Working adult kids and Christmas?

[thekittensmittens76]

Do yours come home? Do you get angry if they don't?

I'm with you fullofhope03. Volunteering is great. Going for a walk and watching telly is great. Do what feels right for you.

I truly think this is cultural

Please don't. I'm Irish too and I think you're acting the bollox.

Fullofhope, there's nothing wrong with your attitude.

FFS, that's hideous for you.

Buy her a grip for Christmas

We're very selfish and generally spend Christmas day on our own, eating far too much and enjoying being to fart off the sprouts without fear of embarrassment.

Very occasionally we go to rich SIL's and cook Christmas dinner for everyone (approx 18-20 people) as no-one else in the family can cook. We enjoy it, but it's not the same as getting gently pissed and overeating in the comfort of your own home.

One Christmas we went to bed to sleep it off at about 6pm, and didn't get up till 9 on Boxing Day. Bliss.

Has anyone ever played Denis Thatcher's Manoeuvre?

That's when a couple tell both lots of parents that they are going to the other lot then go to neither and do what they want!

Is it really an Irish thing? I know a lot of expat Irish people and they have never fallen over backwards to get home for Christmas. It might be different in Ireland itself, but I think it depends on the family and it's not possible to make blanket statements.

My mum always hated Christmas and since I left for the US and my dad died and my other sister has in laws to cater to, she is happy to skip it altogether. She's allergic to fir trees too, so she has the smallest fake tree in the universe, and quite honestly she is happy to go into Dublin and get a good seat at Mass in Clarendon street where they have a lovely choir. Eats enough to keep a sparrow healthy, so Christmas and all the heavy desserts are not her thing either. Quite the Grinch...

My dad's family were veddy stiff upper lippy - marked birthdays with a handshake, with Christmas definitely a religious holiday, presents taking a backseat. Christmas dinner was a festive event, with flaming plum pudding and lots of fun at the table. But if all of dad's ten siblings and their spouses and children were to turn up for dinner they would have had to take numbers for seats.

I don't think it's an Irish thing to look forward to getting home for Christmas - it's more a function of being away, with Christmas providing a handy occasion when people might consider a trip to a focal point that suggests itself thanks to the occasion.

American families tend to make a pilgrimage for Thanksgiving. It's always mayhem at airports and you can never get a cheap flight, and highways are jammed. A lot of businesses close for the whole weekend (Thurs to Sun) - sadly not retail as this is the kickoff to the Christmas retail season, but there is some backlash against requiring retail workers to effectively miss this holiday. I am not fussed over Thanksgiving at all, nor are the DCs. Three of them are doing their own thing this year.

Christmas in the US is not the two week event it is elsewhere. You get the day off, and maybe Christmas Eve.

Pre-kids, I always chose to work on Christmas/public holidays if I could because it meant I got double-time pay (in Australia - don't know if that applies elsewhere). Plus, I tried/try to avoid family Christmases at all costs, because my family are a bunch of assholes and Christmas with them is rife with tension and hostility.

This year, we have conveniently timed our overseas holiday to return on the 27th. What a shame we won't be there for Christmas.

Is it really an Irish thing?

No it really isn't.

I would never ever ever kick off if my daughter never came for Christmas, and in fact, I have advised her not to this year, as she found it a strain last year, coming to ours, going to the boyfriends folks, visiting his lonely nana 40 miles away, and then trying to save some time for themselves.

I suggested we meet say 23rd December and go for a meal, and then meet again 4 or 5 days later. (They live half hour's drive from us.)

My BFF's mother, and her DH's mother always fought over 'Christmas day rights.' His mother wanted to go to their place every Christmas, and her mother wanted them at hers. Shame the lot of them could not have gone to my friend's mother's really!

I also have another pal whose DH's family lives in Devon. They live 200 miles north of Devon, and every Christmas, she, and he, and their son (primary school age,) have to hot foot it down to Devon and spend the week there, sleeping on air beds in the lounge. And every year, she complains about it, and dreads it.

Why the fuck people cannot just stay in their own damn home at Christmas just eludes me. Just say you're going abroad, or something! (Or just say NO, we are staying at home, alone, just us!!!)

I don't understand why some parents think they have the right to demand their (adult) children come for Christmas. Or that they have the right to be with THEM. See each other the week before or something. Why the actual Christmas break - Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Boxing Day etc? Leave your adult children in peace for once!

And no offence, but from what I have read on here, the Irish Christmases (for some!) sound like bloody hard work, involving quite a few 'entitled' people. Glad I don't have to tolerate that to be honest.

My Irish DP has spent Christmas with my family in Scotland for the last 5 years. Apparently home is grim at that time of year!
I work in the NHS about 2hrs from my family home. Christmas eve- boxing day seems entirely normal.

