<p>This isn’t an issue for us anymore as both sets of parents are dead. But we live in the Midwest, my parents lived in Texas, and H’s parents lived in CT. We rarely visited H’s parents as they just weren’t the grandparently type (nor maternal or paternal for that matter). Besides they had cats and I’m the only one in our family of four who isn’t allergic to cats. MIL insisted that H was not allergic to them, so with that attitude, we basically stopped going there for anything. They obviously were not very welcoming and we felt it. I felt bad for our children, who basically had one side of the family they’ve never really known. So the situation devolved into going to Texas as we could, but also started establishing our own traditions here at home. My parents were always grateful for any time we spent with them, but understood the difficulties traveling created for us (weather, costs, etc.) To this day, I do find it annoying that no family members from either side ever offered to come up here. We are always the ones expected to travel, and I resent it. While our financial picture has certainly improved, I doubt it will ever reach that of my brothers. Last year we had our first siblings-only (with their extended families) reunion in Texas for a few days before Christmas. It was a lot of fun, but now there is talk of doing it again this year. I’m having second thoughts about it. For once, I’d appreciate seeing my siblings going out of their way to come see us.</p>
<p>Sorry for the rant… I just returned from the Rio Grande Valley, Texas almost a week ago, where I went for my aunt’s 90th birthday party. Somehow I managed to get there (took many changes in reservations, and car rentals, as well as my flexibility to sleep wherever there was AC and an air mattress). But I made it all the way from Chicago, and my brothers all petered out from Houston. As one of my cousins was dropping me off at the airport for my flight home, she told me she was thinking about making a car trip this fall, and thought about coming through Chicago to see me. I was SO excited; I’m already making plans in my head. </p>
<p>Anyway, I guess what I’m getting at here, is to be aware of precedents you set now that could create problems a few years, or many years down the line. I will say that I respect one of my brothers for his approach to this all. He and his wife never had children. They lived in the same town as my parents, but hers lived in the Rio Grande Valley (six-hour drive). They were pretty adamant about switching holidays… one year with my parents for Thanksgiving and hers for Christmas, and the next, Thanksgiving with her parents, and Christmas with mine. They set some very appropriate boundaries and stuck to them. Interestingly, this is the one brother who has come to visit us, once, for a pleasure trip (not work-related) when I invited them all up to come see D2’s performance in her high school’s musical.</p>
<p>Soozievt, we also have a grandparent (my mother) who is widowed, but has been widowed for many years. She lives fairly close to us, so coming here for holidays is not an issue. The issue for us arises when we travel for some holidays to my H’s relatives. My mother is never invited to H’s relatives. She is insulted when we go H’s relative’s homes (long distances away). She expects me to make sure that she is not left alone. I have resolved this by calling my brother and SIL and asking them to either visit her, or invite her for the holidays. My mother complains about going there, because she says the travel is too far. She can fly, take a train, or drive (and often shares that drive with another relative). She complains about going to my brother and SIL anyway. Yet, she also travels extensively. The situation is really a problem, and I hope that I don’t ever burden my kids with all of these complications. What complicates things more is that my H’s mother is truly too ill to travel, so we have to travel to her for some holidays.</p>
<p>I agree with teriwtt, about setting boundaries and precedents. It still does not mean that you won’t hear the complaints and bitterness.</p>
<p>I actually disagree with this to a point. Of course make some traditions of your own, but I think it’s important for newlyweds to be respectful of the fact that most families are more than just the newlyweds and two sets of parents. there are often extended family members and spouses and their families who are all deserving of consideration. When someone says “i’m having Christmas at my house and whoever comes, comes” that puts the parents in a position of not being able to see other children/grandchildren. Not nice at all. I think first you should determine what special priorities you have (for example my husband’s family didn’t celebrate Easter, so my family always got that, but his family did an extended family blow-out Fourth of July), then assess if there are any special circumstances for anyone in your holiday-celebration list. Your newlywed status would gain you special consideration in my family, (my sister was due to have Christmas the year my MIL was dying, but she came here because of the circumstances) such as illness, pregnancy, new baby, college, lost job, etc. Then send a warm, loving email to everyone impacted