'Work in Progress' Episode 6 explores parent remarriage challenges as Abby takes mom’s ashes to dad’s wedding
There’s a scene in episode 15 of the third season of the popular U.S. mockumentary/comedy series ‘The Office’ that shows a young Michael Scott as the ring bearer at his mother’s second wedding. The boy-Micheal was so upset with the whole ordeal that he not only cried and threw a tantrum -- he shouted “I hate you!” as he threw away the ring -- he also urinated in his pants in the process.
His version of the event was, “My mom was marrying Jeff, and they asked me to be ring bearer. And I was understandably emotional and somehow my pants became wet.”
Watching parents getting remarried can be tough and not just for an emotionally-stunted child who grows up to be an emotionally-stunted adult. In the sixth episode of Showtime’s queer comedy ‘Work in Progress’, we see that it can be a difficult ordeal for an adult as well.
Abby (Abby McEnany), who is already depressed and suicidal, was visibly displeased about the fact that her aged father was remarrying someone, merely two-and-a-half years after her mother’s death. By the time it was the wedding, Abby was at the end of her fuse.
Even though she seemed happy and energetic at the wedding, mingling with friends and her new family members, in moments of solitude, one could tell she was having a hard time. All throughout the wedding, she kept getting flashbacks of her mother -- the good times they had when she was alive, the night she died.
She is so affected by the idea of her father moving on with life that she carries the ashes of her dead mother to the wedding. All night long she keeps experiencing moments of panic, and in one of those moments, she accidentally broke her promise to her boyfriend Chris (Theo Germaine), a trans man, whose one and only condition was that Abby never asks about his deadname.
In an essay titled ‘Mom's in Love Again’ in Time magazine, author Pamela Paul wrote, “Coping with a parent's remarriage requires acknowledging that traditions, boundaries, and plans have changed. Certain situations may prove thornier than others,” adding, “Adult children may grow concerned that they'll be shut out of decisions for their aging parent.”
People tend to feel fearful of being abandoned or isolated from their only remaining parent. They are afraid of a change in the parent’s loyalties to their original family.
They may even experience a kind of jealousy, especially that of being replaced by the new spouse. And then there is the thousand-pound elephant in the room: a fear of the financials in light of this new relationship.
Therapist Ron L. Deal, the director of Smart Stepfamilies, a family educational organization, writes, “Without question, a parent’s remarriage ripples through the generations of your family. It may take a great deal of time for you to open your heart to a stepparent and their extended family.”
Abby’s issues with the remarriage, near the end of the episode, find some resolve. She speaks to her stepbrother and finds out they have similar concerns and that neither of them actually hate the new addition to the family.
She makes peace with her father as well, knowing that one way or the other, she has to accept that he is a married man again. Her only solace is that he has neither forgotten nor fallen out of love with her now-dead mother.
‘Work In Progress’ airs every Sunday at 11 pm/10 c only on Showtime.
