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Exchanging Birthday Gifts with Parents - HELP!
Hi everyone! I need your advice and I'm sure many of you have been in the same boat as I have.
My parents exchange birthday gifts with us, but my husband's parents do not. My husband and I have felt for the past couple of years that exchanging birthday gifts with my parents is unnecessary, but it seems to be hard cycle to break. My mom can be really sensitive, so I don't know how to bring it up to her and my dad without hurting her feelings. My parents are hard to shop for and buy everything they want or need for themselves anyway, so it's always hard to come up with a gift for them, and I feel like they feel the same, since they always ask me and my husband what the other would like for their birthday.
Have any of you ever dealt with this? How did you bring it up, and when? My mom's birthday is this weekend and I plan on getting her a gift since I gave my dad a gift for his birthday earlier this month and feel like bringing it up at her birthday would not be an appropriate time. Thanks so much for your input!!
Re: Exchanging Birthday Gifts with Parents - HELP!
Don't bring it up at her birthday, as you said that's not appropriate, but you can talk to her in the weeks following.
We exchange gifts with both sets of parents, and while they can be difficult to shop for I enjoy buying them things and I still enjoy receiving gifts myself
If it's really something you want to change, have you considered suggesting a new tradition- maybe dinner or a show of some kind? That way you are still celebrating the birthday without shopping for them. If money is the issue, I would be honest that gifts are difficult to fit in to the budget.
We exchange cards (sometimes w/ gift cards) with my parents and nothing with ILs (they aren't in our lives). When they were in our lives, they would send a card to DH and nothing to me. DH doesn't know when his dads bday is and his mom usually got a card.
Both of my parents hard to shop for. My mom actually used to tell me how my dad hates the gifts that my sister gets him and that she should just get him a gc. I took that as my cue that gc would be just fine from us. I think that when they call asking about gifts throwing it out there that gifts aren't necessary, or when you call them ask how they would feel about it. Like you said, not with your moms bday coming up-but maybe around Christmas.
No matter how much of a hassle this is, I would never never never end this tradition. Your parents have raised a daughter and now their time of raising her is over. She's a mature woman who has married and has a life of her own. Still, the parents want to be a part of her life and they want her to be a part of their life. Birthdays are special times in relationship sustanance.
Go buy your mom something nice and don't crush her by telling her later that you are so very done with her as your mother that you don't even want her to get you a gift and think of you on the very day that she gave birth to you - which was probably the very most glorious day of her life and of the life of your parents' marriage.
Get your mom a gift & don't stop the tradition until after her bday & onto the next cycle of bdays. You want to do it w/a fresh start - not when someone's feelings may get hurt.
If it isn't a money concern, just a hassle of finding a gift, why not treat your parent's to dinner on their bdays? That way, you're still acknowledging it?
Or, if it is a money thing, why not make a cake & have them to yours & DH's house for dinner? I guess it depends on how close you & DH are w/your parents.
Why are you ending this? Because of "fairness" - that you don't shop for and celebrate birthdays with your ILS, or because you are TRULY tired of this tradition, independent of how DH's family celebrates?
I think it is wrong to end the tradition simply b/c you don't exchange with your ILS. They are different, you don't need to treat the two the same.
However, if you really don't see the need for an exchange, there are a number of alternatives you can try:
"Hi mom, instead of exchanging gifts for each birthday, why don't we pick an event (play, concert, ball game, dinner, hike, beach day, rodeo) that we all want to do and attend that together? You could do one annually (maybe between the birth dates), and rotate who picks. <<GASP! This does not mean that you are obligated to go to an event with your ILS!>>
"Mom, we have everything we need. Instead of buying a gift, why don't you donate to a charity in our name?"
You can also decide that you want to cut down on gift exchanges, and ask your mom to choose - which would she rather cut, birthdays or Christmas? You may be surprised. Some people feel birthdays are "more personal" than Christmas and would rather exchange at that time.