Should I invite parents for Xmas?

stargazer59

I find the whole situation very sad.
My mum used to drive us all mad towards the end of her life, but one of us always invited her and my Gran to stay for Xmas and New Year.
Now my children are adults(except one) we all take it in turns to get together at each others houses, not everyone in families gets on all the time, but to us Christmas is a time to put the rubbish behind you and get together.

I can't imagine any of my family , knowing i had worked a night shift , who would not automatically invite me to Christmas lunch, as i would them.

Surely any bad feeling can be put aside for just one day?

dirtysexymonkey

Marisco wrote: »

So how have you deduced that from the posts?? When my parents were alive, it was a given that they came to ours for Xmas dinner! They knew what time we were serving up, and they meandered over whenever they wanted, usually in time to see the kids opening their pressies There is only 2 of us these days, my kids and granddkids are scattered to the four winds, so make the most of it whilst you can!!

from reading them.

the ops family doesnt have any such traditions as your family has, or as my family has.

your family is not the ops family and your relationship with your parents is not the ops.

can you really not grasp that the op and you are two different people in two different situations and so the solutions may not be the same?

dirtysexymonkey

elvis86 wrote: »

I can't see that the OP has given any background info to suggest that her mother is emotionally manipulative. Only that she is working on Christmas day and seems to be hinting for an invite for dinner. That's not mind games and emotional manipulation. That's hinting for an invite for dinner.

it may not be in your mind, but it is in mind.

you play games, i dont. im very straightforward.

GracieP

Wow! I'd understand your reluctance if you and your mum didn't get on at all or had an extremely strained or poisonous relationship, but from your comments you don't. You just seem to have a massively childish over-reaction to things that your mum does that you don't like, expecting your husband to help cook his own dinner, planning their own Christmas dinner last year, being an early riser in her own home, having a job. WTH is there to be so annoyed about any of these things? I can see that being woken early when you fancy a lie in is annoying, but only in the laugh about it afterwards type of way. Not the sulk and feel put out about it several years later type of way.

My husband and I normally have Christmas day with his parents and were intending to this year. But my brother who now lives in the same city as me, which is 200km from where we are from, will be working until late on Christmas eve and early on St Stephen's Day so would have a hard time getting to our parents' house on Christmas Day. As soon as my mum mentioned this to me and I told my husband we immediately changed our plans and will now be cooking Christmas dinner in our house so my brother (and his nurse girlfriend if she isn't working) will have family to have dinner with. It'll be a lot of extra work for us as we weren't even going to be cooking dinner and his girlfriend is coeliac so we'll have to be extra careful about gluten contamination. And we'll have stick to a tight schedule as we'll still have to go to my in-laws early in the day for present exchanges and an early lunch, but that's just what you do for family.

The fact that my brother once took the head off my baby doll and stuck nails around it's neck and painted it's eyes and lips so it looked evil and creepy doesn't even come in to it.

POPPYOSCAR

Abbafan1972 wrote: »

You will have to tell me where, as I can't see evidence of this! (Toby Carvery are charging £47.95 each for Xmas day).

Yes I was thinking that as well!!

Most of the restaurants around here are charging around £75.00 per head.

I would miss the aroma of the christmas dinner in my house - even though I do not eat turkey I really enjoy cooking it.

Badger_Lady

I would assume that Mum and Dad went out for Christmas last year because they had nowhere else to go, not having been invited to their daughter's and not wanting to 'angle for an invite'!

It makes me very glad that I have such a lovely relationship with my parents. I wonder if it's a proximity thing? Because mine live in a different country, I appreciate every minute I get to spend with them. And in fact I can't see them every Christmas... this year I've angled for an invite at my Aunt's house in Northern England, where I know I'll be very welcome and have a wonderful time because, er, we're family!

newcook

dirtysexymonkey wrote: »

youve misunderstood the reasons why i labeled her as selfish.

you seem to ignore that the ops mother chose to ignore her daughter and grandchildren on xmas day and boxing day.

theres nothing to suggest that the ops mother would have invited her around for dinner if she wasnt working.

it doesnt sound like the op is being childish at all - she sounds like someone who would rather be asked rather than be subjected to a guilt trip.

and she is under no obligation at all to feed her mother - none.

apologies - I thought you were saying I misunderstood the OP not your reasons to lableling her selfish.

as for the rest - she didnt ignore her last xmas, she chose to do something different (or do you class chosing to do something different for xmas dinner as ignoring?) OP doesnt say that they didnt go round xmas eve or even that they didnt pop in xmas morning - I see nothing to suggest that they were ignored.

duchy

Wow -I started this thread wondering why it was such a big deal-Invite her if you want or don't and was wondering why the OP needed validation from strangers about what to decide............but now I just feel sorry for the OP's mother. She has a daughter who takes the smallest comment or most trivial incident and broods on it -like the dishwasher episode from several years ago (and yeah I was wondering why no-one else had washed up after dinner too) or the "free" turkey comment and then uses it as an excuse to throw their teddy in the corner-a husband incapable of putting a turkey in the oven -and a job that messes her around and a son in law who is mortally offended to be expected to help out in the kitchen over Christmas day. No wonder she's still working-she's probably saving for her run away from the lot of selfish beggers fund.

Oh and then we have the troll-trying to drag the disability card into the mix too !!! Well speaking as the single mum of a son with Aspergers -Oh and I'm also working part of Christmas day-there's nothing that sickens me more when people try to excuse the bad behavour of others by pulling the disability (or any other minority) card. Having a child with a disability is not an excuse for arrogence or selfishness or pettiness.

elvis86

dirtysexymonkey wrote: »

it may not be in your mind, but it is in mind.

In that case, I would suggest that perhaps you have some issues that you need to deal with. Hinting for an invite to dinner does not constitute mind games and emotional manipulation.

Unless you're imagining this kind of hint coming from someone you know, where there is history of this kind of behaviour, in which case you're doing exactly what you've accused others of doing, and failing to recognise that the OP's family and situation isn't the same as your own.

She has offered no evidence that her mum is emotionally manipulative, so it's fair to assume that all her mum has done, is hint for an invite to Christmas dinner.;)

dirtysexymonkey wrote: »

you play games, i dont. im very straightforward.

What makes you think this? You must be incredibly insightful, the only personal experience I have cited here is that I've dropped hints to my OH about things he could get me for Christmas, and even you yourself said:

dirtysexymonkey wrote: »

presumably you are not trying to guilt trip your partner into doing something he doesnt want to do as the ops mother is? thats the difference between dropping hints and being emotionally manipulative.

If you read so much into a mum hinting for an invite to dinner at her daughter's house, I'd say you're anything but straightforward...

aliasojo

So OP, if the rest of us shut up for a minute, do you still feel the same as you did when you started the thread?