The practice of giving and receiving gifts at Christmas is celebrated by a lot of people, but that tradition can also happen in many different ways. After all, there's no right or wrong way to give gifts, and different families have different ideas about who gets gifts and how many they get.
For example, one woman recently shared on Reddit that her husband's family expects the two of them to buy gifts for everyone: his parents, one stepparent, three sisters, three brothers-in-law, and nine kids. For some people, that would be just fine … but for others, it's not. The woman definitely falls in the latter camp.
She starts off by explaining that she's an only child, and she didn't grow up in a family where everyone gives gifts to everyone else:
"I (32F) am an only child. My husband and I have been married 2 years (together for 4) and have no kids yet. Before I met my husband, I only bought Christmas gifts for my parents and my grandma."
Her husband, however, has a giant family:
"My husband has three sisters, all of whom are married, and each couple currently has 3 kids. Plus his mom, dad, and step-mom. Before we were married, he would only buy his parents Christmas gifts. He's the only boy and the baby of the family so no one really expected gifts from him in his early 20's."
The woman's family used a pretty common system when it came to giving gifts at Christmas: they drew names.
"For family Christmas when I was growing up, the children (my cousins) would draw a name and the adults would draw a name for Christmas gifts so each child had another child’s name and each adult had another adult's name. From my understanding, this is pretty normal in families."
Unsurprisingly, the woman wasn't totally on board when she found out that she and her husband are now expected to buy gifts for his entire family:
"I was very surprised when we started dating and I found out we were expected to get gifts for his parents, step-parent, three sisters, three brothers-in-law, and ALL NINE KIDS. His sisters started a group text after we had been dating awhile sending Christmas lists for themselves, their spouses, and their kids. His sisters had even called each other (without my husband or I) and chose $30 per gift and informed me of this via text."
She suggested that the family consider using the name-drawing tactic she grew up with, but no one was interested:
"I mentioned we drew names in my family, and suggested this as an alternative, especially because we don't have children and buying for the nine kids plus siblings and their spouses gets incredibly expensive. His sisters didn't even entertain that as an idea. One sister just said that they have to buy for the same amount too (because they also buy gifts for their own kids.)"
She also says that buying so many gifts is antithetical to how she and husband live, and the holiday is a "huge source" of anxiety:
"We don't have huge salaries and we chose to live below our means so that we can make extra monthly mortgage payments and pay off our house more quickly. Christmas is a huge source of anxiety for me, both because of the expense, and because I hate shopping and trying to find gifts for everyone."
If she had her way, the woman and her husband would just give gifts to his parents and call it a day:
"I'd prefer to either draw names or just give gifts to his parents. We end up with a list of around 25 people to buy for, which is insane. We also don't get to pay extra on our mortgage in December due to the amount of money we're spending on gifts."
Now she wants to know if her attitude is unreasonable. Many people on Reddit think her attitude is more than justified, and they even have ideas for different tactics the woman and her husband could try to show just what they think of being required to buy so many gifts.
One suggestion: keep the cost low.
"Buy them all gifts from the Dollar Tree, Dollar General, 99cent store and other bargain stores so you wont break the bank," one commenter advised. "If they try and berate you about the gift you got them, throw the old 'you never look a gifted horse in the mouth' mumbo jumbo and smile and enjoy Christmas."
Another person suggested that the couple buy gifts for only the kids:
"I have a brother and a sister. They have spouses. My sis has 4 kids, bro has 2, and I have 2. We agreed amongst ourselves only the kids get gifts. To a limit of $30 per kid (max – no judgments if we don't spend that much per kid). Since my sister's kids are all in their teens now, I've taken to getting them a group gift (this year was Mario Party on Switch) which is still within my limit for them, but a nicer gift than they would've gotten individually."
Another person added that the kind of gifting arrangement this family has can become very expensive very quickly:
"I know someone in this situation except not sure of the sibling/children count. She is one of the sisters and spends TEN THOUSAND dollars a year on presents for extended family. That’s just extended family. And yes everyone is expected to buy a present for everyone else around d $25-30."
Ultimately, the consensus is that if the woman and her husband cave and buy all these gifts this year, they'll always be expected to. So they really have to decide if they're OK with that.
A commenter summed it up: "If you do it this time and then refuse to do it again, it’s going to come off worse than not doing it in the first place."
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
