Hi, I'm new, but not really. A while ago I posted occasionally under a different name but think I was stalked.

Just wanted to thank you all for solid advice over the years. For the first time ever, I decided I did not want to spend Christmas with DH's family. Now, I generally like his family, especially his siblings. I even get along with his kids (SS 28, SD 35) more often than not. But after all the drama at Thanksgiving over what appeared to me to be nothing (essentially his daughter didn't get enough Daddy Time and was just awash with stress and irritation), I decided I just didn't have the energy to endure Christmas with them. If DH wanted to see his kids the day after Christmas, go have fun. But I miss my family (scattered all over the country, and my parents are gone) and just don't want to be around his. I have spent every Christmas for the past ten years with his family, seeing pieces of mine either before or after or not at all, sometimes by choice and sometimes by pressure from him or his kids.

For years I have been hearing all their family stories about their holiday traditions and family antics, right down to BM and BM's parents. Great, have your traditions and funny stories but please don't expect me to be assimilated. Especially when nobody wants to hear anything about my traditions. I'm a good sport, believe me, but sitting in silence for hours on end to hear yet again about how Uncle Jerry dropped the turkey on the dog 35 years ago just isn't funny to me. I don't begrudge them their fun, but I do take offense when I try to add to the conversation with my own experiences and SD in particular is irritated that I am breathing. How could I have the audacity not to follow her script? Oh, sorry, it took me a bit to realize that this isn't about storytelling and sharing pieces of everyone's life, it is about creating a tight circle that I'm not part of. I finally get it.

So anyway, DH said he wanted to spend Christmas with me, then go on to see his kids, about a 6 hr drive away and stay for a few days. Fine. I was giddy, planning my own girly days even though I'd miss him. But oh no his Princess would not allow him to drive all that way by himself. He's old (uhm, 60) and might fall asleep and she'd just worry about him nonstop, so, no, he isn't allowed to do that. (DH is accustomed to taking orders from her in particular, and it is not attractive.) And she's livid that he won't be there Christmas morning to watch her precious children open their Santa gifts. (Hey, I like her kids just fine but I'm not going to be guilted into taking orders from a 30-something control freak, even though her father is an easy target for that.) DH is sad. He's a master at the guilty daddy stuff, 20 years post divorce. So he almost asks me to reconsider going to skidville for Christmas, but even before he got the whole question out he got the stink eye and some body language from me, and finally admitted that he lets SD control way too much of his life. Ya think, DH?

So now I don't know what the Christmas plans are. I just know I'm not going to be in skidville, and I am going to have a mani and pedi the day after Christmas. The rest of it, I don't care.

Bless you, all you steptalkers.