A couple of months ago, a listener of The Corey Podcast wrote to me about something that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about.
He was having a difficult time with his wife because of the relationship she has with their daughter. From his perspective, there is a constant undercurrent of tension because he doesn’t feel that his daughter is always honest. He believes she presents one version of herself to her mother and another version to him.
And the harder part is that he doesn’t feel like he can really address it.
His wife is extremely protective of their daughter, which has left him feeling as though he is walking around a family issue that everyone knows exists but nobody is allowed to talk about.
That is a difficult place to be.
And because I don’t know this family personally, I want to be careful with my advice. We are hearing one person’s side of the story, and family dynamics are complicated. There may be things happening here that he doesn’t see, things his wife doesn’t see, or things the daughter understands differently altogether.
But there is one thing in his letter that I think is worth talking about because it happens in families all the time.
Sometimes the problem isn’t that people disagree.
Sometimes the problem is that people no longer feel safe disagreeing.
You Don’t Have to Win the Argument
When you believe someone in your family is behaving badly, it can be incredibly tempting to make the goal of the conversation getting everyone else to finally admit that you’re right.
I’ve done this myself.
You see something. You notice a pattern. You become frustrated. Eventually, you start collecting evidence in your head.
“See? This is exactly what I was talking about.”
But family relationships don’t usually improve because someone finally wins the case.
If anything, trying to prove that your child is dishonest, manipulative, spoiled, disrespectful, or two-faced can make your spouse even more defensive.
Especially when you’re talking about their child.
Your wife may hear, “Our daughter is behaving in a way that concerns me.”
But she may also hear, “You’re failing as a mother.”
And once someone feels like their parenting is being attacked, the conversation can become less about the original behavior and more about defending themselves.
That doesn’t mean you should remain silent.
It means you have to be intentional about what you’re actually trying to accomplish.
Talk About the Behavior, Not the Character
There is a huge difference between saying:
“Your daughter is dishonest.”
And saying:
“When this happened, I felt like I was being told two different versions of the story, and it made me uncomfortable.”
The first statement attacks someone’s character.
The second describes an experience.
That distinction matters.
Instead of telling your spouse who your daughter is, talk about what your daughter did.
Instead of saying, “She always lies to you,” you might say, “There have been a few situations where what I was told didn’t match what you were told, and I’m struggling with how to handle that.”
Now you’re having a conversation about a problem instead of putting your wife in the position of having to defend her daughter.
Your Wife Is Allowed to See Her Daughter Differently
This is probably the hardest part.
Your spouse may not see your child the way you see your child.
That doesn’t necessarily mean one of you is right and the other is wrong.
Parents have different relationships with their children. A daughter may tell her mother things she doesn’t tell her father. She may behave differently around each parent. She may feel more comfortable with one parent in certain situations.
That doesn’t automatically mean she’s being deceptive.
Sometimes people behave differently depending on who they’re around because different relationships bring out different parts of them.
That doesn’t mean you have to ignore behavior that concerns you. It simply means that before you decide there is a conspiracy happening inside your own house, it might be worth asking yourself whether there could be another explanation.
And Then There Are Boundaries
This is where I think the listener’s situation becomes especially important.
You cannot control the relationship between your wife and your daughter.
You cannot force your wife to see your daughter the way you see her.
You cannot make your daughter communicate with you differently.
But you can decide what you will participate in.
If your daughter tells you something that you believe isn’t true, you don’t have to start a family investigation.
You can simply say, “That’s not how I understand what happened, so I’m going to leave it there.”
If you’re being pulled into arguments between your wife and daughter, you can step out.
If you’re being asked to keep secrets, you can say no.
If conversations become disrespectful, you can end the conversation.
Boundaries aren’t punishments.
They’re decisions about what you are willing to participate in.
And sometimes the healthiest boundary is simply refusing to become part of the triangle.
Don’t Make Your Wife Choose
This may be the most important piece of advice I would give him.
Don’t make your wife choose between being your wife and being your daughter’s mother.
That competition is almost impossible to win.
Instead, remind her that you aren’t asking her to love her daughter less. You’re asking for your concerns to have a place in the marriage too.
There is room for both things to be true.
She can adore her daughter.
She can protect her daughter.
And she can still listen when her husband says, “Something about this situation isn’t sitting right with me.”
That is what partnership should look like.
Not agreement on everything, but enough trust to be able to say, “I see this differently,” without the entire relationship falling apart.
Sometimes You Have to Stop Trying to Fix the Child
This is where I would gently challenge the listener.
If your daughter is grown, her behavior ultimately belongs to her.
You can express concern. You can communicate your expectations. You can establish boundaries. You can decide how much access you give someone to your time, energy, and personal life.
But you cannot manage another adult into becoming the person you wish they would be.
And if you spend all of your energy trying to expose what you believe your daughter is doing, you may accidentally lose sight of the relationship that actually needs your attention right now.
Your marriage.
Because at some point, the question stops being, “How do I get my wife to see what our daughter is doing?”
And becomes, “How do my wife and I learn to navigate our differences as parents and partners?”
That’s a much more productive question.
You Don’t Have to Pretend Everything Is Fine
Setting boundaries doesn’t mean pretending that nothing bothers you.
It doesn’t mean swallowing your feelings to keep the peace.
And it certainly doesn’t mean allowing someone to mistreat you because they’re family.
It means learning how to respond without allowing frustration to run the entire show.
You can love your daughter and still disagree with her.
You can love your wife and still disagree with how she handles something.
You can be protective of your family without becoming consumed by the behavior of one person inside of it.
And sometimes peace doesn’t come from everyone finally agreeing about what happened.
Sometimes peace comes from deciding that you don’t have to participate in every disagreement about what happened.
I think that’s something we could all stand to remember.
Family can be complicated because love doesn’t make us objective. Sometimes it makes us defensive. Sometimes it makes us overlook things. Sometimes it makes us see things that aren’t there because we’re already expecting them.
The goal isn’t to figure out who is the villain.
The goal is to figure out how everyone can exist in the same family without constantly feeling like they’re walking on eggshells.
And if you’re the person who currently feels like the third person in your own family, start there.
Don’t start with proving that you’re right.
Start with asking yourself what boundary you need, what conversation you’ve been avoiding, and what part of this situation is actually yours to carry.
Photo by Sandy Millar.
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