Wow, a put-out MIL and you’re not even a MIL. A new DCUM record.

I would say that it seems like you raised 2 boys that still want to celebrate the holiday with you, but also trust that you will understand when they are doing things differently sometimes. Some kids would be afraid to upset their parents, or even not care about ditching them. From what you say, both boys made time for you to celebrate. That's something special.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You’re a grown woman, what difference does it make which day you celebrate? I’ll never understand people who need to celebrate holidays and birthdays on THE day.

+1. If you see your sons within one week on either side of Christmas Day (even going into January 6, the technical 12th and last day of Christmas), you got to celebrate Christmas with them, full stop. Thank your lucky stars, count your blessings, and grow the hell up. Christmas STARTS on Dec. 1, OP.

This, and invite your sons and their girlfriends for Thanksgiving. Jeez. Kids grow up, find partners, start new traditions. Don't be the sad middle-aged woman feeling hurt and abandoned. It's a bad look.

Anonymous wrote:You’re a grown woman, what difference does it make which day you celebrate? I’ll never understand people who need to celebrate holidays and birthdays on THE day.

+1. If you see your sons within one week on either side of Christmas Day (even going into January 6, the technical 12th and last day of Christmas), you got to celebrate Christmas with them, full stop. Thank your lucky stars, count your blessings, and grow the hell up. Christmas STARTS on Dec. 1, OP.

Massive eye-roll.

1) The way it goes one year is not the way it’s going to go every year. For all you know, they plan to alternate—most people do.

2) PICK UP THE DAMN PHONE AND TALK TO YOUR SONS ABOUT FUTURE HOLIDAYS.

3) They are in their 20s, FFS. My money is on at least one of them dumping or getting dumped, and having a few single years before they get engaged. Hope that will make you happy.

Only after you have done step No. 2 will I entertain your whining.

Anonymous wrote:Don’t go on a little trip. Go on a MAJOR trip. To Paris. To Egypt. To Dubai.

We went on a trip like that over Thanksgiving and we got good deals on airfare and lodging, maybe in part because most Americans wouldn’t be going abroad at that time.

This is what we did. I'm creating my own life so I don't get too upset if things shift as the children grow older. I didn't want to spend Christmas with certain family members so we traveled abroad and got wonderful deals.

One of my relatives is taken on lovely trips each Christmas. They are way past 25 and rarely miss a trip!

No matter what, it's wise not to say home where you can easily remember "what it was like." Go somewhere new. Make new memories.

One of the best things you can do as an adult imo is let go of the calendar dates of holidays. They don’t have to be on the calendar dates.

But that’s easy for me to say because it was easy for me to do. I can’t imagine being bummed about this. All your kids came home for the holidays, just not ON the holiday. That’s good!

Would it be better for you if you had to move the holiday because they were surgeons or firefighters or something? If so, pretend it’s that.

Christmas is whatever day you sit down together to celebrate Christmas.

As the mother of 2 boys I've acknowledged that it will be on us (my husband and I) to (a) make friends with our son's spouses, and (b) be prepared to make our own holidays.

Take responsibility for your own fun and your own holidays. Whether that means reaching out to your great aunt or a neighbor, establishing a new tradition of travel for the holiday and yes, possibly celebrating it on a different day with your sons. If you decide to let that ruin your fun it's really on you. You can't expect your adult children to be responsible for your happiness in life - its not their job.

My brother's family (who has 3 kids) has basically adopted their next door neighbors (who have no kids) and they include them in every holiday. It's a wonderful reminder to me that you can build your own family in all sorts of places if you just put in the effort.

Great example of how all the DILs on this board who moan and groan about their MILs are all going to turn into them one day. Might want to make some adjustments now.

Also OP, I think the word you were looking for is "relegated" not "regulated". YW

PP and I’ll admit to finding it hard to feel sorry for people who did the same to their ILs. I have a very large family and we all trade off. It is expected that families spend time with both sides.

We always traded years when my ILs were alive. Is it possible they will do that.

We do every other year and switch up Christmas and Thanksgiving at respective ILs. Only difference is when we celebrate with DH parents they come to us.

Anonymous wrote:Yeah, the girls call the shots in these things. You did it yourself back in the day.

Yep

You could ask to alternate years.

My MIL was passive aggressive obnoxious until we agreed to do Xmas at her place this year. We've decided we're just going to do at home going forward to avoid the drama (and we also have a toddler). Maybe suggest that, or even better, just lean into finding new traditions like travel (which we also used to skip family visits to do over the holidays until we had our DC)