Becoming Sister Wives: The Story of an Unconventional Marriage (21 page)

Meri and I had started out with a really great relationship when I started courting Kody. I was so excited to see that she wanted me in her family. She wasn’t just looking for a sister wife, she was looking for a best friend. I was overjoyed. She even pulled me into her room once and asked me what kind of ring and wedding I wanted because she would make sure it happened for me. It was my dream come true to know she cared about my happiness. Things seemed pretty good with Janelle and Christine as well. I was so excited to share a life and family with these three women. As the courtship progressed, Meri’s and my relationship struggled, but I thought that once Kody and I were married that it would get better again. I knew Christine and Janelle were struggling, too, but again, I thought it would all get better once I was officially a part of the family and not just a fiancée, so I just held on.

When I chose to marry Kody, I wasn’t just choosing him. I wanted a relationship with Meri, Janelle, and Christine. While Kody and I were courting, I wanted to be close to his three wives. Whenever I came over to their house or headed back to southern
Utah, I would hug them hello or good-bye. I had felt secure that these women were open to my arrival in their family. After all, if they truly hadn’t wanted Kody to marry again, it would have been simple for them to forbid it. A man must have absolute permission from his wives before considering a courtship with a new woman. Meri, Janelle, and Christine are an independent bunch and they put their family first. If they hadn’t believed that I should be a part of their lives, they would have let Kody know. But even believing that I belonged in their family doesn’t mean it was going to be easy for them to make room for me. That’s a much taller order.

When I returned from my honeymoon, I was shocked to discover how much my sister wives were struggling. They were cold and standoffish and struggled to make room for me in the family. Where I had expected openness and acceptance, I found walls. Even though I was married to Kody, it still was very hard for them, so hard that they didn’t know what to do with me. I felt as if my mere presence threatened them. No matter how hard I tried to be sweet or kind, it still wasn’t enough. All my naive expectations that we would be best friends flew out the window.

Meri, with whom I’d once had a wonderful friendship, and I struggled a lot. She felt that anything bad going on between Kody and her was somehow my fault. This really hurt me since I had been ecstatic about the friendship I believed Meri and I could have. I didn’t know how to repair our friendship, but I wanted so much to try. I loved Meri, and I wanted back what we had had in the beginning.

I really didn’t anticipate how much my sister wives would struggle with me coming into the family. I was unprepared for the fact that they believed I was the source of their pain. I didn’t understand how difficult making room for a new wife could be. I never, ever set out to hurt anyone. I found that simply having a relationship with Kody hurt them. Anything that he did for
me had the potential of hurting them or making them jealous. I felt as if any kind of love and sweetness that they saw Kody and me share made them feel threatened and upset. So they shut me out.

There’s a strange phenomenon that happens in our lifestyle. When you are struggling with jealousy and insecurities, you manage to transform your sister wife into some sort of monster. You begin to believe that your sister wife harbors you ill will or intentionally means to harm you. And from this paranoid perspective, real problems begin to arise.

Usually, this paranoia springs from an insecurity about your relationship, not with your sister wife but with your husband. Eventually, I discovered that some of my sister wives were often angry with me not because of something I’d done, but because they felt like Kody loved me more than them, and this scared and threatened them. When I learned this, I tried my best to open up a dialogue with whichever wife was struggling with me. By talking things out, I was able to gain a fuller perspective and realize that their issues with me were really not personal. Often, they struggle with me when they aren’t feeling close enough to Kody, or when they are dealing with their own jealousy or insecurities. I feel these things myself, and I have to work on dealing with my own insecurities and jealousies and not blame my sister wives or Kody for them.

I know having a great relationship with my sister wives has less to do with them and me and more to do with them and Kody. In order for me to develop the friendships with them that I’d hoped and prayed for, I know that I need to promote their marriages, be a good friend and help them through whatever struggles they may be having, and, above all, support and love them.

After all, we are all women working toward the same goal: the strength and stability of our family and our marriages. We all want the same thing, and we don’t want to hurt each other. Despite
this knowledge, insecurity, which is the constant pitfall of our lifestyle, rears its ugly head. Instead of acknowledging that we are working together and that we want to make our family and friendships work, it can be tempting to think of your sister wife as the girl in high school who’s fighting with you over your boyfriend.

Figuring out how to navigate our relationships is tricky. Even though some of us were raised polygamous, we still grew up in a monogamous world. Aside from our mothers’ relationships with their sister wives, we don’t really have much of a frame of reference for how to deal with the conflicts and the jealousy that crop up. After all, we never see relationships like ours on television, in movies, or read about them in books. We have to navigate our situation blindly, without a map or outside help.

I completely understand why my sister wives can be jealous of my relationship with Kody. Our marriage is fresh and young. They may sometimes believe that he loves me more than he loves them because of this, but that simply isn’t true. I know Kody loves Meri, Janelle, and Christine. I wouldn’t respect him otherwise.

I know, however, that the best thing for Kody’s and my marriage in the long run will be for him to validate his other marriages and reaffirm his love for my sister wives. All our marriages go through high and low points, but he needs to commit to them and they to him so that together they will work things out. This is a universal truth in all marriages, polygamous or not. Although it’s not always that simple, this is something I’m always bugging Kody and my sister wives to do. I want all the relationships in our family to be successful.

When things become difficult between me and my sister wives, they have a tendency to block me out and not give me a voice. While they might be jealous of my relationship with Kody, I don’t think they realize how often I’m confronted with the fact
that they all share a history that I will never be a part of. They have a culture within their family that was long established before I came in. They have stories, jokes, struggles, and triumphs that are simply off-limits to me. Sometimes it can be hurtful to know that although I’m married to Kody just as they are, I will never be as deeply entrenched in the family’s history. I will always be the new kid on the block.

