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My family holidays have a history of explosive fights about trivial matters, obligatory Southern Baptist church services, and a lack of compensatory alcohol. So one year I decided to skip out on this joyful time to take a trip with my friends to NYC. And I will never hear the end of it. Every year my mom passively-aggressively asks me, “So you’re coming home for Christmas this year, right?” And I’ve attended every Christmas since my New York getaway because I just don’t have the heart to do it to her again, and I also don’t want to hear about it any more than I already have to. The holidays are supposed to be a time of home and hearth, but sometimes you can’t attend, and sometimes you just choose not to. But when is it actually okay to skip out? I’m going to give you a case-by-case evaluation of the most common excuses for not going home for the holidays and how passable they are.
1. You’re taking a trip with your friends.
As I said before, you may think the holidays are a great time to take a friends’ trip, but it’s highly unlikely that your family will feel the same way. My bae is going to Japan with his boys for the winter break this year because it’s the only instance they’ll all have a decent amount of time off of work, and, just as I’ve never been able to live down running off to New York, he’s already feeling the ramifications of his actions two weeks in advance. Your parents might continuously remind you that never know how much time you have left with your grandparents. They might compile a list of health and/ or crime incidents in the place that you’re visiting. Don’t put anything past them – they can get really creative when it comes to this shit. The point is, if you don’t go home because of a friends’ trip, your family will be sad you aren’t there, but, because it was your choice to ditch them for fun-time, they won’t be above making you feel guilty as fuck about it.
2. You’re taking a trip with your bae.
If you follow me on Instagram, you may have noticed that my boyfriend and I were in Mexico for Thanksgiving. While I deserve some slack because our trip was to celebrate his birthday, which falls during the Thanksgiving holiday, I deserve to lose said slack because so does my mom’s birthday. If you’re going to go anywhere with bae for the holidays, your families prefer the destination to be their places of residence. And when you’ve been dating long enough to go home with bae for the holidays, it may potentially stir up a little drama with one family or both about whose home you and your partner decide to grace with your shared presence. But unless the families want to get together (which sounds like a complete shitshow), this is just part of life as a couple. It can usually be remedied with an alternating schedule. Or you’ll get into a disagreement with your family because they got the less important holidays while bae’s family got the good ones.
3. You have to work.
This excuse really depends on what you do for a living and how easily you’re able to get out of it. If you work in a place that’s open 24/7, like a hospital, or in a business where the holiday season is crunch time, somebody is going to get the short end of the stick and be forced to work. Sometimes that person is you. And that’s okay. Maybe you work in a country that doesn’t have the same holiday schedule, and you can’t just take off a week to spend time with the fam. That’s understandable, too. With certain jobs, working the holidays is unavoidable, and your family is likely to understand that, especially if you do something very impressive/that people’s lives depend on. Do what you gotta do to make that money, honey.
4. You’re overseas or really fucking far. Or broke.
If the time it takes to travel is going to be more than the time that you’ll actually be home or if it’s going to cost you an arm and a leg to fly there, you might decide that it’s just too much of an ordeal. And that seems reasonable to me. Maybe you’re not that far, but you’re still working on your hustle game, and a $300 flight is out of the question. That also seems like a reasonable excuse if your family isn’t able or willing to cover the cost. But what if the distance or your financial instability is a long-term situation? Do you just never go home for the holidays or do you find a way to make the sacrifice? Do you meet in the middle, distance- or cost-wise? Do you every-other-year that shit? If anybody has experience in this area, please let me know. Because, while I have finally gotten past regularly taking a hodgepodge of coins to the bank to avoid my account being overdrafted, I haven’t yet reached the international point of my life. But I plan to, and I need to know how to navigate.
5. Your family is a nightmare.
Look, if going home for the holidays is a significant threat to your mental and emotional well-being, you are not obligated to put yourself into a miserable situation, no matter how much shit your family gives you for it. I usually only need one therapy session after the holidays to process my family’s political views and our brush-it-under-the-rug-until-it-results-in-a-blow-up style of communication, and I’ve made peace with that. But if going home for the holidays legitimately sends you off the fucking deep end, I’m setting you free. I encourage you to celebrate with the family of your making, the people that love you for who you are and don’t cause a complete loss of sanity.
The thing about ditching out on your family is that there’s something about being home, for better or for worse, that truly makes it feel like the holidays. When I was in New York, there wasn’t any family drama, but there was also no waking up on Christmas morning to the bomb stocking stuffers my mom still curates for my adult brother and me. My friends and I were all too poor from saving up for the trip to buy decent presents for each other, and we spent Christmas day at one of the only restaurants we could find that was open, which was completely devoid of holiday cheer. So I’ll keep going home for now and just hope that everyone keeps their heated opinions about politics and the presents they’ve received to themselves. Or, realistically, to a minimum. Can’t set the bar too high..
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hannahrose
Excuse me, but I've got some shit to say. @xohannahrozay on IG and Twitter.
@xohannahrozay
@xohannahrozay
My parents are leaving me in MN to visit my brother in NC this year. I can’t take work off (new job), so I’m taking a weekend solo trip to Chicago. Spending Xmas alone, eating a large deep dish and keeping my eyes out for the Wet Bandits.
We’ve got plenty of room in ‘Tonka, friend.
Sounds like we might need a MSP PGP thread
Check Reddit. We can talk about a GroupMe if people are interested.
My dad died 2 days before Christmas 8 years ago. That was the last Xmas I was at home for. Now my family just takes a trip somewhere which is nice.
Casually suggested this to my mother, who proceeded to go on a tirade about how ungrateful of a person I am and hasn’t spoken to me in a week. Christmas promises to be a thriller this year
It depends, some families are closer than others. I’d love to be home for Christmas but I have to work. I also know people who dread the holidays because their families just can’t seem to behave when they’re all together. I’d just try to do what makes you happy.
Plus stacking those premium time pay bump nights, on top of weekends, on top of holidays definitely makes your bank account feel good you didn’t go home.
6. You conveniently scheduled a surgery for December 20th so that you can pretend that #5 isn’t the reality.
My siblings and cousins are all married and I’m the black sheep, drunk degenerate who spends all his time flying around the country attempting and going to the bar. No way in hell would I purposely subject myself to the awkward interactions and “when are you going to settle down?” questions I know I’d have to endure.
And when everyone questioned why I’m not flying home I said I hadn’t spent the $3000 required to get 60,000 free miles for my new AA credit card. I also have enough miles for a few flights already saved up. I’m leaning in to being the family shithead/drunken uncle to my nieces and nephews.
I missed Thanksgiving this year and I know I will hear about it for the rest of my life regardless of how many future holidays I go to.
Everyone pls stop traveling on holidays so I can go home thx
“Brush-it-under-the-rug-until-it-results-in-a-blow-up style of communication” definitely hits home, no pun intended…
Skipped Thanksgiving last year to go to Hong Kong with a friend. Parents basically said to enjoy myself but they wouldn’t be saving leftovers for me. Flight deal was too good to pass up so it was worth it.
Casual.