Home More advice Parents & Family
Everytime a holiday comes around its extremly frustrating trying to figure out which family we are going to spend it with. I need some input from other married people. Its gotten even harder now that we have children and everyone wants us to be with them for the holidays. Am i supposed to do by every other year, or do we try and see both families on holidays and still have time for our own "family" time.
Mandyloo, I can't stress strongly enough the importance of your putting your own nuclear family first and establishing your own holiday traditions while your children are young. I speak from experience. For 30-some years I was pressured into traveling to my mother-in-law's every single Thanksgiving for a loud, chaotic gathering. She disregarded the fact that my mother was still living, on the grounds that we lived in the same town as my mother so we could see her anytime. On the one hand, I knew it was wonderful for my children to be part of a big, loving family, and that's why I capitulated. I was always extremely good-natured about it and I worked like a dog in my mother-in-law's kitchen to help her prepare everything. But on the other hand, I did resent the yearly obligation and I always came home too exhausted to pull off a nice holiday meal for just my family. And I yearned to do that - I love to cook but I had never prepared my own Thanksgiving meal and set my own holiday table because everything always took place at my mother-in-law's.Two years ago I finally put my foot down (nicely) and told my husband and children I wanted to stay home for Thanksgiving. It was wonderful and I simply loved being at home and we had a great time in the kitchen cooking a beautiful meal together. My husband grilled the turkey and my three 20-something children all chose a dish to prepare on their own. It was such fun we did it again last year, despite pressure from my husband's family. I felt as if I had finally established a Thanksgiving tradition of my own. Well, imagine my disappointment this week when I found out my sons and husband want to go to Grandma's for Thanksgiving. They say we can come home Friday afternoon and have our own special Thanksgiving on Saturday. The thing of it is, I'll spend six hours traveling, endure 10 or more hours of noise, chaos, and television on Thursday, then "sleep" on a hard, lumpy mattress. I won't have either the time or the energy to do much more than the bare minimum for a Thanksgiving meal here at home. On top of that, my husband and the boys plan to hunt Saturday morning so it will be me in the kitchen by myself making that special holiday meal. I do sincerely understand their desire to be with extended family, but I am hurt and regretful that I didn't take a stand years ago and work out a compromise so that I wouldn't feel so resentful. What I wish I had done was establish a tradition of alternating years so that we could keep both mamas happy. I suppose it is not too late for that, especially considering the fact that my children are all still single. But I do find it ridiculous that I am nearly 60 years old and still struggling to find peace with the holiday issue. So I would urge you to look within yourself and decide what kind of Thanksgiving YOU want for your family, then work to find a compromise that will involve extended family from both sides.
If you can handle the traveling, try to find time to visit all your family and friends.
If you avoid doing so you are more likely to become more isolated as you get older, and that is probably not a good thing for you or your children.
This may sound a bit morbid, but over your lifetime there are a limited number of times you will get to see the people you love and respect. If you chose not to visit them when you have the opportunity - you might never see them again.
You probably have a number of relatives and friends who you have already seen for the last time in your lives.
-- Best wishes - Majikthise.
I'm not merried but meaby you guys could go ahead and make a deal, like meaby you can tell one of the families you will be going half the holidays with them and tell the other family that you will be going next year, that way the other half of the holidays you can spend with your family and not traying to please everybody else. Make a plan, one year with this family, next year with the other, and explain to them your reasoning why you want to do this, they have to understand that you also want your family time, everybody need that.
My family has this problem around holidays. On Xmas we used to actually go everywhere, which was rushed and unenjoyable, as we had to visit my grandparents on both sides, as well as my great-grandparents on my Mom's side, I know I always looked forward to the day after Xmas to play with all my things. Now, we usually just pick one set of grandparents to have Xmas supper with, and visit the other one for a short time that day, or make special plans for another day.
