... to be sad at the way Christmas seems to have changed?

[MereDintofPandiculation]

I was brought up to view Christmas as a magical time, but a time above all for giving. Getting together as a family (grandparents cousins, aunts, uncles) because it's one of the few times that the family does get together. Making sure no-one is left out. Learning to enjoy yourself and have a happy time with others even if your home is full of relatives, or you spent an hour on Christmas morning travelling to other relatives who don't make the bread sauce and brandy butter quite as well as your mother.

Nowadays on MN "family" means "me, DH, DC" and Christmas is all about receiving and not giving. "You have a right to spend Christmas in your own home". Everything centres around making it perfect for the children, without any thought of modelling for them the qualities of thinking about other people.

AIBU in thinking this not only makes life more unpleasant for older relatives who are excluded or barely tolerated, but that it also bodes ill for the future, in moving society more towards "it's all about me" and less about taking responsibility as a society for the welfare of all its members?

I don't recognise any of what you are saying OP.

My christmas as a child wasn't particulary inclusive of our wider family- by choice.

My christmas now actually embraces more family members that we did when I was growing up.

Do christmas the way you want to.

My parents are on a permanent world cruise or similar. This is VERY different to the generation before. My GP were very prudent and always had a traditional christmas every year.

I don't think it is just this generation changing their values and priorities it is the whole of society.

We would love for our family just for once to consider us, sadly the endless cocktails are more enticing than making christmas lunch and spending time with their grandchildren.

You really are only telling one version of events with your post op.

Secondly, it's often a question of logistics. One person is far easier to transfer than three or four. I actually don't mind the idea of having people over on Christmas Day, but dragging kids out of their home for the sake of older relatives who are in fact perfectly able to make their own way over is ridiculous. I know I talked about travelling in my OP but what saddens me is the number of MN posters who talk about spending Christmas at home with no visitors - not simply deciding to do their own Christmas instead of going to one set of parents, but having Christmas on their own.

OK, people are saying I'm lucky and unusual in having relatives who are capable of enjoying themselves together, and if that's true, that is even sadder. Have people got nastier over the years, or are we simply less able to tolerate other people?

I feel sad that Christmas is definitely a lot more materialistic but then that’s true for society all year round. A lot of it is to do with the internet. DD asks for way more than I did as a child because she gets to see so much more. I must admit to feeling very happy when she said that the best thing about Christmas was having dinner all together.
Going back to your post OP, I think Christmas is very much an individual thing. Our families are a bit scattered but we do meet ups near to the big day with extended family then on Christmas Day it’s DH, DD, me & my parents ( DH’s folks are no longer with us). When DM was fitter & “ did” Christmas Day, she would often invite friends along who would otherwise be on their own.

YABVU for talking about Christmas in early October.

Also, I think this may have something to do with women becoming less willing to run around facilitating everyone's needs/demands and smoothing ruffled feathers, and being more willing to say no.

Christmas involves a fuck of a lot of wifework and in many families it is done mostly by women - the present-buying, the wrapping, the journey planning, the packing (or conversely, preparing the house for guests) etc etc etc. Then the cooking, managing overexcited kids, tidying up etc. I'm sure some men do their share but there are a lot of threads on here from exhausted women doing it all, and others telling them they can say no, which I agree with.

If a woman can actually have herself something resembling a break at Christmas by saying no to in-laws and opting for a day in her pjs on the sofa, I support that.

YABU op

What works for your family, doesn’t work for others, for their own personal reasons

My husband’s parents expect us to be at theirs for dinner until dd’s bedtime now that my parents have passed away. Never mind the fact that my mil was never expected to leave her house on Christmas Day. Just once I would like to not have to tear my dd away from her new toys just to suit someone else, who could easily hop in the car to come and see us for a few hours after dinner.

I think to some extent. But one thing I think maybe has gone is a bit far is the pressure to make it magical for the kids by spending a shit load of money on activities over the holidays. In a group of 6 friends all with 2 - 3 year olds and à baby, they all did at least a couple of Christmas activities at 30.quid a pop (train rides and santa meet, Christmas wonderland and santa meet etc) and a christmas play and a panto. That adds up to hundreds. And Christmas eve boxes. I just think it's another way for parents to put more pressure on themselves and spend more money. Christmas eve is magical enough for kids without a box of even more stuff!

I always thought that JK Rowling's description of Christmas where they all ended up at St Mungo's was the most accurate I have witnessed. Bah Humbug.

My PIL refuse to meet on Christmas Day instead coming round on Boxing Day. They say Christmas is for being with your family ie DH, DD and myself. I personally find this weird and lonely with my DH in the kitchen and me with a 2 year old in the living room. It feels like any other day.

With my parents it’s for 3 days and there is always someone to talk to and help entertaining DD. It’s more social.

Lydia

Yes, sorry, I wasn't explicit.

I do also think spreading the joy out over several weeks is lovely anyway. My grandparents didn't get all.their family around at one time often, no. But they did get a visit every few days from siblings, children, grandchildren etc over a whole month.

This year I'm doing similar because we'll be on honeymoon over Christmas. Seeing my parents one weekendeknd before we go away, friends for another Christmas party and fiance's family round to ours when we get back. Christmas day in a lovely hotel abroad! Looking forward to it.

