Need to rant? Come on over.

[DontlikeChristmas]

I’ll start. We’ve just opened presents. I couldn’t give a fig about presents for myself, but I think if you’re going to spend money on a gift for someone you’d may as well make sure it’s something they will like/use. DH has panic bought me a horrible tie dye jumper two sizes too big. I’ve never worn tie dye in my life. My mother has inexplicably bought me a truly awful outfit clearly meant for a teenager (I’m 50) in a colour I never wear, also in the wrong size. DH has also managed to buy DC a load of stuff they already have because he couldn’t be bothered to check. I feel so deflated by this & think it’s all such a massive waste of money (we probably could have gone out for dinner with the cost of the presents no one is going to wear/use, or made a charity donation).

We now have DHs family coming for dinner, who are lovely people but seem to have ever changing dietary requirements (none of which are due to diagnosed conditions) that it’s impossible to keep up with, so I’ve got to make about 15 different gluten-free/oil free/non-acidic/anti-inflammatory and whatever else dishes (DH ‘doesn’t do cooking’).

I’m over Christmas & it’s not even 8.30. Anyone else?

My husband bought me excellent gifts. Outstanding. A lovely mix of things I had asked for and surprises that I love.

He also stormed out of the restaurant at lunch over a stupid argument he was having with our son. Son was right - in so far as it matters given what they were talking about - and husband cannot STAND being wrong so flounced off. I had the car keys, it was bitterly cold and the restaurant took ages to bring our bill. I didn’t chase as hard as I could have. Because I’m mean.

I co-ordinated the whole of Christmas. He has taken responsibility for none of it, up to and including getting himself up today. I got up, walked the dogs, fed the cats and dogs, emptied the dishwasher, put washing out to dry, cleared the grate and laid a new fire, cleaned up cat sick, put the presents out (our son is 17), then woke him up at 11am like the child he is, along with actual child. I know I should have just woken him up sooner if I wanted help with stuff. Own worst enemy. But also - I shouldn’t have to wake another adult up on Christmas Day, and I don’t want ‘help’ - I want equal responsibility for the shit that makes our life function.

However I did get ace presents.

What an ungrateful man. You deserve so much more.

My Mum was waxing lyrical about my much younger (golden child) brother and what a wonderful Dad he is to my little nephew...adding 'he really loves him. Not like your Dad...he didn't love you.'

Well Merry Christmas to you too Mum. I know she's getting older, but she clearly favours said nephew (aged 4) over my grandson (aged 5) and is either not very kind to him or ignores him . She has just bitched about everyone all day, is bored with life, hates everything on TV, and goes ON and ON about the semi feral rescue cat we have, who has had 4 meals today but will not stay in the house while it's full of guests. He's fine, he's on my lap now she's gone to bed and the grandkids are asleep.

Next year I am NOT hosting. It brings out the worst in me seeing her belittle a 4 yr old. My brother wisely buggered off abroad this Xmas , and we will happily see him separately later...but he can have her next year. I hate feeling guilty for not being the perfect daughter, but fuck me she makes it hard.

However I cannot fault DH. He helps in the kitchen, washed up while I walked the dog to get a break, and as I asked him not to get me presents as I want to get some new clothes after Xmas, had tucked £200 into a Terry's chocolate orange for me. along with some lovely Adidas trainers I had shown him.( we pick our own gifts to avoid disaster, after the year of the Celine Dion CD😂)
He had a new expensive Kayak paddle as is equally happy...

Guests leave on 27th and I get lunch with my oldest friend... cannot wait!

Sod buying him socks, just box and wrap some dog shit if that's his attitude!

Mostly good day but my older teens will dip in and out and always play some games and then have a bit of time to themselves, but MIL goes on about "I wish they would come down they should be here all evening playing games etc" puts me in the middle protecting them as one has OCD and anxiety and I know all the upheaval is hard.
I also feel like I'm being criticised for not making them join in all day but it's a long bloody day when guests are staying over. I just said they don't want to be with us all day let them have chill time but it still niggles me especially when they have sat with us and played games and had food probably most of Christmas Eve and a good chunk of today.
I know she doesn't mean it nastily but it's still an implied moan. What 19yr old wants to play scrabble with grandma all evening.

I’d like a little rant. My MIL came for for the day. We alternate Christmases between the two families. She can be a little “middle England” in her outlook. My brother and sister in law were alone today as my SIL is pregnant with twins. I asked my husband if my brother and his wife could join us for dinner. My husband said he’d prefer if they didn’t because my MIL can be a bit inappropriate with some of her comments. Forriners etc. (my SIL is mixed race)
This morning we visited my bro and SIL. My husband then on the way home felt guilty that we hadn’t asked him and told me to call them and invite them. I did so but they declined as they had already started prepping their own food. They weren’t pissed off in any way, as they’re very happy in their own company. But I was a bit cross with my husband.

