how many NOT looking forward to thanksgiving tomorrow.....im not im not

a reply to: Grovit

I can empathize. I spent years dealing with the Thanksgiving chaos of a dysfunctional family and it just seemed so counter intuitive to the holiday's meaning--being thankful. Hard to be thankful when you're surrounded by acerbic people and the pressure to participate is intense. Not to mention that your wife sees it way differently. That just makes it more difficult and you really can't put your foot down because it is your spouse that wants to do it.

I did throw in the towel and bow out a few years ago. We have a quiet thanksgiving here without the guilt trips, arguments, thinly veiled barbs and more. We're thankful for each others' company and love. I think that's how the holiday is supposed to be honestly. Felt kind of weird at first but nobody ends up storming from the table or leaving in tears. My extended family thanksgiving was more like Darwin's survival of the fittest (and most emotionally closed). Totally thankful that we have a lovely evening instead.

Hang in there. Maybe eventually you will get that peaceful Thanksgiving dinner that you want. Coming from a dysfunctional family myself, I can honestly say that sometimes the toxicity of one's own family is the hardest to see (and most frequently excused) simply because one has always been in the thick of it.

a reply to: CagliostroTheGreat

i dont hate depression boy, hit # just gets old.
its always the same crap you know. im tired of hearing it...

i dont want to be told all about witch craft and how he just learned a new spell and 5 minutes later say how much he wants to die.....its just a non stop barrage of that.

the father in law is another thing...without getting into too much detail, my wife had it hard when she was a kid. her mom split when she was like 6 and they didnt talk for 10 years. there are reasons but i dont want to get into it.

the thing is, every time her dad is around us for more than a half hour he starts in with his crap.
talks about how much of a bitch her real mother is. about how he had to work so hard to raise the kids while the bitch mom was blah blah blah.....
and on and on and on....
hours of that.....

my wife does not say anything though.
it hurts her feelings cause she has been working on her relationship with her mom the past few years and he just comes in and tries to bring out all the past terrible #.....
it hurts her feelings but she wont say anything.
he thinks they dont talk. if he knew she talked to her mom he would freak out.

i told her to tell him whats up and if he dont like it then he and i can handle it.
my house. my wife....this is how its gonna be...
she wont though.
she just sits there and listens to it.....

im friggin tired of listening to it.....

it totally ruins my day.

so in the middle of hearing about how her real mother was a bitch this or that for the thousandth time, i get manic boy up my ass talking about spells and what he;s gonna do when the zombies come.....

its a major drag

a reply to: Grovit

It sounds to me like you and your wife should set some ground rules for the visit. Your lady should definitely tell her dad that she is nit comfortable gearing him bad mouth her mom. I know what having bad parents is like, trust me they were both drug addicts and alcoholics but now I have a good relationship with the both if them.

Truly, communication is the key in any relationship.

But on the subject of manic man, you should just tell him that you aren't interested in his witchcraft BS, being honest is always better than being passive/aggressive, always, even if that leads to a minor altercation. I would tell your wife before you confront him though.

Hope my advice helps.

And remember: if all else fails there is always pot. (To cook the gravy of course )

a reply to: CagliostroTheGreat

we talk. we have good communication actually
this is just the issue where we have problems...

she has parent issues she needs to work out....i have to be here to pick up the pieces...

as far as manic boy, if i did have the thing to cook the gravy in, he would sniff that # out no matter what.
he's like a bloodhound with that...

thats another thing...i have to hide my meds around him. i would not put it past him to take my vicodin

i think he would do it in an instant

a reply to: Grovit

Well, Grovit, at any rate I hope you Thanksgiving is bearable at vest and mind numbing at worst. I am sure that, regardless of familial shortcomings, you certainly have a lot to thankful for brother.

Love, peace and big fat Turkey grease!

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic
I'm very lucky to be spending Thanksgiving with my husband only. There have been plenty of years where I've been in your shoes, but I have been so happy since we pretty much quit celebrating holidays. It's so freeing! The most we do for any holiday (including anniversaries and birthdays) is have a nice meal. No pressure, no shopping, no decorating... It's great!

Sorry you'll be spending your day with weird people... Good luck!

Ditto for us, many years ago we used to host a Christmas bash in our home yearly and it was fine for about the first 7 years or so. Then we found ourselves getting a little older and the guests getting a little more sedated then we would like.

So we tried to cancel it with grace and not offend anyone, yet we still had about 10 folks show up that year.
The solution was simple as mentioned in this thread already. The next year we left our lights (indoors and outside) off and just took a hike for the evening.

We had a visit with my Parents for a few hours then went out for dinner and drinks. When we arrived home all was quiet and we slept like babies that night.
We woke in the morning without the stink of cigarette smoke and filthy empty beer bottles used as ashtrays.
No piles of dirty dishes and no puke on the toilet seat:-) and lots of toilet paper left for us.
We even had ice cubes in the freezer and my beer supply was intact.

