How To Deal With Difficult Family Members At Christmas

Stay sane without needing to fix anyone

7 min read

Just now

The annual reenactment of old sins

A lady emailed me in the middle of November. She read a couple of pieces I’ve written over the years about dealing with family over Christmas and Thanksgiving, and was looking for some advice.

“I understand the theories and the practices, but there’s a huge difference between theory and doing them.”

Aye, I thought to myself, hammer meets nail on the head right there.

We spoke in early December, and when the camera came on, she was sitting as if she already knew the verdict, but wanted to tell the story anyway.

Christmas was still weeks off, but her body had skipped ahead. Her shoulders were tight, her jaw clenched, and a laugh arrived before the first sentence, which usually means trouble.

She starts with what went down in a Baltimore suburb last Christmas.

X was late, and not fashionably. Y sulked like a child who’d found the puppy had pooped in his Nutella. Z made a racist joke that landed like a cement brick in the borscht soup.

A drank too much, and B pretended not to notice, or care, but definitely did because I’d often…