To think the attitudes of some MNetters towards extended family at Christmas very dispiriting

[welliesandleaves]

There just seems to be a lot of threads here at the moment where posters are being advised to 'do whatever suits you' at Christmas, regardless of how much it hurts the feelings of parents or parents in law.

I realise that sometimes it's just not possible for families to be together on Christmas day, but I actually feel my heart breaking for some of the elderly people who are being left on their own, not because they're toxic or anti social, but because their grown up children or children in law simply can't be bothered to include them. All these comments about wanting to spend Christmas 'with my own family'.

AIBU to find this very depressing and selfish. Surely 'family' includes parents, regardless of whether you now have a partner and children of your own.

[miaowroar]

For the first few years after having DC we spent every Christmas travelling up the motorway and dividing Christmas Day between two families with two fractious over-tired kids. The GPs (who were younger than I am now - 60) had never travelled on Christmas Day, but had the downside of having to put up a family of 4 overnight.

Then my *SoL and Bol came back home after living abroad for 10 years and Bol announced that he would be staying in his own house on Christmas Day - anyone was allowed to come, but he would not be moving. My PoLs were a bit but after all, that was what they had been doing for the past 20 years.

We were quick to jump on the bandwagon and Christmas became a lot more relaxed and enjoyable after that.

I have told my DCs that if they ever need to spend Christmas with partners and their family, that's great - I would relish and nice Christmas Day on my own - watching what I like on the telly and eating what I want.

• Sol - Sister out-law (am now divorced)

[MildVirago]

I think the OP is a combination of sentimentality (Christmas trumps all else in the emotional blackmail stakes), soft-centred ageism ('Ooh, the poor, pathetic old people eating their cut-price turkey crown for one') and muddy thinking, with a side-order of 'women need to run themselves ragged after everyone else, regardless of what they want' - frankly, I don't see a current of panicked men wondering how to get through a day that's still almost two months away while balancing the mutually-contradictory needs of a large set of people.

And the undercurrent of implicitly blaming women because their male partners choose not to cultivate close relationships or time-consuming exchanges of birthday cards and Christmas presents with their own families is misogynistic and frankly illogical. I have no idea whether my husband sends his parents and siblings cards, because that's not my job.

I'd like to see women putting what they want first far more often.

[Moreshabbythanchic]

I used to invite MIL for christmas every year but she prefers to spend it with BIL's exW's parents. I dont ask now.

[WyrdByrd]

For me it's not a case of preferring to spend time without them rather than with them - just that we could never please both sets of parents so it was easier to say if we see neither of you, no one can accuse us of being unfair/favouritism.

[museumum]

You can't please all of the people all of the time.
If we spend Xmas with my ILs then what about my parents? And if my MIL has SIL and her family too then what about BILs parents?
I have a brother and he has a gf and she has parents too.
It's an impossible chain if you insist on including "everyone".

[Thurlow]

It's an attitude thing, though.

Sometimes the logistics don't add up. Sometimes a GP doesn't want to give up the hosting, definitely - because there definitely is a point where it makes more sense for the poster and DH to start hosting Christmas, rather than a DM/MIL hosting, especially when there are lots of children involved.

But there are some people who seem to think, fuck it, I'll do what I want and I don't care about how anyone else feels.

[Sansoora]

When I married DH he got my whole extended family- they were not an option. I got his.

Yep. Its the same here. Warts and all. And thank God everyone seems to like being 'one of us' just as we like being 'one of them'.

I love having a houseful and it doesn't matter if I know people or not. If the kids or extended family want to bring someone they can. The more the merrier and I'd never see anyone without a home to go to or a place at the table.

Life is just way too short to not share it with others.

Loneliness is a killer.

[trollkonor]

Hmmm my Mum sometimes makes little comments about my brothers spending more time seeing their inlaws, there's an underlying feeling that they are being bossed about. Nothing could be further from the truth! I've sat in so many conversations with a sil desperately trying to get one of my brothers to give an idea of what they want to do and sign up to a plan.

My Mum often makes comments about how useless men are at organising, not interested in remembering birthdays, warnings not to send them present shopping. Wierd how my brothers take a back seat and seem to think they can opt out.

[Thurlow]

Also, if you want to look at it as women need to run themselves ragged after everyone else, regardless of what they want - that's too simplistic. Because if you're going to go into the argument of women 'hosting' Christmas, then you have to follow through with the whole argument about why their DH isn't helping out around the house more, why their DH isn't doing more cooking, why in their particular house it becomes about the woman 'hosting'. And then you're into societal preconditions and all that jazz.

Or the simple fact that many people will simply assume that it is the woman who has to bend over backwards and concede to others wills. Which says a hell of a lot, really, if that's an assumption that's jumped to.

[bronnie98]

YANBU

[SarahSavesTheDay]

Sometimes I fantasise about a Christmas where it's just me, my husband and our kids; we wake up, open presents and spend the day doing fuck all except eating/drinking.

In reality it involves 15 people, multiple airports, hotels, shipments of gifts appearing at the 11th hour, someone being sick, someone crying, jet-lag, etc. Viva La Christmas. I know I'll miss it terribly when its over and hope my kids will bring me into their fold the way we have our own families.

[DickDewy]

It's easy to feel pity for abandoned grandparents because you don't know the whole story.

We have great parents that we want to spend time with, but when I got together with my dh, we inherited an extended version of his family - a cousin, her husband and their 3 kids (they live abroad). My dh is not close to them in the slightest, in fact he finds them pretty unbearable.

