves him. You may initially receive cold responses or even less. Don’t panic. Say your piece, and allow the words to enter the heart. Let things happen. Believe in your husband and son and the process they are in; everything new needs getting used to.

In conclusion, let me add that your question implied that father and son share a healthy, normal yet stuck relationship. This is why I lingered on the issue of acceptance on your part and allowing things to move on and progress. Had I noticed in the question that the father-son relationship was humiliating or abusive, the answer, of course, would have carried a different character.

I very much appreciate your search for the right path and wish you much joy and satisfaction from the process,

Tamar Pfeffer