Holidays always seem to bring relationship issues to the surface. My 46 year old boyfriend of five months isn't ready to cut the apron strings from his family - should I stick around and hope this changes or learn to accept it or move on? How do you accept something so annoying? Snowflake details inside. [more inside]
posted by BlueMartini7 on Nov 24, 2012 - 43 answers

Is it possible to make someone happy, if they're generally not most of the time? [more inside]
posted by SoftSummerBreeze on Nov 9, 2005 - 28 answers

Several months ago, it was agreed that we would visit my family for Christmas. Now the SO has said he'd like to see his daughter. [MI] [more inside]
posted by Miss Bitchy Pants on Nov 19, 2004 - 9 answers

Let's say you are a 21 year old female, senior in college, with a 23 year old sister who is a grad student. The two of you are quite close but have very different interests. You're into Five-Eight for the moment and she's been into Tim McGraw for about ten years now. You have a steady boyfriend while she spends more time with her friends. Your mom and dad are divorced but that's ok cause they are better apart anyway. Now your mom wants to start her own Christmas tradition that doesn't involve your dad. She wants to take you, your sister, and maybe a couple of friends on a trip every year leaving on Christmas Day or maybe the day after. Her budget is $4000. Any suggestions on how to make everyone at least 90% happy?
posted by oh posey on Sep 6, 2004 - 22 answers

I'm recently engaged and my fiancée and I are stuck between families. Ideally we could see both sets of family for Christmas but geography rules it out.

How do you handle sharing the holidays with a minimum of stress or hurt feelings? Rotating, where you go to one house on one year and the other house the next year? Split each holiday into halves and see both each year? Any ideas?
posted by jmevius on Dec 10, 2003 - 19 answers