Hillbilly Hell

Since meeting my spouses rural family - they have rejected accepting me into their rather large family since day 1. With the personal attack from my husbands brother and the support from his parents - its been an all out war to break us up. No RSVP or go crap in a bucket response to wedding invites, showers, invitations etc from his large family.

Under verbal siege and harrassment, we got married and have been married for two years. Of those two years, being dragged through tension that my husbands family hated us, we realized their constant barrage of calls to have their son attend family events that though they missed "his presence" that they didnt really care about him as a person (so there was no way in heck they would ever care about me).

Then the slap in the face was their undying support of his older brother and his new white wife. And their showering of love and support in our faces and them telling us to just get over it and deal with it and just put it aside so we can give them what they want "his presence" to family functions so that they feel better having the entire family together. No one can tell you much about hubby because no one really knows him because they dont care. They just want him there to say that he is there. After the first year of me attending with him many weekly events, no one spoke to me, no one asked me life questions, no one got to know me. I was in a rural backwoods house, sitting among rural backwoods people who gave me evil eyes and refused to talk to me. And I am blamed for the reason hubby has changed to try and think for himself and be himself.

So after two years of receiving harrassing messages from his family on both of our cell phones, ranging from threats, calls to insue a return call, name calling and just announcements about whats going on with the family from jobs to weather to health - we decided not to return the calls until someone decided to value us as people to build a real relationship.

So with a health scare and cancer detected in his father, surgery was recently necessary - hubby has become the FAMILY BAD GUY for not "being there" for his father at the hospital to take on the hail of insults, complaints, physical threats from the 20+ family members that would be there.

After 16 voicemails, calls and imposing calls - hubby finally called his mother. Basically - he cares for his family, but he doesnt appreciate being disregarded as a person or his choices ignored. So I am sure he feels better for calling since he is being blamed for his father not recovering properly because he is so concerned not hearing from hubby...I believe that they should have tried to fix the broken relationship well before now. Not just demand hubby be present whenever they demand to make them happy whenever they say. Basically all the hurtful things that have occurred we have to ignore, get over and include them back into our lives.

I sat with a sick angry feeling because hubbys mother used to talk to him the way she should talk to her spouse since he was so gruff. That relationship has severed and she has missed her gossip buddy. So the minute he got on the phone, the anger he had softened. It turned from hurt to sadness. He articulated some of how he felt, but not all. He asked questions and assured that he cared, but he was hurt. Relieved that he called, his mother talked as if everything is in the past and her concern to move forward with him being there for his dad. I am both happy they reconnected and sad at the same time. I realize that that reconnection will occur with hubby losing a large part of his adult self again to become a little boy to obey his mother and his family. I also realize that his call to his mother opens the door of for his entire family to piggy back off of with their demands. He also told them of our move out of state. They, once again, will know where we live to haunt us with their demands.

I am not happy about being around closed minded people and reducing myself to a black person in the 60s with limited rights as a human being just to spend time with his family to make them happy. I am not a real person to this family who believe blacks are less than. I have been in their presence and its unbearable. There is no relationship there between us and if there is an emotion, its animosity and contempt. Yet, they are my hubby's family and he is trying to do the best thing. I am just seriously afraid it will be at the cost of our marriage. Listening to the call gave me the sinking feeling that hubbys backbone has disappeared and I will have to fend for myself for any type of respect.

I may have to rethink some things, and I hope his father recovers 100%, and I know that health will continue to be an issue for this family because its hereditary and we will continue to get calls. He will continue to try to rebuild the relationship bridge that they purposefully burned down and as he builds, they will stand on his back no doubt. Because of who he is, he will be walked over by them because they refuse to see him as a man of his own who is married. They see him as a college kid who cant think for himself because thats who he used to be before me.

It seems that I am going to have to allow hubby to surrender to their will to make his family happy and face the evil bombardment alone. But as it stands, I will not willingly go into the lions den to be ravaged to sacrifice myself for people who know nothing about me but my name. They dont know my age, my life, my history, they dont know anything about me so I am offended seriously by their disregard for hubby and for me. To me, they are backwoods closeminded strangers. To them, I am the enemy who married their son.

I am so torn and happy that we are moving in two weeks. But with the poison that has been spread throughout the entire family and the venom that we've heard on cell phone messages will not be in our faces. Well, hubbys face because I wont be there. But I know that I will have to deal with the after affect casualty they inflict on hubby and have to deal with the emotional torment it brings into our marriage. Makes me think twice about having kids because I dont want to expose them to people like that. I dont want their racial comment of "having little black babies running through the house" to ever cause my unborn children harm when they come into the world. They wont be just "my kids" so hubby could allow them to be exposed to his family and I would have to take it....but if they never get born....

Lots of thinking and inner searching to do - even in my moment of resettling in a new state...(ugh and sigh)...