To judge friend's approach to Christmas?

[NoisyDenimShaker]

I'm desperately trying not to judge my friend, who keeps talking about how much she loves spending Christmas only with her husband and kids. I don't have kids, so perhaps I just don't understand. But I feel I've watched her turn into someone I'm finding more and more difficult to respect. Here's the situation: Her parents are dead now, but when they both had terminal cancer, a few years apart, she wouldn't invite them for Christmas. Even when her mum was terminal and widowed, she wouldn't invite her. The mum did have a companion, but she was desperate to spend Christmas with her daughter and four young grandchildren the last two Christmases of her life. She was terminally ill for both of those Christmases, although the cancer hadn't yet overwhelmed her and she could have travelled. Anyway, it didn't happen, because she wasn't invited.

My friend also has a sister whose husband had an affair, and the sister will be alone this year since the parents are gone and her husband is with OW, but she won't invite her sister. (When I say alone, she'll probably have invitations since the sister is cool, but she has no family left to spend it with.) Neither will she inviter her in-laws, who live nearby and are old and one is terminally ill.

She gets on fine with all those family members, whom I know are deeply hurt, as our families know each other and go way back. What she says to me is that she just wants to spend Christmas with her husband and kids.

So my question for all the parents here is this: When you have kids, is it understandable to just spend it with the husband and kids. even when various family members are dying and/or alone? That they grow up so fast, and in the blink of an eye, they'll have their own partners and Christmas will change forever? So you want to have Christmases alone with your spouse and kids while you can?

I'm just really trying to understand, because friend keeps talking with glee about how she's having the Christmas she wants, and I'm having difficulty not judging.

I don't have kids, so perhaps my friend is being totally reasonable and it's what all parents want - just to be alone with their spouse and kids at Christmas? Maybe my friend is not being unreasonable?

This thread is terrible. There is no guarantee that because you invited great aunt Hilda over at Christmas every year that your dc when adult will invite you over. Likewise this woman’s dc might really appreciate she put their Christmas over doing duty to family and welcome her with open arms when they do their own Christmas. You should do it because you want to and not because society expects it, you’ll feel guilty if you don’t or you feel like you’re paying chocolate coins of Christmas hosting into some kind of savings account that will pay out when you’re old.

And again op if you dislike her this much and cannot see a way past her apparently incomprehensible behaviour, bin her off and leave her be.

We alternate our home as just us and the in-laws. We never host.

Because they don’t drive we would have to pick them up, dh doesn’t get on great with my family, if we hosted mine we would have to host his at some point, I don’t get on with his that great. Then that means dh sibling will want to come with their children, that’s too many people. My children also don’t like their cousins so would hide in their bedrooms all day if at home it’s bad enough when at in-laws for Christmas dinner they try and hide away. Our house is not huge there is already five of us. Then we have cats. In-laws don’t do cats.

And frankly that just does all sound like far far too much effort and a terrible day. I don’t see my brother fretting about leaving our parents alone either so why as the daughter is it just my issue… in-laws have every other year with nobody as well because again dh sibling always wants to be when we are because cousins which ruins it overall anyway because her children cry and moan because mine won’t play read 9 year age gap and their undisciplined children who smack and cry when it isn’t their way.

There is no guarantee that because you invited great aunt Hilda over at Christmas every year that your dc when adult will invite you over.
No of course there’s no guarantee, but it does make it more likely, when they’ve grown up with a certain example of how Christmas works.

Likewise this woman’s dc might really appreciate she put their Christmas over doing duty to family and welcome her with open arms when they do their own Christmas.
Or they could think “mum will understand not being invited/us not going because she didn’t think it was important to invite or visit her parents/dad’s parents”

That's very sad actually now unless she didn't talk to her parents then I woukd understand but jf she was talking and no issues then yes that's selfish. Terminal mum to bless.
I don't talk with my parents because they were emotionally abusive to me telling me they wished they never had me and all sorts of stuff. However if I had a relationship like others do then I wouldn't have minded

I’d be more than Happy alone. Drive to the beach with a snacky picnic then home for a hot curry or go aboard. As long as they have a good Christmas I can have a good Christmas.

That’s you. There are plenty of people who would feel sad not to see their adult children at Christmas.

How very Christian & kind calling a woman a "total bitch".

If you were in the same position as the friend described in the OP, would you still do the same?