through the web of connections and say “now that we’re all one big family, let’s come up with a plan for this year’s holiday celebrations” and list the holidays and anyone’s special considerations/needs/wants and see what you come up with. If there are conflicts, talk them out and come up with some middle ground. I don’t believe in setting these things in stone because you don’t know where life takes you. At your age, Mollie, God-willing your family is growing and expanding, but there does come a point at which the family will grow smaller and having taken a hard-line earlier may make you unable to be flexible later. When I was first married, I was adamant about being fair and what I considered to be appropriate because I was going to show those in-laws how it’s done. Well, my inlaws and my dad are gone, my brother has every holiday in North Carolina with his grandchildren (haven’t seen him on any holiday in about 8 years), and hubby’s siblings also had the split year plan between parents and in-laws. They have only one set of in-laws left and go there for every holiday. The point being that from the front end, it feels like you have forever to plan for, but time passes faster than anyone thinks and before you know it, people that you planned for are gone or have different priorities. My brother’s wife used to drive me out of my mind, but I didn’t realize that the holiday traditions weren’t forever and I wish I had appreciated the things that were good – or at least familiar.</p>
<p>Enjoy the blessing of every holiday and every loved one while you have both. If you start one tradition, start the tradition of communicating with and respecting the people you care enough to share the holidays with. Cast a wide net and be welcoming somewhere so that the holidays are times of joy and not bean counting.</p>
<p>Yikes, I don’t want to hijack but to respond to your excellent advice which we HAVE tried…:)…</p>
<p>My mother is VERY difficult. But yes, her mobility is a challenge but she can and does travel. She recently flew alone to my D’s graduation at Brown. She flew a year ago to my niece’s HS graduation in Alaska! However, I accompanied her on her trip to her winter home in CA this year. But her reason for not coming here was not just the flight (which is hard to listen to given she HAS flown at other times), but she says she can’t stay here because my mom cannot handle stairs (our guestroom is up a flight of stairs) but this is not insurmoutable either. We offered to set up a bed on the first floor in the living room and we have a bathroom on the first floor. She could stay at a local inn as she has before and I know she doesn’t want to stay alone (though she lives alone!) and we offered that either I or one of the girls would stay at the inn with her. Still, no can do. It also wasn’t HER year for us but was either the year for us to be HERE (long overdue as we got a bit off our very fair cycle) or at my in-laws who want us just as badly as she does (but she doesn’t care). She laments that she is a widow, etc. So, it isn’t about who can accompany her on the plane really. My brother normally might but not for Thanksgiving as his family can’t come here as my sister-in-law is confined to a wheelchair due to MS and she doesn’t travel. I get a lot of pressure and aggravation over this each year, even though I feel we have been reasonable and fair minded and there are TWO families and not just one who want us to come for the holiday. So, my mom doesn’t really care that I also have to please the in-laws. Then, we truly want everyone to come here but they won’t. Haven’t yet dealt with this year but I am sure its coming. The thing with Thanksgiving and going to my mom’s also involves that we see more of my family and so that is important for the kids too (cousins, etc). But anyway, I’m just saying that we have been completely fair minded for 31 years about taking turns on this holiday and you’d think nobody could argue with that but that is not the case, unfortunately. </p>
<p>OK, back to our regularly scheduled thread. :D</p>
<p>Many useful suggestions appear above. I agree that you would be wise to make your holiday schedule a short-term, flexible one, with no long-term expectations involved. What works now may not make sense 3 years from now. People move, change jobs, have children, have health problems, etc.</p>
<p>If we did not go to my mother’s for Thanksgiving, she would NOT be alone on it because one of my brothers and his family live near her. Still, I get the demands that she is the one who is the widow and my in-laws are not in that situation but they care just as much about seeing us and the kids. And we really want it to be here now that our kids are in college and live away from home. We feel the three year rotation we have had going for years is fair, but you’d have to know my mother.</p>
<p>By the way, we went to my mom’s the Thanksgiving after the Thanksgiving that my dad died even though that was two years in a row. That’s when the cycle got interrupted. It was her first year and all. But that was over four years ago.</p>