However this year I am on-call over the period but crucially this is from home- and luckily in a specialty where I am likely to get phoned for advice but unlikely to have to physically go in. I've invited my family to spend Christmas with DP and I at our house instead but they're really not keen, which is making me quite sad - I would not however go all tears and tantrums about it!!

Not cultural at all! It's just individuals the world over who are controlling over this kind of shite. We have Christmas Day with my side of the family, Boxing Day at home and a couple of lovely days with friends in that no-mans land between Christmas and New Year. It's lovely and yes it sounds routine bitbit works well. There's no expectation to be at anyone's at 9.00am, and we usually don't get to the host on Christmas Day until 12.30/1.00. We all do our share an no-one is in control.

I agree, Grilled.

exMIL was not just controlling about Christmas but about every single Sunday for the rest of the year too.

Another Irish person here, not quite emigrated but did move from the real capital to the actual capital after uni.

We spent every Christmas Eve driving home (as I had to do the morning at work) and back again afterwards, but DH and I had to split up once home until we were married. The year that we were getting
Married 5 weeks later, I was allowed to call to dh's DPs for about an hour.

The following year, we ate 2 dinners (1 cooks at lunchtime, the other at night). We managed 2 years of that, then rebelled to staying home 1 year (there were 5 younger DSiblings in my house, and 2 younger in DHs). After that, we have generally rented a house when we go home for Christmas as an escape option, and it's less often than it used to be. No one will ever come up to us. We stayed at home when DD was due Christmas Day (arrived 6am BD) and when she was 1, but travelled again for a few years.

We had a year at home then DFIL died and DMIL is distraught still and has also lost the tempering influence of DFIL against her guilt-trips, so we've been down the past 2 years and I am adamant we are staying home this year (so so sooooo needed) but she's just broken her wrist.

Of my dsiblings, all have missed a year at lest due to being abroad but yes, there is the annual trek home for most. We are the only ones who spend Christmas away from DPs without spending it at DPILs (there are some others married who split or do turn about - but none have yet spent it alone in their own homes).

And funnily, it's often a few of the various DSibs who are the worst for guilt-tripping (other than DMIL at present).

I haven't had Christmas at my parents for years, but 'Christmas won't be Christmas*' without my sister (until very recently single, mid thirties, lives abroad, journey involves plane-coach-ferry, usually on 24th).

I learnt this the time I suggested my sister stay with me for Christmas and we visit in Boxing Day. We're unable to stay overnight due to a bad mix of dog/children and it's not possible to do a return ferry trip on Christmas Day itself. So have often had it at home, sometimes with PIL visiting.

*where Christmas is a day of work for my father, not great food, and ends in them going to sleep at 3pm

I love spending Christmas with my parents and we always go back home for a week or so. They still live where I grew up so it's a good opportunity to see friends as well.

One of the benefits of being in a mixed race relationship is that we always do Chinese New Year with my partner's family and Christmas with mine and everyone is happy. We don't have kids of our own yet though so things might change then.

I have friends who drove to 3 different places in the country on Christmas Day. What sort of a Christmas is spending it in the car? I wouldn't want my children spending their day traipsing round the country just to squeeze in seeing every relative just to meet the demands of family members.

It must be very easy to place demands on family when you're not the one doing the travelling.

Next year I'm hoping to do some sort of Christmas in January and try to ge them all together.

@Maryz then you are a sensible Irish parent. (and a sensible parent in general)
The ones being complained about are those who would whine and moan and cry and rend their clothes and not accept that sometimes the 25th of December is not practical (and that sometimes 3 days with your family is plenty).

Glad to know I'm not the crazy one!

Gosh I'm Irish and don't have any of this pressure, not sure why it is labelled as an "Irish thing". Sure I think Irish culture is more family based with lots of big gatherings involved but I don't know anyone in my family who would feel pressured to go to a Christmas gathering, nor do I know of any families like that.

fairly sure all cultures are based around families.

My dad and in laws are super chilled out about Christmas. My mum not so much. I get that she wants to enjoy the magic of her grand children at Christmas I really do. But she just doesn't understand it's not about her now, it's about the kids. Ever since the new years day, the day after I was allowed home from hospital after a brutal forceps induction birth, unable to stand due to my blood pressure meds and the fact I still had pre eclampsia at this point. She turned up with her dp, my sister and her husband hours late, when it was only meant to be her.

They then stayed hours, let dd walk on kitchen sides, let her wee on the floor, pretended not to see it. Let dd walk it everywhere and made me clean it up while dh cleaned dd up assuming someone would help me. I ended up back in hospital the next day, wonder why my blood pressure rocketed up again?

She's already putting feelers out, but she is not welcome in my house on Christmas. Ever since that entire lot showed me how little they respect me and dh they can take a flying jump.

No, I don't get angry. My children have lives that don't revolve around me. Some of them will come home at Christmas, some won't - it's up to them, and I don't love them any the less if they choose to spend it elsewhere. Why would I?