The holiday drama just never ends

[citrine]

I feel for you....I have the same guilt trip thing with my Mom, Dad, and Brother. I have disengaged with the extended family and still have a hard time with the nuclear family. I just keep repeating myself and keep setting the boundaries....some days it is better than others. I am not responsible for how they feel...just how I feel.

[frugalone]

Frugalone, do you spend any quality time with your mother or sis outside of the holidays? If not, and you don't feel good about your family dynamics at all, as in they make you miserable, maybe it is time to part ways for good....

I had just gone on a short day trip to meet a relative with my mother the week before Thanksgiving. I don't see my sister very much--she works a pretty crazy schedule in health care (and I have a second-shift schedule). My sister and I mostly email, and that's the way it is with my mom, too. We do see them at birthday parties and holidays, and meet up every now and then for lunch.

I admire those of you who have given your families the freedom to spend the holidays/their time as they choose. Thumbs up!

You're right--I may never get anyone to "understand." I should give up those expectations.

Please help me with one thing: Those of you who have said they understand why I don't want to spend time with my family--I just need a reminder of what I've said that points to "dysfunction" or "unhealthy" dynamics. I wonder what it looks like to outsiders. What did you take away from things I've said?

Thank you for listening.

[Spartana]

At almost 50 years of age, you are free to choose to spend your time as you wish. Just don't expect that others will like that your choice does not include them. At some point, you will accept the trade-off for your freedom, their disappointment vs your self-control of your time, energy and emotions.

.

This!!

Frugalone - You know the old saying: you can't change others, only yourself. And you can't change other's reaction to the things you choose to do with your life either, you can only change your reactions to their reactions. In other words, instead of expecting their blessings, then getting mad or hurt when they don't respond in the supportive, positive way you expected them to, just let it go and don't worry how they feel.

[lhamo]

I have conflicting feelings about the holidays. Quite often, I don't want to go to family events, and my SO is generally supportive. Last week, we opted (albeit rather late) not to go to my DSis's for Thanksgiving. I emailed her, told her we were both feeling run-down and tired and were going to stay home. She said she was "Disappointed" and I did not hear from her until this past Monday, when she emailed me about a fractious situation with our brother (she is very angry with him at the mo). Some of you may remember I have a very uncomfy situation going on with my brother. If you don't recall, just ask and I will tell you (feel free to PM me, even). I don't really want to be around him. I'm also not crazy about DSis's in-laws and neighbors (who always manage to come over on these occasions) but I don't HATE anyone.

OK, my sister and I are on the same team, speaking terms, etc. I call my mom before and she is barely speaking to me. Giving me the silent treatment on the phone. Then when I ask what's wrong, she says she's very angry and hurt that we didn't come for Thanksgiving. She's like, "It's a major holiday and you're just TOO TIRED to come to dinner with your family." Like that's unacceptable And she said she thought perhaps we didn't "like the family" anymore. (As I said, NO, I don't particularly like my brother, and I feel VERY uncomfortable around him but she doesn't know that, and I can't tell her the reasons WHY I feel this way). I also get extremely stressed about preparing food and bringing it. We're always late for every occasion, whether we bring food or not. It's all stressful. My partner says he thinks the bottom line is I don't really want to be around my family, and I think I have to admit that's true.

Dear readers: I chickened out--I told her something I should have kept between me and my SO, that she found to be an acceptable excuse. I just couldn't bring myself to tell her the truth, especially since she is also upset about this incident with my brother.

I'm not necessarily looking for advice. I mean, what can you say? I just feel totally effed up about this. I took a big step in saying I wanted to stay home for the past holiday, and now I feel like I've just had my hands slapped. Like, it is NOT an option to not go? I am almost 50 years old! WTF?!

(To those of you who are saying, "Of course your mother is hurt," I understand that she is hurt. I just feel totally stuck.