I put up with about 3 bloody awful Christmases with them here, eating us out of house and home and massively outstaying their welcome. Then I called time on that particular arrangement.

We love a houseful, but we have to actually like the people.

[Bakeoffcake]

Yanbu. I've had my PIL for Christmas almost every year for 20 years. Dh's brother lives only two hours away but only invites them or visits them at Christmas about every five years. He and his wife are definitely of the "we please ourselves at Christmas" variety.

My PIL are lovely but bonkers. I'd love a Christmas with just DH, me and the children but the thought of not inviting them would never cross my mind. It's what Christmas is all about IMO- families.

[TheOriginalMerylStrop]

It makes me sad too.

So far as I am concerned being irritated by someone's refusal to help in the kitchen/insistence on present opening rituals/idiosyncratic Boxing day buffet options/Johanny Cash Christmas CD is the bloody point of Christmas. It is not about it being "perfect" or doing whatever the fuck you want and sod everyone else. Do that another day...oh, yeah, you probably do that too

We travelled 100 miles every Christmas morning to be at my mum's because she had a "companion"/manfriend who lived down the road who would otherwise have been alone every year because his daughter preferred to go on a cruise and he had a condition that meant he didn't like to stay overnight away from home. The kids always thought it was fun to bomb down the motorway in time for Xmas lunch listening to carols in the car.

[flippinada]

Hard as it might be for some folk to comprehend, there are people who actually like spending Christmas alone!

This happened to me a couple of years ago (DS away with his Dad, my parents visiting in laws) and it was WONDERFUL. No stress, no pressure, just pleasing myself all day. I may well do the same this year.

[WorzelsCornyBrows]

Were doing our first Christmas at home just with the DC this year, but our parents are welcome if they want to come (they don't as they prefer doing their own thing). However, none of them will be alone. I couldn't bear the idea of any of them being alone at Christmas. That said, both sets of parents are lovely and enjoy Christmas, so having them around is no hardship. If they were toxic I wouldn't let them anywhere near my Christmas celebrations.

[TheOriginalMerylStrop]

If people:

1. want to be alone; or
   
2. are so bloody obnoxious that they deserve to be alone
   

that is different to their selfish grown up kids would rather do whatever the fuck they wanted and they got left alone/caring for a sick spouse

[CurlyhairedAssassin]

Family is what Christmas is all about in my opinion. DH and I have always spent it together, taking it in turns to spend the day with my parents or the Inlaws. It wouldn't feel the same to just spend it here with the kids on our own. It becomes just another Sunday roast dinner then!

That said, if relationships between any parties were particularly fraught then I would think twice about it all. And I don't mean trivial things like someone else hogging the remote control, or great grandma refusing to try the "exotic" starter of prawn cocktail. Any real nastiness wouldn't be tolerated.

I see a couple of people have likened the selfishness of some people on Christmas Day with the bride and groom wanting everything their way on their wedding day. You can't possibly compare the two things, FGS! Christmas Day comes every year, a couple only get married once, why shouldn't they had things the way they want it, just for one day in their whole life?

And a wedding is about 2 particular people and only them. Their guests attend if they wish and hopefully everyone has a nice time. Christmas is not just for 2 individuals to celebrate, with their guests joining in with their support. It's a celebration AS A GROUP. Everyone is equally important on the day in my view and mucks in together. Nothing like a wedding where all attention and focus is on the bride and groom.

[Rangirl]

YANBU
To be honest I always find the thing about wanting it to be just the 4 of us etc really odd
Might just be me but that is just a normal day!

[MildVirago]

Thurlow, that exactly what I'm saying - our social norms, as amply demonstrated daily on Mn, still see hospitality, household cleanliness, the preparation of food, present-buying and nurturing relationships with both sides of the extended family as 'wife work', not something equally shared between men and women, making Christmas a female domestic trial by fire for an awful lot of women. Again, as seen annually on here.

It's not what happens in my house, but from what I see on Mn, absolutely there is still a strong societal expectation of female domestic effort and self-sacrifice for the sake of others, and a corresponding lack of expectation that men share all domestic duties, cooking, care taking family relationships etc - and that means that all this 'invite everyone for Christmas' idea is not an equally shared burden, but another gendered expectation.

[MorrisZapp]

MildVirago has nailed it. It's all about female effort, organisation and emotional responsibility. When the day comes that men fret months in advance about how on earth to please everyone on Christmas day, I'll hear otherwise.

And loads of older people are grumpy shites. They aren't just a generic mass of benevolent kindness and smiling at small children.

And even the many nice ones will want to eat their meal when they're hungry and not when a busy family day allows.

[flippinada]

I don't know..I think there's a lot of pressure on to have the "perfect" family Christmas (whatever that is) and folk tie themselves in knots doing what they think they should instead of what they want.

If people do enjoy that type of Christmas then great but it isn't for everyone.

I have a friend who always goes home to their family at Christmas despite the fact that all of them spend the entire holiday arguing and fighting with each other and having a thoroughly miserable time. Despite this, any suggestion that it's not necessary to go through the annual nerve shredding torture fest is greeted with absolute disbelief.

[flippinada]

There's a lot in what Morris and Mild say as well. Much of the organisation and grunt work around Christmas falls to women.

[drizellatremaine]

YANBU - as you know, I agree with you. I do wonder what message it sends to children that Christmas should be all about 'us'.