They Always Alternated Christmas With Their Families—Until His Mother Demanded Every Holiday After His Wife Lost Her Parents
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Holiday negotiations between families are stressful enough without someone using grief as leverage to tip the scales in their favor.
In this story, a couple spent years trading off Christmases between his large family in Wisconsin and her smaller one in the UK.
But after his wife lost both her parents, their Christmases started looking a lot different. Still, his wife decided she wanted to keep their trip to Spain they already planned, but this caused some discord with the husband’s side of the family.
Since his wife’s parents were out of the picture, his mother suddenly felt entitled to 100% of their time at Christmas.
You’ll want to read on. Reddit is sure to have some strong opinions on this one.
WIBTA if we went to Spain instead of visiting my family for Christmas?
A bit of background, I’m American and my wife is British.
For Christmas, we trade off every year — one year we’d do a big family Christmas in Wisconsin with my big extended family, the next Christmas we’d go the UK.
Soon, his wife and her family started doing something different for their holiday traditions.
My wife’s family is much smaller than mine (she’s an only child, so it was just her and her parents).
Her mom sadly passed a few years ago, so the last few years instead of going to the UK, we’ve started doing low-key Christmas trips with her dad (we’ve been to Greece, Italy, Japan, and were planning on Spain next).
Sadly, last year her father also passed.
Still, his wife wanted to preserve their plans — and this is where the drama started.
This year, it’s my wife’s turn for Christmas, and she still wants to go to Spain on the trip we originally had planned, even if it’s just us, and wants to continue doing Christmas trips every second Christmas.
I have zero problem with this, but my mother is upset.
She understood us alternating Christmas when we had my wife’s family to visit, but since my wife now has no direct family left, she thinks that we should have Christmas every year in Wisconsin going forward, and that we’re being selfish doing a solo vacation and not spending the time with family.
So WIBTA if we did solo vacations every second year for Christmas?
Sounds like Mom is making a pretty big overstep.
What did Reddit have to say?
When in doubt, it’s probably best to defer to what his grieving wife wants.
His mom needs to know she can’t behave this way.
It’s his wife’s turn, so his wife gets to choose.
Maybe his mother just needs a little nudge to be more empathetic.
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The mother-in-law’s logic only works if you believe the alternating arrangement was purely about visiting family and had nothing to do with respecting the couple’s time as a unit. But that was always part of it.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a disabled man who is considering cutting off his friends because they take advantage of him.
Every other Christmas was theirs to spend how they chose, and the fact that it used to involve the wife’s family doesn’t mean it now belongs to Wisconsin by default. This woman lost both her parents, and the Christmas trips are clearly tied to something emotional she’s trying to preserve.
Telling her that her grief doesn’t count as a valid reason to keep the tradition is breathtakingly tone-deaf, even if the mother-in-law doesn’t see it that way.
The husband supports his wife, the arrangement is fair, and every family in the world survives seeing each other every other year.
Missing one Christmas doesn’t mean they love his family less.
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