My parents have some very specific Parenting Policies. Policies that I grew up with, and appreciated, and followed… But now, as an adult, am not sure how or if they apply to my life.
For instance, the Curfew Policy. Which lasted until I was – no lie – 22 and in graduate school. My 21-year-old self still rebels against that Policy. But I will have to wait until my own kids are old enough to drive to really figure out whether I’ll adhere to it myself.
But another more relevant issue is the Bad News Policy.
My parents’ Bad News Policy goes like this: They did not share Bad News with their kids until we needed to know.
Need an example? This is not a real life example, but say I was in Paris studying art for a summer (I wish! How awesome would that have been?! I’m pretty sure there’s no curfew in Paris.). And let’s say that my grandfather died while I was in Paris.
My parents probably wouldn’t have told me until I got home. (Note: Let me reiterate that this did not happen. But I am extrapolating from actual events that this is how my parents would have enacted The Bad News Policy.)
They aren’t hard-hearted. They aren’t forgetful. They aren’t cavalier about death.
But they believe that there’s no reason to disrupt someone’s life for something they can’t help. Am I explaining myself poorly? I mean, if I were in Paris, and my grandfather had died, there’s nothing I could do at that point. So why would they want to ruin my wonderful experience for something that I couldn’t do anything about?
They would tell me, calmly and compassionately, when I returned. But my trip wouldn’t be marred by grief and the desire to leave in the middle to fly home and… do nothing.
Or maybe, say, my sister (Note: Another fake example. I don’t have a sister.) got appendicitis while I was in the middle of final exam week. And she had to have an emergency operation to remove her appendix.
It’s likely that I wouldn’t find out about it until the end of finals. Because why would my parents want to add stress and worry – about a scary but perfectly normal procedure that I could not add anything to – to my life when I had exams to stress and worry about?
I hope this doesn’t sound like my parents are cold. I truly believe this Bad News Policy comes from a kind and compassionate place.
But I remember, in some real life cases, that a part of me felt awful that I didn’t know what was going on at the time.
Was there anything I could do? No.
Would the situation have caused me stress and anxiety? Yes.
Would it have been nice to know, at least, what was going on? Yes.
Recently, I was put in a situation where I had the dubious honor of being the distributor of Bad News. Bad News I needed to tell my husband. But he was on call.
And the only way I could get a hold of him was by text message or email. And what was I to do? Share the Bad News electronically?
While I was contemplating this dilemma, I got an email from him about how stressed out he was. About how he’d gotten four patients in an hour, and one patient needed to go to the ICU, and it was his first day on this service and he was overwhelmed and stretched to the breaking point.
So I merely responded with some encouraging words. And kept the Bad News to myself.
Because you know what? He’s already Stressed the Fuck Out. And there’s nothing he can do about the Bad News right now. He’s at work. He can’t leave – and even if he could, there’s no reason for him to do so. Nothing he can actively do will help the situation.
So why add to his stress? Why overload his brain with yet another overwhelming fact? Why put his stretched-thin nerves even further on edge?
But even though all these things make sense to me, I’m not sure this Bad News Policy feels right.
What would you do, Internet? How do you want to hear Bad News? How do you want to share it?
I think you explained it very well. My parents will stress me out with small pieces of ‘bad news’ like my dad had a fender bender AGAIN, but then ‘forget’ to tell me that my sister had a cyst removed from her HEAD a month earlier and had to have her head shaved. (Just a small happenin’ apparently). My other sister called me at work to tell me that one of my closest friends had died. Personally, I prefer to be told ASAP, but when the caller KNOWS I have some time and space to process the information, if that makes sense.
My parents do the same thing, except then, I think that they forget to finally tell me the bad news. So, I usually end up finding out about it from a family member/friend and am totally embarrassed/mad/upset/overwhelmed when I hear something from other people that I would have rather heard from my parents.
Many phone conversations begin, “Mom/Dad! Why didn’t you tell me such and such about such and such?!!??! Such and such just told me and now I’m really upset!”
And, they still never tell me about any of their own medical maladies. My grandmother used to call me and tell me and make me swear not to say anything. That was the worst.