My brother and sister did this for each other on their milestone 50th birthdays. Nobody travelled to me for mine and no presents. My brother called me later in the day. It's taken me a while to start researching scapegoats in unhealthy families. It's helped me a bit, knowing it's a well established phenomenon and not just me. I also never get any response to anything I post on the family chat, including my merry Christmas post - every body else's was acknowledged with a heart or reply. I get the feeling you might be the scapegoat in your family. It's one of the most difficult things to handle. If you say anything about it, you'll be branded difficult and a negative complainer. There's no way to resolve it, as it serves a purpose for the other family members. Sorry you're going through it.

(DH ‘doesn’t do cooking’)

Sorry but more fool you here, OP. They are his fickle and ever-demanding relatives, it's up to him to cook for them! I would NOT! It's frustrating to me that even in 2025 women are such doormats. Like fuck would I be cooking for them, and that's that and that's final! You're enabling your husband and your ILs. 15 different meals? Find your ovaries and just say no! This is 2025, not the 1940s.

We were having a very normal family Christmas afternoon when my mother announced that it was very odd that I had such sensitive children as I am the least sensitive person she knows - ‘as sensitive as a brick’ in fact. Feeling very stung. DH, ironically, says I’m being over-sensitive to be upset by this…! 🙄

Merry Christmas, @ChronicallyMum❤️

mine is obscenely minor compared to most…

though I have worked hard over the years managing expectations and engineering Christmas down to a level that is manageable. (Various disabilities and whatnot in the family and I refuse to do any more than we can collectively cope with)

but I have a grotty virus, along with a godawful perimenopausal period from hell. it’s making me tired and headachy, not quite bad enough to postpone Christmas, just enough to make me feel sick and dizzy whenever I try to do anything.

fortunately, the teen cooked most of the dinner. I did a bit of prep, and supervising but mostly got shooed out of the kitchen thank goodness because Im not a keen cook, and had never done a Christmas dinner — DH used to do it all until he became disabled 2 yrs ago, so I’ve had to learn.

He doesn't do anything because you let him get away with it! You should have shaken him awake and told him to get cleaning!

Went away on holidays for xmas and 17yr DD has done nothing but complain about everything she possibly can complain about. The car travel, where we stop to eat, her drink isnt a proper thickshake, starting arguments with her brother for no reason, conplaining about the beach we went too, complaining about the seat she is sitting in. Everyone else is trying to enjoy themselves and I never get a break so trying to enjoy our time away. Am I wrong for telling her to shut the Fck up yesterday while we were out for a nice lunch, I think not lol. Heading home now. 12hr car drive, told her I dont want to hear a single thing out of her head. Wish me luck.

Ugh, so on top of the sister who made a big deal about exchanging gifts and them being a surprise blah blah etc - she failed to get me anything... oh and then showed up here to get hers and ranted on for ten solid minutes about how awful she felt that her boss had got everyone else something personal to them and got her nothing... with zero awareness at all (honestly I waited to see if she'd hear herself, she did not)...

She then guilted me half the day about wanting me to call Dad, messaging me to say 'he keeps saying how nice it would be to talk to you', because either he cannot remember I am currently housebound or chooses not to, nor does he grasp that even if I could get in the car to his, his house is not accessible I could not at this time of year even get out of the car (muddy grass driveway, wheelspin guaranteed) and the only pub all three of us is not banned from is not accessible to me (between him, my sister and my DP, the number of appropriate pubs is very low!)...

So I called.. and as I predicted, he said hi for 1 second then was totally disinterested, wouldn't even look at the phone, and when I chatted to sister a bit to try to get him talking he eventually shouted at her to get off the phone.

I know later on/tomorrow he will be back to telling her and his carer that I never bother with him and hes going to cut me out of his will because of it - I know he's down to his last few marbles, but he also has a track record of refusing to acknowledge the upsetting things in life like, his eldest daughter is in a power wheelchair and can't do various things.

I have bent over backwards to sort the many and varied shitshows the two of them have stored up over the years (stupid dodges and schemes they've both had that are likely to bite them on the arse), neither can fill out a form, call anyone, google something or write a letter, I've done all that. But because I can't pop round there (note, he could be brought here, he doesn't want to, because its not a fucking pub - my DP takes him to a pub once a week, if he ACTUALLY wanted to see me he could come here that day...) I may as well not fucking exist.

Just - UGH and why the fuck do I let it upset me when I know exactly how it will be, what he will do etc etc? He's never going to turn into an interested and involved parent, he's had 45 years to have a crack at that and never bothered!