Ummm I don’t know - maybe because there is a pro- social norm that family and friends take care of each other, especially at Christmas and especially when people are old, dying, alone…
If I have any more such radical thoughts on the matter I’ll let you know.

But it’s not on their adult children to have to fulfil that need every year. When do the adult children get to have a Christmas they like or want. When their parents are long dead, children if they have had them moved out with their own now children.

We expect children to understand that not every want and whim is possible but the second an elder person stomps their feet over Christmas everyone else should jump?

Thankfully my parents and dh’s don’t place any such expectations that we are required to fulfil their happiness just because of a date on the calendar.

Did you or your family end up inviting her mum or sister for Xmas?

It seems some people think you should only need to demonstrate love caring and kindness at Christmas and not on MN threads.

Yeh cos responding in a sharp tone during a debate on mumsnet , is certainly the moral equivalent of abandoning your dying mother at christmas,

Are any alone? Any with a terminal illness?

I learned years ago that it’s not a crime to disregard to societal expectations. To quietly explain one’s choices without making a drama out of them, but being able to compromise if it is required. For all that today’s women say they benefit from a great deal more freedom nowadays, there does appear to be self imposed expectations around certain choices. Hence the rush to conform in so many different ways, and if you choose a different path to the “latest” must do, must have, you can be judged harshly.

No we are good. And the ops friends parent went to her sisters so still not alone.

It's like another thread where the dd had said she'd prefer Christmas just nuclear family.
The OP (her'd' m) of that thread and many posters were just as vicious and spiteful with calls of how evil and unkind the teen dd was, and the best way to show her loving values, not be selfish and #bekind was to permanently throw her out of the family home!

And who said 'stomp their feet'

If we get away from the hyperbole and to the original point:

If you have a close relative who you actually love and who has been a good parent as opposed to abusive, would you:

a) not invite them if they were going to be alone
b) not invite them if they had a terminal illness

We are not talking 'usual' Christmases here

My family couldn't give two shits about me. I have no idea how my parents will spend christmas, one is disabled and one has cancer , they certainly won't cross my threshold. Toxic families are not just for christmas and being old and sick doesn't absolve these people , they are still bad people until the day they die. We as a society really need to stop trapping people in toxic situations under obligation, guilt and fear of being judged.

I would ask them firstly what they would like to do. It might be that they would prefer most of the day alone, but a long zoom call and a nice meal prepared for them.

My Mum is terminally ill. Incapable of coming to our house for Xmas, in fact she won’t really know it is Christmas most of the time. This year, having spent 364 days previously looking after her, by agreement, I am having the day at home, with my OH, and we are going to do exactly what we feel like doing, probably enjoying a cycle ride while lots of places are quiet, then back for a nice meal. I don’t feel selfish, I am not stressed about not seeing her, and it’s all been worked out. We have had lots of Christmas’s together as a family, lots of Christmas’s doing our own thing, a few actually away together over Xmas.

It’s just one hyped up slightly different day of the year. Great if you have the day off from work and can get together, great if you have the day off and can do something different.

The I admit here selfish part of me wouldn’t want to host a last Christmas either.

Because I think it would ruin Christmas going forward. It would also be on your remember the year nanny was here and she did/said XYZ. Remember when Nan sat there and then… I’d be up for a meal out though on the day book a restaurant.

Alone, again depends would it then become a yearly obligation meaning I was forever tied into this never getting to change my own plans. Invite for a meal between Boxing Day and new year sure but Christmas Day invites always tend to lead to yearly obligation from duty.

I’m so sorry your family couldn’t give two shits about you
Maybe they also subscribe to the vicious individualism displayed by OP’s friend and so many posters on this thread

I really feel for those with horrible relationships of one kind or another, and hope that somehow they find a way of enjoying what the vast majority of people consider a time for families. Fine if that’s what you want, and you have that kind of loving bond (I am lucky enough to have a lovely family, and have married into another). But you don’t choose your family, and they don’t get to choose you. So you have to make the best choice for yourself. Get along in the least stressful way, make the most of what you do have. For some, Christmas is the only “me time” they might get because of parental, caring, employment responsibilities.

But there’s the difference … your mother didn’t care, whereas the OP’s friend’s mother clearly does.

Family dynamics can be a strange thing. I've seen all sorts from people who see their parents daily to those who have zero contact, I know people who go abroad every year just to avoid the Christmas rows. I'm lucky I get along with my family so I'm happy to spend Xmas with any or all of them but it's not the same for everyone! Try not to judge and just be grateful you're not in the same position.