Interesting policy!!
My family is way different – if someone farts the wrong way, everyone knows about it, and will call to check on how the farts are going.
I prefer to be told right away about bad news or aggravating news or news that will make me anxious because I’m a superwoman control freak. I see it as almost a badge of honor to be able to function despite knowing that things are catastrophic.
But then again I’m a complete head case…..:)
Good call on not sharing the BN with your husband at that point. I think you made the right decision to wait.
I’m not sure how I prefer to hear bad news…the control freak in me wants to say that I want to hear it ASAP, but then the logical part of me (wait, is there a logical part of me?) thinks it is probably better to received the bad news at the right time, whether that be sooner or later. Does this make sense? I need coffee.
I guess I can see where the good intentions are by holding back bad news, but “being able to do something about it” isn’t really why you tell people bad news. If, like in your example, my grandparent had died while I was away, I would want to know, because I’d want to process my grief with other people who were also going through the same thing. Wait to tell me, and I feel like everyone else has moved on and I don’t have anyone to talk to because I’m at a different stage in processing the bad news. If someone is going through a health scare, I want to know so that I can comfort them and keep up with how they’re doing. I don’t feel like it’s anyone else’s job to protect me and my stress level from bad news. We all get bad news and it doesn’t always have the best timing, but we should at least all get the opportunity to respond to it in our own way. By holding it back from me, I would feel a little bit betrayed and resentful, that somehow the person who didn’t tell me was assuming I couldn’t handle it.
Part of life is getting bad news, but the only way to get through it is to do it together. If you’re the only one that isn’t in the know, you’re at a disadvantage. I don’t know that I would have waited to tell your husband if I were you, but depending on the nature of the news, doing so electronically might not have been the best way. But nonetheless, he’s a grownup and he deserves to know what’s happening when it happens.
I think you should have told him or at least told him that there is some “bad news” and would he rather hear it now or later? He is a big boy and can handle news and not be coddled. Is there really a “perfect” time when we are not stressed or overwhelmed? You could be sitting at dinner and think, “why waste a nice meal with such bad news…” or “why ruin his morning with such bad news…”
If my husband kept bad news from me just because I was having a stressful and overwhelming day I would be upset…
My mom always did the same thing with me and it drove me crazy. I feel like I want to know what’s going on regardless of how bad it is, but parents just want to protect!
Yep, my parentals had the same parenting policies. Like when my dog died three weeks before I took the LSAT. The dog that was like a sister to me growing up and I didn’t have a single childhood memory without her. My mom told me when I called to say that I was done with the LSAT and heading out for drinks with my girl friends.
Or when my parents got divorced. My mom waited until after my finals when I was home for Christmas break…and apparently it had happened quite a few months before.
It drove my insane, but I can certainly understand the need to protect! When my husband was deployed, I used this tactic all too frequently. I mean, I definitely told him that my grandfather died and that our dog had to have horribly expensive surgery, but I waited until he had time to talk on the phone…and not over an email.
I like your policy and the theory behind it. I’m just so bad at self-restraint. I can’t keep news to myself like that! But I should try.
Oh my gosh, my parents are the same way. My childhood dog of sixteen years died while I was on vacation in Jamaica and they told me when I got back. IT’s not like I could’ve done anything though-although if it were a friend or family member, they may have called and told me. I agree with you keeping it to yourself until he is home and not stressed the eff out-it would piss me off and make me more stressed to hear something like that while I was already “done.” But that’s just me. I see from some other comments they do not like that idea. But you know your hubby best, so do what you need to do. 😀
Best,
Sus
I think I would want to hear the bad news. Yes, I am stressed, but I think I would feel worse later for you keeping it to yourself for all that time. Am I making sense?
My parents more or less have this policy, too. My grandmother died when my cousin was at a Bowl Game in Florida, and they didn’t tell her until she got back. I thought it was a really bad policy at the time.
