Reply to PSA- Yes, you are a jerk if you don't invite your older parents to Christmas

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Reply to "PSA- Yes, you are a jerk if you don't invite your older parents to Christmas"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]A few hours? More like they spend 4 days and nights as our houseguests, making things difficult and generally making me dread Christmas. Not this year, sorry. They have 3 other grown children they can spread the love this year and visit one of them for once. [/quote]

You’re an adult and can say not to hosting for four days. It doesn’t mean you can’t offer up your home for Christmas brunch. Use your words and be firm about what the invite entails.[/quote]

This assumes people live close enough to just come for brunch. Or can afford to stay in a hotel and will entertain themselves while you do things you'd prefer to do with just your nuclear family, or do traditions they cannot or will not engage in.

Both my parents and ILs live too far away to just come over for one meal. If they come, we are 100% hosting them for a minimum of 3 days -- every meal, entertainment, accommodations in our house, etc. It means my kids having to be on "grandparent behavior" the entire time.

We always travel for Thanksgiving specifically because we want to spend Christmas at home, just us. I think a lot of families make this compromise.

When I was a kid we always spent Christmas at home. I can only think of two Christmases when my grandmother was present and it was just her (her husband died long before I was born) and she only spent Christmas Eve with us and then went to my aunt's house where she spend Christmas morning -- no one just hosted her for the entire holiday.[/quote]

The problem with this scenario (both of them) is that it becomes normal to always be "just the nuclear family"--and one day you won't be part of that.  Then you'll be spending Christmas along while your kids do what you grew up doing, and what they grew up with.  That's fine if that's what you want, but many of us do not.[/quote]

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