January 17, 2025 at 2:49 am

She Gave Her Husband’s Family A Year’s Notice That She Couldn’t Come To Christmas, But Now Her Husband Is Making Her Feel Guilty For Missing It

by Michael Levanduski

Source: Shutterstock/Reddit

It is unfortunate when you have to miss a Christmas celebration with family due to work obligations.

What would you do if your husband was making you feel guilty for missing the celebration even though everyone knew you had to work for over a year?

That is the situation the first responder in this story is facing and she isn’t sure how she should be handling it.

Check it out.

WIBTAH for not going to my husband’s family’s Christmas?

I am a first responder and have been for the last 3 years.

My schedule is a rotating shift pattern (days/nights).

The pattern is consistent and I can tell you what days I’m working very far in advance.

So, they had plenty of notice.

Because of this, I told my entire family last year that I would be working on Christmas this year and reminded them when we saw them.

This is the first time I have had to work on Christmas.

My side of the family understands and we are celebrating with just my parents and siblings another day.

My husband’s family is really into Christmas.

Like everyone needs to be at SIL’s house at 8am to open presents together and then we spend the entire day together.

It is hard to change the date for just one person.

So when I asked if we could celebrate together another day over the holidays instead it got shut down with statements like “Christmas is on December 25th.” or “I don’t understand, can’t you just ask for the day off?”

So I let them know my husband would be attending solo this year.

This morning while I was at work, my husband (who works a 9-5 and is enjoying his day off) texts me “it would be nice if you could come by for a couple hours tomorrow after work..”

All very valid reasons.

I declined because:

  1. SIL lives ~90mins away, so that’s 3 hours of driving. I would be driving home alone at night with not the best weather.
  2. My job can be very stressful and my social battery is drained by the time I get home.
  3. We already agreed that it made more sense for me to stay home and to have him go to his parents house on Christmas Eve so they could drive over in the morning together.

Well my husband is upset and thinks that I don’t want to spend time with his family.

He should be more supportive.

He’s been sending me passive aggressive texts all day trying to guilt trip me, “we don’t know how much time we have left with my parents…”

It’s working because I feel like I’m letting everyone down and I don’t want his family to think I don’t want to spend Christmas with them.

Am I wrong for sticking to our original plan instead of making an effort to go see his family tomorrow after work?

AITA?

Just make it clear that you are unhappy about it too, but that you have to work, then stick with the plan.

Read on to see some of the comments from other people.

Yes, first responders need to cover 24/7. It is what it is.

Source: Reddit/AITA

Here is someone saying they should be more understanding.

Source: Reddit/AITA

Yup, this isn’t a new job or schedule.

Source: Reddit/AITA

This commenter thinks the husband is more concerned with his family.

Source: Reddit/AITA

This person says driving in the dark like this is not a good idea.

Source: Reddit/AITA

This family needs to be more understanding.

She gave them plenty of warning.

If you liked that story, read this one about grandparents who set up a college fund for their grandkid because his parents won’t, but then his parents want to use the money to cover sibling’s medical expenses.