Both of our sets of grandparents have chosen to move away. Two of our three sisters have moved away for work. We relocated 100 miles to be in the middle of DPs (one set live v remotely and one set in a v expensive city - so unable to join either). Neither set of parents will visit us while the others are there. So we have our own Christmas Day and visit relatives at some point before new year. I refuse to spend Christmas Day driving for hours, stuck in traffic with all the other mugs.

Families are often geographically spread out now - chasing jobs, meeting partners at university and not returning to hometowns, priced out of where they grew up. And current generation of grandparents are holidaying more, moving to long-dreamt-of locations etc. Society has changed.

I spent years dragging my kids around both extended families, one in the afternoon and one in the evening. They had no fun. It had to be meticulously planned to make it work and we spent most of the day travelling. Eventually, we stopped because we just couldn't face it any more. Nobody is upset at our absence, they completely understood and we see them on other days in a much more relaxed way. Now we're home the whole day, I've been able to invite people round when I found out they were going to be alone on Christmas day. It's so much better.

I do think there's something skewed about a Christmas that involves hundreds and hundreds of pounds worth of presents under the tree for children but excludes any invitations to relatives in lonely or difficult circumstances to come over to yours for Christmas dinner.

In some families it's the presents and the outings that seem to be the entire focus of Christmas, with extended family coming a very poor second.

On the whole I would say many people’s attitudes to drink driving have changed for the better over the years, and that this too influences how much driving people are prepared to do on Xmas day.

I wonder how many people who are citing wonderful get-togethers in days of yore have actually been responsible for hosting?

That makes total sense soundofsilence.

I don't think ppl have become nastier, there's always been problems in many families. Ppl may have become less willing to put up with it which is not a bad thing IMHO. Many of my older relatives have longstanding feuds with each other so it's not a 'younger person' thing. Also spare a thought for ppl who have divorced/separated parents (esp if its on both sides!); that's a whole new level of stress/unpleasantness. And all of that is not even taking into account logistics, long working hrs/shifts etc. I think YABU to make such blanket statements without considering ppl's circumstances. I agree with the pp who said about the 'season' of goodwill; visits can be spread out, different ppl seen at different times etc. That seems far less pressured to me than trying to cram everything into one day.

Christmas involves a fuck of a lot of wifework and in many families it is done mostly by women - the present-buying, the wrapping, the journey planning, the packing (or conversely, preparing the house for guests) etc etc etc. Then the cooking, managing overexcited kids, tidying up etc. I'm sure some men do their share but there are a lot of threads on here from exhausted women doing it all, and others telling them they can say no, which I agree with.

I spend a lot of time with extended family over Christmas, but this is true.

Learning to enjoy yourself and have a happy time with others even if your home is full of relatives, or you spent an hour on Christmas morning travelling to other relatives who don't make the bread sauce and brandy butter quite as well as your mother.

If a relative who doesn't make the bread sauce and brandy butter quite as well as your mum is your example of having to spend Christmas not quite as you want it, you've obviously led a very sheltered life. No wonder you're so astonishingly lacking in empathy for others' situations. Every unpleasant person whatever their age is related to somebody else, so why should those people's relatives spoil their own or their children's Christmases by entertaining such unpleasantness?

YABU and slightly weird. Why do you care how other people spend their Christmases? Especially people you don't know. I know I don't. Let people get on with their thing and have the Christmas that you and your family want.

Absolutely spot on about wifework. The massive happy gatherings you remember were almost certainly the fruit of an extremely tired womans labour.

Women don't have to knuckle down and ruin their health running around pleasing others any more and for that may we all be very grateful.

Some people don't have extended families!
I grew up with no aunts, no uncles, no cousins, one GM, who I don't have beyond 4, so none of my siblings even had that.

My children have had no cousins until a year ago....

Our Christmas was just us and our parents. I think many people had the same tbh. Your Christmas experience seems unusual to me.

You should meet my family. I bet you'd very quickly change your view of magical Christmases with extended family. I'd rather be on my own with a Christmas dinner flavoured pot noodle than with them.

You sound a bit keen to garner applause for your concern for the elderly, which is slightly ironic given your claim Christmas should be all about selfless giving. If you really were selfless about it, would you need to make a song and dance so everyone knew?

My childhood Christmases definitely had magical elements I loved. I have wonderful memories of stockings and decorating the tree on Christmas Eve, and excellent food my mum made. But I also remember that she always got incredibly stressed, and often ill with the stress. And it was her birthday!

My parents did Christmas just as our nuclear family, and they've always been very clear we should feel free to do the same. My mum loves to cook a big meal and get us all round the table, but we don't do it on Christmas day and it just takes the pressure off a bit - plus, now we're all adults, it means having several festive meals over a longer period with different people hosting. I think that is much nicer! You may not have a single day when every single family member is there, but you have more opportunities, and if one day you are ill, or it snows or freezes so you can't travel, you don't feel so left out, because you can get to something else.

It’s just a generational shift, these things happen.

We wouldn’t leave elderly relatives alone but they always have their own plans for Christmas anyway. My DGM spends it with friends from church and DP’s Grandad goes abroad. Our parents honestly get on our nerves and they spend it with their partners anyway so we end up it just being the DC and us at home which suits us just fine.

As for presents, we do only buy for those who buy for us. Selfish? Maybe but we don’t have reams of cash.