There is dysfunction all over your original post. I've bolded/underlined the specific examples. A few comments:

1) You often don't want to to to family events. That's fine -- but you should try to get to some clarity about why that is and work on articulating it clearly to your family members. Don't be passive aggressive and agree to something you know you don't want to do, only to drop out at the last minute. Try not to give too many back-ended excuses for why you decide not to participate -- own your decisions to the extent you can, and do so from the start. Consider making general agreements that you can keep. Something like "I'm an introvert and large events with lots of people stress me out. I can only handle one gathering like that every [insert time period -- year, 6 months, 3 months, month, week, whatever you think is a reasonable limit]. Which holiday is most important to you? I'll make a commitment to come share that event with the family (barring actual illness, etc.). Otherwise, I'd prefer to see people in smaller groups/under less stressful conditions. I'll commit to [insert event of your choosing -- coming over for lunch, going out for coffee, going on a hike, whatever] with you individually every [insert time period].

If you dislike having family events attended by your SILs neighbors, speak up about it. Some people are the inclusive types who like to have anybody and everybody over for special events. You are clearly not. Draw a boundary around that issue and let people know where you stand. They then have the choice to honor your preference and limit the participation to family only, or to invite others. BUt if they do the latter you then can bow out early, having let it be known that you are not into that kind of arrangement.

2) Your brother's issues. You need to give them a clearer explanation about what is going on. Clearly he's a problem for more people than just you. You don't need to get into the details, just say something like "Over the past couple of years [name] has made some lifestyle choices that I personally find offensive, and has tried to pressure me into getting involved in similar activities. He has also done things that make it impossible for me to trust him. I cannot stand to be around him while he is engaging in these behaviors. I'm not going to go into the details so don't pressure me to do so. But I will not attend family events where he is present. If you invite him to something, I'm not coming. If he shows up while I'm there, I'm leaving. I'm telling you this now so that you understand my behavior. It is between me and him, but as it also affects how I interact with you where he is involved I need you to know why I'm doing what I'm doing."

3) Communication style

Doing everything by email can rub a lot of people the wrong way, and with certain people leads to a cycle of passive aggressive interaction. If you do need to back out of an event at the last minute, call the key players to let them know. Otherwise you end up with them doing "telephone" about it and they probably spin all kinds of stories and dramatic interpretations and the bad feeling just escalates.

Basically I think you need to work on owning your feelings and communicating them clearly with empathy for how they might feel but at the same time not apologizing for who you are. You caught up in a cycle of reactivity and passive-aggressive interactions that is difficult, but not impossible, to break out of.

Dave Ramsey frequently recommends the book "Boundaries" by Henry Cloud to people dealing with complicated family dynamics. You might want to check it out from the library -- I haven't read it, but maybe it would be helpful

It's ok to be you, frugalone. And it is ok to say what you want/need in your relationships. Your family will need some time to adjust to a new pattern of interaction, but it will be better for everyone if you can communicate your needs more clearly and avoid getting caught up in these cycles of drama.

[frugalone]

All very good advice, lhamo.
Thank you.

[Gardenarian]

I don't have anything to add, but I'm so sorry you're going through this with your family.
This is why I moved 3000 miles away.

[RosieTR]

Llamo's post was an excellent explanation and advice! I would like to add, you can have unhealthy/dysfunctional relationships with some family members and healthy ones with others, or some that can sort of slide back and forth. So you may have a healthy relationship with sister, an OK relationship with parents, and a terrible relationship with brother and that's OK to acknowledge. I definitely got that sense from your post, esp from the points outlined by Llamo. It's not easy to tell a relative with whom you have a good relationship that you cannot be in the presence of another relative you find toxic, because you're basically putting the first relative in the position of choosing between the two of you. But, sometimes you have to do this, and that sucks but now you have an excellent outline to bring this up. Hopefully things will get better if you put this into motion, and then turning down a holiday gathering will be less guilt-filled and attending a holiday gathering will be less stress-filled.