<p>zooser does bring up a valid point that when you ask parents, inlaws, and/or grandparents to come to your own house for the holiday, that can also be a problem because they have their other kids and grandkids to see and so that is another reason they are reluctant to come here…in order to be with the rest of their family.</p>
<p>soozievt, I have heard about my mother being a widow for years. I have a lot of sympathy, but she also can be very self centered. She becomes overly sensative around her birthday and for any holiday. On the one side, I hear that my mother is widow (who has not kept up with her family, btw). On the other side, I hear that every holiday might be H’s mother’s last, but have heard that, thankfully, for more years than I care to count.</p>
<p>The worst part for me is that I can’t win. I am put in the middle and if I do what one wants, the other will be mad. Same with if I do what I want (which I always put others first). Last year, my mom wanted us, my husband wanted here, my inlaws wanted there and in any scenario, someone was mad at me. I ended up splitting it between my mother’s in Philadelphia and my house here in VT and my two kids traveling on three different days to make this all happen. Plus my husband needs to work on that weekend here. Mollie’s thread just reminds me that after being fair about this for 31 years, I will surely have to deal with much conflict once again in a few months (actually they will start talking about this REAL soon I am sure).</p>
<p>Northeastmom, cross posted again. Yes, I hear the widow thing and that this could be her last years, etc. a LOT. But my in-laws are not spring chickens either. Yes, it is a very self-centered type thing. We see both sides of our family many other times per year but the Thanksgiving bit is a big deal to them.</p>
<p>If we celebrated XMas, it almost would help and one family could get one holiday and one the other but we are Jewish and so it is mostly about Thanksgiving only. Passover is an issue but we rarely see either family as our kids have always had school on that holiday.</p>
<p>I won’t get into it too much but a MAJOR conflict ensued over the winter holiday a few years ago when my mom took the entire family on a cruise to celebrate her 75th birthday and that time period was chosen since six grandchildren were involved who all had the holiday break and four were also in college and we span the east and west coasts and Alaska, but the cruise overlapped my father-in-law’s 80th birthday (no affair scheduled but just being together on it), and I was going to fly directly from the cruise with my kids to my in-laws and arrive late at night on my father-in-law’s 80th with hopes to celebrate the next day but that was NOT (!!!) OK with them at all. I think we should have been able to work this out so that we could celebrate both important occasions (my mom scheduled this for everyone’s convenience when it was actually a few months after her real birthday and I think we could have celebrated my father in law’s birthday one day after the fact but no…). It turned out that my husband did not go on the family cruise with my entire family and then my in-laws did not want me and the kids to bother to fly directly from the cruise to their house arriving the night of his birthday (would be late as I was coming in from San Diego and they live in upstate NY). My husband did not want to miss his dad’s real birthday and so we were all split up which was unfortunate and there is a LOT of anger on his side of the family that I went on the family cruise (my entire family) for my mom’s 75th birthday and that she had scheduled it to overlap with my father-in-law’s 80th birthday. This is what I am dealing with.</p>
<p>Soozie, I’m really sorry that you have to deal with that. I have a sister who is a master manipulator and, as a result, we’ve finally ended our relationship. I wish I had some words of wisdom for you, but I don’t. Is there any middle ground where you could all get together like at a hotel or an inn? We did that one year and it was really fabulous with both sides of the family.</p>
<p>The pattern we’ve evolved over the years is that we go to the in-laws (now my BIL’s) on DH’s side to NJ for Thanksgiving, to my family (who celebrates Christmas) in Georgia in December, to BIL’s for Passover and to my family at some point during the summer. (We’re Jewish, my parents are Catholic.) We also have a second Thanksgiving and Seder at home so we have some semblance of our own family’s traditions.</p>
<p>Due to a variety of reasons (money, inflexible jobs, health issues), folks from my side of the family seldom make it to our house. BIL and his spouse bring down my FIL to visit once or twice a year.</p>
<p>My current frustration is that my brothers can’t be bothered to commit to even dinner if I am in the Atlanta area after I’ve driven 700 miles to get there. My mom was shocked that I didn’t drive three hours to Atlanta to see them this trip, but I didn’t really see the point. I know we all have our lives, but getting stood up just isn’t acceptable. </p>
<p>This Thanksgiving I would like S1 to come home and not have to go elsewhere. Instead, DH wants S1 to fly into Baltimore on Wednesday, we’ll pick him up there on the way to northern NJ, where we’ll have Thanksgiving, then visit the other friends we usually see on this trip, come home Sat., and put S1 back on a plane Sunday. To me, this does not sound like anyone’s idea of a good time, esp for S1. I’m feeling a little selfish in wanting to have some time with him without all sorts of chaos.</p>
