Christmas
Dealing with quarrels with your partner on the holidays
There are more breakups around Christmas than the rest of the year.
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The Christmas holidays hold a lot of potential for disputes in relationships. A psychologist gives tips for a more harmonious party.
Christmas Eve with the in-laws or the wrong present: Christmas can quickly become a stress test for the partnership. On the “Festival of Love” there should even be separations much more often than in the rest of the year. dr Hanne Horvath, psychologist and co-founder of the online therapy platform HelloBetter, explains in an interview how to make the holidays more harmonious and how to deal with different expectations of the festival.
Do separations or divorces really happen more often after the holidays?
dr Hanne Horvath: The Christmas holidays, which are associated with stress and pressure for many people, can be the icing on the cake for a partnership in which there is already a crisis, but they are rarely the sole trigger for a separation or divorce.
What makes the festival of love a danger for the partnership?
Horvath: Many people feel tired and exhausted at the end of the year and long for rest and relaxation. For a partnership, this can mean giving yourself the appropriate freedom and quiet space instead of doing unusual or exciting things.
It also happens that family gatherings are used to have a clarifying conversation for which there was not enough time and peace during the year. In this case, a certain level of expectation and sometimes pressure arises in advance, which we either carry out ourselves or notice in our partner. Last but not least, the days of Christmas can also be associated with unpleasant memories, for example from childhood. These often very individual motives can lead to conflicts in the partnership, especially if the ideas about how the common Christmas should be different.
What can be done to keep the holidays harmonious?
Horvath: It is helpful if we discuss our own expectations and fears in advance with the people with whom we are spending Christmas. But it is also important to follow your own needs instead of just focusing and adapting to family activities, as this can lead to frustration. The walk in the forest on December 24th, which is good for you, or a sports unit should definitely be feasible. It also helps to be generous yourself and lower your own expectations. Whether the son wants to come to church or not shouldn’t affect the Christmas spirit any more than the sister, who only arrives on Boxing Day.
If you’re already arguing: Would you rather discuss it directly or finish the discussion after the holidays?
Horvath: If you want to avoid arguments on the public holidays, you can leave the room when conflicts arise or ask to take up the topic again after the public holidays.
What do you do if you don’t like your partner’s gift?
Horvath: If we don’t like a gift, we should discuss it honestly with our partner. For example, we can ask what the intention behind the gift purchase was to understand why the partner chose that particular gift. A gift that you don’t like can be used as an opportunity to communicate your wishes and gift ideas more clearly.
How do you deal with different expectations of the holidays?
Horvath: If we talk about our expectations beforehand, we give our family members the opportunity to understand us better. Of course, the same applies the other way around. Spatial distance and breaks on Christmas days are important and relaxing, but going for a walk with your sister, for example, should be kept to an extent where the other family members do not feel excluded. Furthermore, radical acceptance supports us, especially with regard to the fact that nobody can live up to all expectations. Here it helps to know the motives behind the expectation, for example to approach each other more. For example, if I know that my partner thinks Christmas Eve at his mother’s is so important because it’s been the loneliest day of the year for her since her father’s death, I’ll probably give myself a push to spend Christmas Eve there and the Scheduling time with my family differently.