How to get through Christmas without a row

meritaten

balletshoes wrote: »

i do think thats a tad dramatic - not every human, male or female, gets all excited over young children's christmas presents.

Really? how strange. to me and OH that's the main pleasure of Christmas as we are not Christians. the joy of the kids opening their pressies and discovering just what they wanted! magically Santa knows exactly what was on their 'wish list'. and if it was in any way affordable - they got it!

balletshoes

meritaten wrote: »

Really? how strange. to me and OH that's the main pleasure of Christmas as we are not Christians. the joy of the kids opening their pressies and discovering just what they wanted! magically Santa knows exactly what was on their 'wish list'. and if it was in any way affordable - they got it!

oh i agree with you - i love that part of christmas morning . But as I said before, different families, (and different cultures too) have different ideas on whats important at christmas, even with kids.

meritaten

balletshoes wrote: »

i do think thats a tad dramatic - not every human, male or female, gets all excited over young children's christmas presents.

sort of contradicts your other posts and has confused me a bit!

Counting_Pennies_2

balletshoes wrote: »

I feel so sad for you - I hope that doesn't sound patronising, I really don't mean it to.
I think christmas is for the kids, I have an OH who was brought up in a country where they don't celebrate christmas, we don't exchange gifts with each other at christmas, but I have free rein over what kind of christmas day our child has - because I had magical christmases as a child and I want my child to have them too.

Would your OH be more amenable to christmas for the kids if you stuck to a budget and didn't have to spend money on exchanging presents between you and him? Or would he think that would show him up with his family?

I am sorry I am giving myself a bit of a pity party here. I genuinely believe he wants to give the children a fun Christmas but we so disagree on how to do it. I think he just wants to give the one present and not spend too much. It all feels like an enormous up hill battle to get any decision that is not his making. I have raised this with him and he says he can see my point but still his wish remains. I think I just need to find a way to cope with how we are and not to fight too much. I want the children to be happy. He says they are but I just feel this undercurrent throughout I just don't feel the happiness I feel we exist

balletshoes

meritaten wrote: »

sort of contradicts your other posts and has confused me a bit!

sorry to confuse - what i'm saying is, even though I'm totally into christmas for kids and all the magic that goes with it, I don't expect everyone else to be, and I don't expect everyone to do christmas the way i do.

*Louise*

OP- rather than the number of parcels causing issues, could you come to an agreement on a budget which is halfway between what each of you consider reasonable? Then you can choose the gifts within the budget.

Say_who?

My OH is similar at Christmas, he only buys the girls what he feels they SHOULD want not what they actually do want, books and cd's mostly. He even sends off for freebies throughout the year and then wraps them up for Christmas and birthdays.

His other charming habit is to do no Christmas preparation until a few days before, he hasn't got time. Manages to find time to buy badges and CDs on eBay though! (rant over)

Luckily I earn my own money so just buy the girls what they want out of that. Our food cupboard contains only the basics at Christmas (I buy the food) but hey I'd rather the girls have nice presents. As long as he's not paying for it he doesn't care.

Do you work for your husbands company? Could you work elsewhere and have your own money?

My OH can be controlling but I have a part of my life that doesn't involve him at all, and I think he knows that if he got too bad he'd find himself alone and he does love us very much.

He's never wrong either ;-)

littleredhen

My advice would be, remember you can't change/control people you can only change your reaction/behaviour towards them. So let go of what you can't change and try and relax a little. Try and do something you can change and you will be more at peace. Alternatively get rid of dh:D
Sorry, just trying to inject some humour.

bagpussbear

meritaten wrote: »

Reading your post - your problem isn't Christmas - its your OH. I pity you - to live with a real life Scrooge cant be easy. Your life sounds like a joyless existence. I don't really know what to advise - if you love him and want to stay with him I have no idea how to make Christmas more a celebration and joyful time.
Personally - I couldn't stay with a man who cared so little for his childrens happiness - and was more interested in his xmas 'legover'.

Absolutely agree with Meritaten. When you dig deeper this is about your relationship with your OH, the christmas situation is simply a magnified manifestation of the issues you are having in your relationship.

Why does he expect a legover on christmas day? is your sex life poor and he sees it as the only time you might get some couple time? (you don't have to answer that though, sorry if thats a personal question :-)

Your christmases will never be happy ones until you fix some of the problems between yourselves. You sound resentful, and with good cause. I would go to a counsellor again, even if its just on your own.

jetplane

littleredhen wrote: »

My advice would be, remember you can't change/control people you can only change your reaction/behaviour towards them. So let go of what you can't change and try and relax a little. Try and do something you can change and you will be more at peace. Alternatively get rid of dh:D
Sorry, just trying to inject some humour.

Many a true word has been spoken in jest.