Dh is rubbish with gifts. I shared my amazon wishlist to help, impressed he had actually asked. Told him I didn't need the books new, secondhand ones are fine.
I got three secondhand books, one new one and a pair of socks. Thought maybe I might get stuff not on the list like chocolate? That he might think outside the box? Nope.
Done with presents. Put chocolate on my click and collect shop for tomorrow.

I genuinely can't believe how many women got nothing for Christmas, especially whilst sorting everyone else's gifts, food etc.

How can a family actually sit there opening their gifts when one person is clearly just watching them with nothing of their own to open? I would be absolutely mortified if someone didn't have a gift and everyone else did.

These partners are the lowest of the low. I hope that these poor women either voice their anger loudly or that they see a divorce solicitor. They are not valued and deserve better. Their children also need to know that women being treated so disrespectfully is not acceptable.

This Christmas was hard for my Mom and I because my Dad died Oct. 6th.

I was accused of ‘hiding behind the cooking’, yesterday, so I guess I must have been hiding behind all the menu planning, food shopping, present buying and wrapping, too. I’ve told DH I won’t be hiding behind it all next year. I want to go away somewhere. Someone else can ‘hide’ behind it all. Even better today is my birthday, and DH woke me at 5am, thanks you selfish prick. Plan to spend the day looking at sales on caribbean holidays for December 2026…

It was my baby’s first Christmas and it was incredibly stressful. Everyone was so loud and making such a fuss of her that she was super over stimulated and couldn’t sleep for more than 10 minutes at a time. I tried taking her to other rooms but people kept following and mocked me when I said she needed a calm moment.

Then my husband hated the gifts my family got her (I didn’t love them either - all pink outfits that she will grow out of before summer) but once we got home I listened to him complaining about them basically until we went to bed.

It’s pretty sad to read some of these. Some husbands, partners and various family members need to be ashamed of themselves and how they treat their wives or daughters/in laws. I hope some of these women who have done everything with little or nothing in return ( gifts or ‘help’) are really reassessing their lives. It’s so sad to read.

People need to really look at themselves and their behaviour. I can’t even imagine people sitting and watching people open presents while not getting ( mostly the person that does the bulk of not everything) any gifts at all or something they’ll never use: no thought or time given. Some lazy arsed men on this thread who don’t deserve their wives and kids.

This has struck a chord. I’m going through a depressive episode and desperately waiting for the anti depressants to kick in. Yesterday I just couldn’t sit in the lounge with the tv on at 20 decibels as Mil is extremely deaf watching old episodes of dad’s army and rumpole of the Bailey for hours. DH told me MIL commented on my absence. He seemed to agree that as we had a guest I should be sitting in the same room. I reminded him of the year I was left sitting with mil listening to her tell me about every ailment since the dawn of time, whilst he had a 4 hour nap upstairs. He’d also agreed before she arrived that as I am struggling so much, and she is his mother after all, he needed to take the burden of hosting duties this year. I don’t think teens should be compelled to stay in the same room either. They are not the hosts. As long as they’ve been polite and engaged some of the time that’s fine.

why didn't you wake him up

Went to my brother for lunch and I asked one of my teens to carry the 3-tier pavlova to the car and hold it carefully for the journey. Husband said he would do it - being the only person who could bear it safely.

We didn’t even get as far as the boot before it slipped from his grip and lay smashed on the gravel drive. (He was trying to carry too much so that explains things - he said).

My ungrateful manchild brother:

• mocked me for having 3 outfits (PJs, jeans for a dog walk, a dress for lunch)
• put no thought or money towards stocking gifts for our mother, which I sorted myself (our mum does stockings for everyone else in the family)
• didn’t thank me for sorting our mother’s stocking
• didn’t thank me for his card or gift
• gifted me a block of cheese
• spoke condescendingly throughout the day. Any question asked about him / his life was met with an exasperated attitude we should already know the answer
• asked only one question about me / my life
• hurried along every element of the day (gifts, dog walk, lunch) to make sure we met his timetable of leaving at 3pm (he really could have left within a larger window, but no, it had to be 3pm)
• when our mum got stressed with the lunch and asked him to stop chatting and actually help (he’d spent the hour before lunch in his room), and then apologised for snapping, he rolled his eyes and said “whatever”

This man is 30 years old, you’d think he was 13. We all breathed a sigh of relief when he left. It makes me sad because we were always close as siblings, but he has become an intensely selfish, rude and ungrateful person who I can hardly stand to be around.

The MIL sounds like my late MIL, when we were back in UK during the school Summer holidays, she told our girls not to pester Daddy because he needed a rest, he worked very hard! My response was Yes, because Mummy sits on her arse all year, doesn't she? Luckily they were a bit too young to notice.