Make Holiday Plans That Please Everyone

“By the time Halloween rolls around, I get that nervous feeling in the pit of my stomach,” says Margo, 30, a public relations manager and the mother of two boys, 5 years and 11 months. “As soon as the pumpkins are gone, and the first Christmas decorations go up, I start worrying about where we are going to celebrate the holidays.” This year is no different. The fact that Margo’s parents live in Denver and her husband Phil’s family hails from Chicago, makes the scheduling even more chaotic.

College sweethearts married for seven years, Margo and Phil used to alternate Thanksgiving and Christmas to make the rounds of different houses - her mother and stepfather, his mother, his father and stepmother. It was busy but manageable - before they had kids. “With two little guys, it’s a logistical nightmare,” Margo explains. “The frantic pace wears me to a frazzle and I dread the holidays that used to mean so much to me.”

Margo is so confused, she doesn’t even know what she wants to do. On one hand she admits she can’t bear the pained sound in her mother’s voice if she announces they’re spending Christmas in Illinois. “And it’s true that, for years, I looked forward to watching my boys open their presents in my mom’s living room on Christmas morning. That’s what my sister and I did and that’s what Christmas always meant to me,” she explains. “But to tell you the truth,” she continues, “if I had my druthers, this year, I’d stay in my own house and celebrate the holiday surrounded by my husband and children - and no one else.”

Complicating the picture is the fact that Margo has never gotten along well with Phil’s mother or his older sisters - and Phil thinks that’s why she wants to stay home. “He’s being totally unreasonable,” Margo insists. “I try to talk about it, but Phil has never been great about expressing his feelings and he avoids long talks like the plague. He refuses to work on a solution; instead, he tells me I’m being selfish and pig-headed because I don’t want what he wants.”

Holiday planning has become their number one hot-button issue. “We’ve started quarreling about really stupid things, stuff that never used to bother us, and I know it all boils down to the Christmas crisis,” she adds.

Thirty-year-old Phil, a soft-spoken tax attorney, is uncharacteristically steamed. “We agreed years ago to alternate the holidays - one year Christmas at her mother’s, Thanksgiving at mine; the next year, the opposite - and this year, it’s my mother’s turn,” he says angrily. “Just tell me how I’m supposed to tell her, ‘Sorry, Mom but we changed our minds?”’ he argues. Margo, Phil continues, gets her way on almost every domestic issue. “She makes big deals out of little deals and gets so worked up, it’s usually not worth trying to convince her otherwise,” he says. “It’s my nature to let things slide.”

Phil is convinced that Margo is using the upcoming holidays as a way of getting back at his difficult relatives. “I know my mother is difficult and I know my sisters can be snobs, but why can’t Margo act like a grownup for the little time we see them?” he adds. “She’s always getting into cat fights with them, pushing issues that just aren’t important, calling them on the things that other people would ignore.” If he can let their comments roll off his back, why can’t she?

Handling holiday headaches

“Deciding how, where and with whom to celebrate the holidays can strain even the best marriage,” notes Susan Heitler, Ph.D., a clinical psychologist and the author of “The Power of Two: Secrets to a Strong and Loving Marriage” (Harbinger, 1997). The holidays trigger strong feelings about traditions - made even more potent by the presence of children. We want to pass along and create new traditions as powerful as the old ones we remember.

How can you ease seasonal stress and still arrive at a solution that makes most people happy? The following suggestions helped Margo and Phil work out their holiday logistics.

Fantasize about your ideal holiday. Pick a quiet time after the kids are in bed and picture for each other your dream holiday. Although this may sound silly, even trivial, when you’re both annoyed or angry, it’s actually a good way to share needs and desires that you may not even be aware you have, or may have been reluctant to express.

Listen for the real feelings behind the words.

Put your dream holiday down on paper. After you’ve discussed your ideal scenarios, write them down and see if you can combine them into something you both feel comfortable with. Try to come up with at least three options.