Dubois Posted December 20, 2010 Posted December 20, 2010 I've been dating a guy for just over a year. He is very close to his family and I have a few questions. During football season, he spends every Sunday at his mom's house. If it's an early game he goes at 10:30 and leaves at around 9:30 at night. He is completely unwilling to miss one of these dinners. He wants me to go with him to all of them. I hate football so for awhile I would go later and have dinner and stay for the after dinner stuff. He also sees his mom regularly outside of these dinners. It was my brother's birthday celebration in August and he said no because it was on a Sunday until it came up in front of his mom (she asked what I was doing that night) and she said he had to go. It's the holidays and we spent Thanksgiving apart and are now about to spend Christmas apart because he won't skip his family and while I have been invited to all of their festivities I've said no since he said no to my family. When I asked what was going to happen in the future when he had to go out of town to spend a holiday with my family he (half jokingly) said he didn't see it happening. I just spent 3 days in Vegas with his extended family celebrating his step dad's birthday. To be fair, he flew to Oklahoma to meet my dad for two days. So we've both done that. So first question, when is it appropriate to say we're a couple and we make couple plans together and he has to sacrifice some of this family time? I feel like he puts his family above me. The second question: we've been invited to his sister's mountain house for New Year's. There are 4 couples and 7 kids. There are 4 bedrooms, one of which has 4 bunkbeds. We are going to have to sleep on a couch in a high traffic area since we are the lowest status couple. What are my options? I tried to set a boundary of requiring a door and a bed but he's really upset that I don't want to go. Thanks!
creighton0123 Posted December 20, 2010 Posted December 20, 2010 If you measure and weigh communication, it reads as though he is closer with his family. How far apart do both of your families live? I mean... are they in the same town? Same county? 1-2 hour drive apart? If any of the former, you can do both families on the holidays. "We are going to have to sleep on a couch in a high traffic area since we are the lowest status couple. What are my options? I tried to set a boundary of requiring a door and a bed but he's really upset that I don't want to go." That's an unnecessary boundary. You're only going for New Year's. If you were going on a two week vacation or something, that would make sense, but one or two nights spent on a couch isn't the worst thing in the world. Compromise. They key to all of this is compromise. It's also important to note that even with family events, the two of you don't have to do absolutely everything together.
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