I recently read Glimmer of Hope by Eden and felt it had a worthwhile tale to summarize. Beware, it will be a SPOILER ALERT. But I just have to share.
This takes place in England during the early 1800s. The couple married without the husband's parents ever meeting the wife. The couple enjoyed each other's company and then he left for a session of Parliament in London. The father convinced his son to leave his new wife at home because she wasn't ready to be a political hostess yet. The wife was disappointed when she didn't get to go to London.
After a three year separation, they meet by accident at one of their estates. It's a house party so they have to pretend to get along in front of others. They both thought each other had abandoned the other spouse. The husband's mother is there and exacts her daughter-in-law to play hostess beyond her physical ability. The couple slowly grows closer. After the wife collapses, he discovers she has a heart ailment. The wife's grandfather asks why he never responded to all her letters. The husband then discovers that his late father and mother had withheld all his wife's letters. The parents knew she hadn't left him--she physically couldn't return--but they assumed the wife would ruin their son's political career. The parents feared he would return to his wife.
The couple works through their misunderstandings. The wife tells her husband not to have regret, but enjoy the present and look to the future. The husband admits that if had he known all this, his parents' influence would have affected his decisions to a certain extent, but not kept him away as much.
Parents usually positively influence their children, but a few parents do not have their child's best interest in mind. Children need to know their parent's intentions, and not let them manipulate them in anyway. This is just so critical concerning marriages. There are running jokes about in-laws, which occasionally has truth to it. The relationship with the spouse takes precedence over parents.
"What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder" Matthew 19:6
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