Sometimes it’s challenging to speak up and ask my sister wives to make room for me in their world. I have been in relationships in the past where I’ve been steamrolled. After this happened, I made a promise that I would always stand up for myself. Since my sister wives had developed such a solid and preordained way of doing things before I arrived, there was a tendency to brush off my suggestions. I had to tell them that I deserve a voice in the family, too. However, since I wasn’t around for those first sixteen years, my ideas and concerns often got downplayed.

During my first few months in the family, I would listen in family discussions while my sister wives and Kody would get angry with one another. I tried to suggest that there was a more constructive way of arguing—a safer, calmer way. I know from experience how much damage can be done when you don’t have control of your anger and frustration. But the family pretty much told me that that they had their own way of doing things. Eventually, I showed them through example how to talk things out reasonably. Now I’m often asked to help mediate family talks.

My sister wives will sometimes try to mother me. I feel like I’m the “little sister wife.” I have to remind my sister wives that I survived both a difficult marriage and several years of single motherhood on my own. I’m strong and independent. While I’m grateful for their advice, I don’t always need it.

We’re still in the process of blending our families. This has taken a great deal of patience. Before I arrived, the Brown family had their own way of running things, which was slightly different
from mine. Since they have so many children, they cannot tend to all the discrepancies that arise. They have a saying: “If you’re not bleeding, don’t tattle.” For the most part, they leave their children to work out their own problems.

I’m very emotionally sensitive to those around me, which makes it difficult to turn my back on even the smallest issue between two of our kids. If even the slightest disagreement arises, I want to get to the root of it. I want to sit the children down and talk it through, get to the source of the problem and solve it. Instead of telling the children to go work something out on their own, it’s my instinct to mediate.

It is my nature to be emotionally in tune with everything around me, both bad and good. For instance, I’m careful to group our youngest girls in a way that one of them doesn’t get picked on by the others for some of her quirks. I go out of my way to create an environment that is safe and protective for everyone in the family.

At first, the older kids and some of my sister wives thought I was babying my kids. I had to explain that I was just looking out for them—all of them, not just my own biological children. I had to explain to them that I raised my kids to be more emotionally sensitive to one another and to be comfortable expressing their problems and concerns. It’s not a sign of weakness, I explained, to address your issues head on.

Soon some of the older children grew comfortable with my parenting style. They’ve begun to confide in me because they know I’m patient with their problems. They are willing to spill their guts to me about their most personal issues, which is something of a relief for them. I want not just all the children but all of my sister wives to feel that I am emotionally available to them, so they can talk to me about anything.

During the first year of my marriage to Kody, my sister wives began to recognize what they call my “emotional intelligence.”
When I first started courting Kody, my viewpoint gave him a new perspective on his family and some of his relationships. At first, I think it was hard for my sister wives to hear my voice coming through when Kody spoke, but I think as time passed, my opinion was respected more and more. Janelle has expressed to me that she is grateful for my ability to make a tough conversation safe. Meri also confides in me when she is working through an issue because she knows I will validate her feelings.

After Kody and I got married, Meri and I decided to see a counselor together. We both wanted to get our relationship to the great place from which we’d started. I was heartbroken that we weren’t close because it was all I wanted. Meri was very mature about facing tough issues with me. It has made us better people and better sister wives. I love Meri so much. From the moment I met her on my cousin’s lawn, I felt an eternal connection to her. Meri is loyal, fun, and good. I love spending time with her. We have a lot of fun hanging out and being girls together.

We’ve both worked hard to implement the things we have learned in our relationship. She and I have repaired our bond and we’ve finally arrived at a place where we have our own friendship independent of the family. Now I tease her by telling her she tricked me into marrying her husband and then abandoned me! We have come so far that we can actually laugh at this. I’m so excited about the life that lies before us.

The potential for an everlasting friendship with these women is the best thing our faith has to offer. Meri and I have come so far in our relationship, and I am so grateful to have such a special closeness with her. I’m on the path to developing a closer relationship with Janelle and Christine as well. Janelle and I have opened the lines of communication and we have found that we have many things in common. She has amazing talents. I hope she knows how much I support her. Christine and I are building the foundation to a better relationship. Some days I know just to
let her be where she’s at. I miss it when she isn’t her fun-loving self. I pray all the time that she understands I have her best interests at heart, and that I love her.

I want to do girl stuff with them all. I want to be close to them all. I love them all unequivocally. I want them to know that I will always be open to hearing what is bothering them so that we can get closer. I want to share our families’ triumphs and sorrows with them. I want to support our husband together as a unified team.

I know that the potential for this closeness is there. My sister wives already do so much for me that sometimes I feel lazy. I had grown used to taking care of myself—attending to all of my business affairs, my housekeeping, and my child rearing. Now, Janelle does a lot of the accounting for the family. Christine entertains and keeps the kids happy when we are together. Meri gets us all organized for trips. They have taken such an enormous burden off of me. I’ve had to grow accustomed to having so much taken off my plate. Especially after being on my own for so long, the help and support is welcome. I realize that I don’t have to do it all.

At Christmas, I really learned how my sister wives could come through for me. I had been sick leading up to the holidays, and somehow, I had neglected to buy stocking stuffers for my own kids. I didn’t realize this until Christmas Eve when the adults were sitting around stuffing stockings. I was horrified. But my sister wives had it covered. I sat there in awe as they produced everything I needed to fill my children’s stockings. Now that I’ve had my first child with Kody, I’m especially excited to see what my sister wives will bring to this experience. They were wonderful throughout my pregnancy, looking out for my needs and lending a hand whenever possible. Meri even has a changing table and baby clothes in her house so she can take care of my baby on her own from time to time. Right away, I could see
the perks of having three wonderful women to help me raise not just this child but my three other children.