<p>So, Mollie, you see from all of these posts that visiting the relatives is a whole 'nuther ballgame from appeasing the families at a wedding. Just be flexible and keep in touch with what you and DH would like.</p>
<p>CountingDown…we surely are giving Mollie a run for the money of what the future can hold!! :D</p>
<p>I hear you on the Thanksgiving and wanting your son to get to come home. With our girls in college (and now grad school for the oldest this coming year), we want them to get to come home…they will not have been here since a few days in May. And yes, it is also a chance to see home friends who they never see. And to just get to come HOME. Like I said, the past two Thanksgivings, we have had a LOT of travel…first to my mom’s (the kids going from their colleges to there, and then on the Friday, traveling all day to get them home for two nights and then their going back to colleges on Sunday). Given the traffic, we spent most of the holiday weekend traveling!</p>
<p>First,
I do NOT think you are hijacking this thread. It is on the topic of holiday politics and though you are no longer a newlywed, your experiences might contribute to some background for Mollie’s decisions.</p>
<p>Second,
I can feel my blood pressure rising as I read your accounts of the demands on your family. Let me deal with your mother and I will make sure you can have your Ds home for a relatively relaxing Thansgiving this year.</p>
<p>Nobody can make you go anywhere. Don’t feed into any guilt-tripping. Sounds like you have been more than extending every year and are really entitled to do this one putting your own family’s needs first. **If need be, more than one can play the guilt-trip game LOL. **Tell your mom you, your Ds, etc. have been feeling a lot of stress from all the changes and demands on their lives and that you all NEED to decompress over the Thanksgiving weekend. Tell Mom she can have the living room, the local inn, whatever – or she can choose not to come, and you will see her at some other point.</p>
<p>Tell her you are confident that she will support your decision as you know how much she cares about the wellbeing of your/her family and will make that her primary concern. ;)</p>
<p>P.S.
OR PM me your mom’s name and address and I will send her a print of this thread LOL! ;)</p>
<p>Jyber…I’m smiling. I agree with ALL of your advice. I will try it yet again this year. You don’t know my mother, is all I can say. VERY difficult. </p>
<p>I like your idea of printing the thread out to show her. But knowing her, that won’t mean a thing. Reason/logic do not matter with her. She expects everything to revolve around HER. </p>
<p>Since neither of my kids will have been able to come home since May, I really think we need to let them come home this year. We do see them where they are but that is still not the same.</p>
<p>I tend to put everyone before myself but even when I do, they still get angry and I am caught in the middle. If I please one person, the other is angry. It becomes a no win situation. Either way we do it, one or more people are going to be angry with me. That’s what happens every time.</p>
<p>I am going to follow up with you to make sure your family has Thanksgiving at home in Vermont!</p>
<p>One more suggestion - your younger D could use this material for the development of a dramatic musical on the theme! Let’s think up some song titles! ;)</p>
<p>P.S.
If they are going to get angry anyway, you may as well do what you want! :)</p>
<p>A thought: if some people are going to be upset with you no matter what you do, why not make them upset by doing what is best for you and your immediate family? Much easier for me to say than for you to do, I know.</p>
<p>You are too funny. I can’t decide whether to laugh or cry. </p>
<p>I’m gonna try for this Thanksgiving…yep (again). </p>
<p>I love your point…that if they are gonna be angry at me anyway, I may as do what I want. Of course, they will work on guilt tripping my kids. I am telling you, they become relentless. I think last year, I had about 25 calls about this topic, every call was on it. It caused many problems. </p>
<p>The cruise incident…has been a source of contention still from my in laws and even my husband who think my mom was wrong to schedule her 75th birthday celebratory family cruise to overlap on the last day with my father-in-law’s 80th. Couldn’t he have celebrated one day later? My mom celebrated four months later just so that everyone could be there. In this one regard, I actually am siding with my mom. </p>
<p>Anyway, I love your idea of the musical for my D to write. She definitely would have plenty of material!! She is going to be writing a new musical this coming year but I believe she is basing it on some mythology, not family “dysfunction.” But ya know, the dramatic play that won the Tonys this year, which my kids both saw this summer, August Osage County, is based on family dysfunction. Not sure if that would make good musical material or not. :D</p>
and I will make sure you can have your Ds home for a relatively relaxing Thansgiving this year.</p>