After that year we did the same thing twice more just to be sure and that was the end of it and we never looked back.
Nice and quiet but we did miss a few of our regular guests but they came with luggage and that was uninvited friends, it just seemed to get out of control and we could not put a lid on it.

Never looking back here as well
www.youtube.com...

Regards, Iwinder & YogaGinns

Happy Thanksgiving Lovely ATSers, whether its your bag or not, you have a virtual family here.
xox

a reply to: Grovit

I'm stuck on the avatar thing... or now, lack thereof. I got docked for the eff word with $%^ taking the place of most letters... but that's more understandable than that avatar getting removed... how is Molly's head stuck on a raw turkey worth censorship?

I really don't get people ...and the people police are the worst.

And if I were there, you'd def wanna lock that Vicodin up... or do the fun family gathering trick with an a-hole who likes drugs and substituting the Vikes for laxatives and watching the fun... as long at there's more than one bathroom in the house, that is.

If he wasn't a manic a-hole I'd say share them.

a reply to: Grovit

That makes two of us, although I will say that this is the second year I didn't have to celebrate 3 Thanksgivings (my parent's are split, and now live so far away that I have to pick & chose which one I want to attend).

Back then, it was hectic - my ex didn't fit in with our side (90% introverts, and she was an extrovert), and I definitely didn't fit in with her side (99% extroverts, and one introvert: me). There was usually a lot of drinking, and a lot of things being said that I really didn't need or want to hear.

Although I'm not looking forward to it because I need to "dress up" for the occasion, I at least get to be there and help keep my siblings sane.
-fossilera

originally posted by: FlyersFan
I always hate Thanksgiving because we usually get stuck going to a giant family get together on my husbands side of the family. The worst part - sick drippy nosed kids with hands all over the food 'helping' in the kitchen. Thankfully, this year, there is no get together. Ahhhhh ... relief!

Wifey sensed the same thing. Thankfully she agreed to a small family (our family) get together. We'll have the ability to do what we want when we want. No need to cater to extended family this time!

a reply to: ChuckNasty


to the poster who started this thread..you and your wife should set a few boundries....they start fighting...tell them this is your house there will be no fighting...not sure how to handle the other one.

come back tomorrow after it's over and let us know what happened!

a reply to: research100

will do
i have to admit, the only thing i like about the brother in law coming over, is my 2 year old calls him 'meat'
hahahahahah

it took me a while to get her to catch on to that but to her, thats his name.
i love it

a reply to: Grovit you don't want them fighting in front of your 2 year old and I am sure your wife doesn't either you don't want them to scare her.

I've not had much family Thanksgivings growing up. Just a couple of times, at my real dads house- he and his family are all like strangers to me, so it was just awkward.
Though I think those times I was in a state of naive dreaminess, seeing a fairytale-like Norman Rockwell situation, because I was out of the loop on all the history and conflicts and passive aggressive references flying around me.

Though once I had my own family, I tried to create that idealized holiday with my husband and kids, which wasn't easy at first because they are not familiar with the holiday.

The irony of it this year is that I found out I had to work on Thanksgiving, and just figured no one else would care- I was the only one into that anyway.
But my kids all called up this week assuming we'd be doing it, and when I told them we weren't, they were very upset! Even their partners were upset (apparently through the years, they've liked this ritual).

So I am not looking forward to Thanksgiving, but for the opposite reasons- I won't get to have my family together.
The irony of life is that we often get the opposite of what we'd prefer!

Now that the family is getting older and larger, we all get together at a nice restaurant. For the family members who occasionally act up and get on my nerves, I'll have one or two black Russians or glasses of wine and make sure I take my nerve pill. LOL I concentrate on my wonderful meal and the rest of the family and all is well. If you have family members that continue year after year then something has to be said or it never ends. You can't continue to allow them to ruin your holidays.

Perhaps next year you can make reservations at a nice restaurant for your immediate family and let the rest deal with the holiday as they will.

I know that lots of folks here have really messed-up family situations. I don't have that experience; but I won't bore you with how wonderful my people are.

Could it be that the family members have no real connection to each other besides the fact that they are family? i.e., no common interests or values?

Or is it that the difficult people are controlling or judgmental?

Yeah, well, be glad you don't have to go in to work to prepare for Black Friday on 3 hours of "sleep" which has been constantly interrupted by a pulled muscle from the previous day. Can't even take a deep breath without maneuvering around. I had to get up at 2:30 am. And tomorrow, Friday, I have to be there at midnight and work 11 hours.
Retail Hell.

been cooking all day.
as soon as uncle meat gets here we are informed that he is tired of feeling bad about himself and is back on his 'ninja diet' and will only eat 2 spoonfuls of veggies

I do not know what time it is over there but let us know how it went unless it was too uncomfortable to talk about please.

I would like to think it was not as bad as you thought.

it went off pretty much without a hitch.
no fighting which was nice..

just hard to deal with uncle meat. he's a goofy bastard.

he mumbles when he talks so you have to get real close to hear him.
not too much talk about wanting to die today.

todays visit was all about his ninja diet...on and on and on about it...
and practicing his ninja moves...

dude is 27