Family Matters
Knottie69195896
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Holiday Drama with Splitting Family Time
Ladies, how on earth do you deal with family drama around splitting the holidays?
Our plan this year was to spend Thanksgiving with my fiancée's family, and Christmas with mine. Reasonable enough, right? A couple days ago my fiancée asked if we could go to his family's house (two hours away) for Christmas Eve dinner, which is a big deal for his family. His dad has cancer and he doesn't see his family very often, so I thought that was a reasonable request. We would still be home for Christmas morning with my family.
I mentioned this to my mom, and she got upset that we wouldn't be around for Christmas Eve, saying that we had told her we would be home. She also said that she had wanted to go to Christmas Eve mass with our family to honor my dad, who passed away earlier this year.
I feel like I'm losing my mind trying to keep everyone happy and avoid arguments with my fiancée and my mom. Help!
Re: Holiday Drama with Splitting Family Time
You and your FI need to figure out what the TWO OF YOU want to do. And then stick to it. Someone is going to be upset- you can't control that. Accept that and move on.
YOU felt it was a reasonable request. That's all that matters. It doesn't matter what your mom thinks.
And I've had my step mom do this. NO mention of any ideas or plans around X, but once I say that the ILs want to do X, all of a sudden it's "Oh- well... I had thought we might do __. But... o.k. I guess we won't".
She's only throwing that shit out because suddenly she feels threatened.
To your mom I would simply say "Well, I understand your disappointed. I wish we could be in two places at once. But as we can't be, FI and I are sticking w/ the plans we already made.". If she pushes, I'd just say "When FI asked to do this, I agreed. I'm not backing out on that.".
Again- you have to accept that you can't make everyone happy. And guess what? It's not YOUR JOB! They are responsible for their feelings. Really, they are. It's not your job. Your mom (and your FIs family) is going to have to accept that now that you're a couple, you're going to have to split your time. AND sometimes things will come up that might mean having to change things up. His dad is sick - makes TOTAL sense that he wants to spend part of the holiday with him. I would hope your mom can understand that.
I wish I could tell you that it gets easier dealing with all of these personalities over the holidays, but after 21 years of marriage, I can assure you that it, unfortunately, does not. I would LOVE it if my husband would agree to go spend Christmas Eve with his family without me, so I could spend Christmas Eve with my parents and then we could have the ENTIRE CHRISTMAS DAY all to ourselves and not have to leave our home or have anyone in it. I cannot imagine a more awesome thing ... I really, really, do not like the whole Christmas thing. People are so irrational, like what exact 24 hour period you spend with them for Christmas matters one bit.
Aside from church services that occur on Christmas Eve and Day, the actual days themselves are filled with eating, playing games, watching movies, chatting and opening gifts. Any of these activities can be done on any day of the year. There really is no difference between December 23rd and December 24th or 25th. Or, December 11th or the 4th. Etc.
Moving forward, why not see if your family or his family can "celebrate" Christmas over a different set of days earlier in December. Then, the other side of the family can celebrate over the actual Christmas dates (24th-25th).
With this there will be no crazy running around. No fighting. And no one feeling like they're getting the short end of the stick on holiday celebrations. Every body gets their own "protected" holiday celebration.
This year we celebrated Christmas the 13th-16th of December with DH's family. We had actual Christmas just DH and kiddos and me. We're doing my family's Christmas the second weekend in January.
It seems to work well. With this, my sis and her DH celebrate over actual 24th-25th with his family. Our family in January like I mentioned. DH's brother and our SIL, celebrated with us on the 13th-16th and with her family the 24-25th. It's so nice and PEACEFUL.
You would think that though, wouldn't you? I was told this, too.
Every other year we switch holidays. Thanksgiving with one, Christmas the other. Then switch. Last year, it was my parents' turn for hosting Christmas, except - last year was my first Christmas with DS. My parents understood that I have a family and I have a right to spend Christmas Day with my son. This year, it was the in-laws' turn. They are not as understanding - or forgiving. Being my second Christmas with DS and first with DD I was beyond excited. Until the dreaded family Christmas was brought up. MIL had her entire family spend the night Christmas Eve so that everyone would be there first thing Christmas morning but DH and I said no - She said it's their turn and we can celebrate Christmas any day really - - I said ok so why don't we do it with you all Saturday. - - That went over just peachy. It's "just another day" for you - but not for them. ((Bah humbug))