I am pregnant, due on Christmas Day, and we have three year old twin boys as well. We spend every Christmas with my MIL, SIL and other members of DH’s family, always going to MIL’s house. I’m not British, so my parents are in my home country. As a result, it’s never been a point of discussion about whose family we will spend Christmas with. My DH also feels very strongly that his family should see our children regularly, at least once a week ideally. This has been difficult for me because it’s very different from how I grew up (my extended family weren’t local, so we only saw them once or twice a year), but I have tried to be accommodating and now just tend to let him take the boys while I have a couple of hours to myself.
Anyway, due to being pregnant this year, I suggested to my husband that we stay home on Christmas Day and have a quiet, relaxed meal just the four of us, and then invite his family to come for dessert, presents, visiting etc afterwards. I thought it would be a good compromise: I can be home where I’m relaxed and comfortable, but everyone in the family can still see each other. My DH seemed happy with the suggestion and presented it to his mum, who was fine with it. However, it turns out that he didn’t listen to me properly and thought I was suggesting that we have his mum, sister and uncle for the whole Christmas meal and basically all afternoon. He is now saying that is what he wants to do and doesn’t want to change the plans.
I know there will be some people who cooked a Christmas meal for twenty while 40 weeks pregnant with triplets, but that just isn’t what I want this year. I thought that I had found a good compromise that would keep everyone happy with a little less stress, but my DH seems to think this is unreasonable. He also says this will not go down well with his mum. I’m not asking for every year to change, just for this year to do things a little bit differently so there is less pressure on us (me) to organise a full, elaborate Christmas. I now feel quite hurt that he is unwilling to see this from my perspective and that he thinks neither he nor his mum would be happy to be accommodating just this once.
To avoid drip feeding, this kind of argument regarding his need to accommodate his mum and sister having unfettered access to our children is a common one. I had felt really grateful when I thought that he understood my desire for a compromise this year at Christmas, and am disappointed to discover that the only reason he was happy with the suggestion was that he didn’t actually listen to me properly.