Then, my grandpa died when I was on a weekend trip to Boston with friends this past autumn. I had an awesome Saturday making new memories, eating ‘chowda’ and strolling Newberry Street in a tweed blazer. Sunday morning, my dad called to tell me that he had died the day before. I was still in Boston but would be leaving soon. I finally got it. I was so grateful to have had that evening of ignorance with friends who so rarely have time off of work to just be silly. Even when he called they hadn’t scheduled the funeral yet, so I couldn’t even make travel arrangements. When there is truly nothing to be done, I think this is a good policy.
However, if it was a case of someone needing surgery, I would want to know before the surgery so that I could be there if it was serious or at least pray beforehand.
I think you were 100 percent in the right to keep the Bad News to yourself while your husband was so stressed at work. I doubt your parents’ policy felt “easy” or “right” to them, either. In the event that someone special had died, I am sure they would have had their reservations about not telling you, of preventing you from attending the funeral and finding whatever closure you could by sharing the grief with others experiencing that same loss. There will always been pros and cons to any way you handle a Bad News situation, and you just have to do the least harm, the most good, with whatever situation life has dealt you.
I think it is a great policy…unless the bad news is that a family member has a terminal illness and less than a month to live or something. Then I’d want to fly out from paris to say the things I’ve always wanted to say, or just to be there.
I would not be able to stick to this policy – more because when something (anything) happens I need to talk about it NOW! I am terrible for that. That being said – I am protective as to what I tell my kids, you know – like age appropriate business.
Anyway – I think that not telling hubby was a good idea… the lives of his patients rest on him sometimes and he needs a clear mind to be able to do that. Nothing wrong with that.
My mom always wanted to shield me from bad news while I was away too, but I hated hearing about it after the fact and feeling totally out of the loop. Like when I came home from studying abroad in Spain to find out that she’d had CANCER while I was gone (skin cancer, relatively mild, she was OK, but still)! I hated feeling like I was prancing around Spain without a care in the world while my family was going through a crisis. I know she only did it out of love and to try to protect me from uncecessary worry, but I want to know what’s going on with my family!
It’s a little different with your husband, though… I don’t think telling him something at work while he’s very busy and stressed is necessary. Just fill him in the next time he has a moment at home.
I wouldn’t want to send bad news via text. I would wait until you see him.
You are a stronger woman than I! I have NO control over holding Bad News. If Bad News falls in my lap, I have verbal diarrhea and MUST. SHARE.
I am sure it was hard to hold in, but it sounds like keeping the news until your husband was off work was probably the right thing.
Although I would be seriously upset if my folks didn’t tell me a close family member died or was in the hospital for months… that might be a tad too much for my taste.
I always want to know/share bad news (or any news, actually) right away. But I think you made the right choice with your husband–he didn’t need to know RIGHT then, surely, and it could wait at least until his shift was over.
I hope everything’s okay! Sorry to hear there’s bad news in your life.
Our parents may in fact be the same people. Your scenarios pretty much did occur in my actual life.
When my grandfather died while I was in Japan, did they tell me? No, of course not. True, there was nothing I could have done. The man was close to death before I left on my trip, so it wasnt a shock or anything. Although I really didnt see the point in them telling me that he was doing ok when I inquired about him in a phone call – I could have handled the truth, I was 23 at the time and very much aware of his declining health.
Also, my junior year of college – day of my 21st birthday, also day of my final 2 exams. My mother neglected to tell me that my great aunt had died 2 days prior because she didnt want to stress me out. This one I have to say was fair game. I did appreciate her consideration (I was REALLY stressed). Mom claims that she also didnt want to ruin my birthday. I could have handled the news if it were simply my birthday, but I do appreciate the consideration due to the fact that it was also finals time.
Given your situation I probably would have done the same. What good is it to stress your poor hubby out when there was probably nothing that he could do immediately with said news.
I am loving your blog. It’s nice to have a peek into the life of another newlywed wife! Let me just say that I do think you did the right thing by not telling the bad news right then. However, what I really want to comment on is the curfew policy. I thought my parents were the only ones who enforced a cufew on their 23 year old daughter! It didn’t go away until I got married and moved out. The even weirder part was it didn’t even start until I was 20…