I appreciate that people have taken time to think what I would like and then acted on that, but it’s been a huge swing and a miss.
Out of the 7 presents, 5 were clothing items, 1 was something my wife wanted (not me), and the last was actually something I had been mentioning I had wanted for a while, so that was a silver lining.
When it comes to clothing and fashion, that is not me. I’d rather wear a £10 t-shirt from some high street chain, than whatever emperor’s new clothes rubbish is being pushed by the designer brands. On top of that, I have a young child, so it’s not uncommon for there to be food, spit, mess etc. on me at a given time. I don’t want to get that on my nice clothes, so I just wear old sports t-shirts most of the time.
Maybe they’re telling me I should change my style? But I’m happy with my style, I dress for comfort and practicality over looks. I don’t care what strangers on the street think of how I dress.
On top of that, 1 of the clothing items was smart, suit-like, work trousers… I’m in the office maybe once a week, and even then I normally wear smart casual attire, nice jeans, chinos, etc.
Then there’s the joint present my wife and I got. I appreciate it was expensive, but it’s something my wife has been raving about since she saw it, and I don’t really have any interest in it. At least she’ll be happy I suppose.
What I think disappoints me the most is I saw all the effort my wife and I were putting in for my family members, coming up with ideas based on their interests and things they may not think about, so I was excited for her presents for me expecting a similar level of thought, but it was just more clothes; some nice printed t-shirts, but I’m not going to wear them much, due to the aforementioned messy nature of having a young child.
I hope I managed to hide my disappointment. The only saving grace was the fact I was cooking Christmas dinner at the same time, so I could go out to the kitchen and “check on the veg” to compose myself and come back.
Be happy to give and don’t expect anything in return.
I dislike the gift giving thing as a grown-up but I go along with it because the wife loves it. I’d much prefer being given gift cards so I can get things I want but I’ve been informed that’s not fun for the giver.
I found myself annoyed by my gifts this year too but that is also fairly common most years.
The thing that I struggle with is the sense of obligation to keep gifts that I just don’t want to keep, and the burden of pretending I am enjoying a gift when the giver asks about it 5 years later when I threw it away the day after I received it.
I grew up with a dad that was a hoarder, so I see the accumulation of stuff you don’t actively want as a ball and chain you willingly carry around. I’ve seen what it does to you and I’m not going to live that again.
I’m getting better though, slowly. One gift was related to a hobby of mine but it was mall ninja garbage tier and I asked them to get their money back on the spot. In the past I would have quietly trashed it when nobody was looking.
I literally only got socks and wasn’t this ungrateful lmfao
Love languages are apparently a thing. Gift giving is apparently one of them. I’ve learned that communication is super important. If one person’s love language is giving gifts and the other is quality time, or words of affection or whatever, there’s going to be problems without proper communication.
That said, I’ll echo what others are saying, albeit hopefully with a bit more compassion. Emotional maturity is absolutely a thing and not something most people learn at home and even less so out and about in our society/culture (assuming American/Western). Not sure how you best work on it, but you’ve got a starting point. Assess where you’re at in your journey and set a goal or just try and get 1-10% better at practicing being emotionally mature.
You could be an adult and just tell your family that gifts are for kids…
If you’re a married adult and had to “check on the veg to compose yourself” because you got clothes though, you might not be emotionally mature for that yet. It’s kind of a carch-22, you need to grow up, and maybe that’s what your family is trying to signal.
No adult should react like this.
I know that’s not what you want to hear, you want sympathy.
But that’s what you need to hear.
Lol, I think everyone should experience being poor at least once in their life. A few xmas’s without gifts really makes you appreciate just to have people by your side. I tell everyone they should just donate to the food shelter instead of buying me anything but I still get stuff and extremely grateful for it.
Just going to echo
No adult should react like this.
Because OP should hear it twice. Holy hell, I feel like I’m being trolled right now
Yeah, I got socks, a relaxing bath thingy and some lip balsam.
Feeling a bit like they thing I’m 80, but with 40 I don’t have anything to complain about.As you said, gifts are for the children
As an adult, I never expect someone will get something I want or that I can really figure out what someone else wants. It’s not like when we were kids. You generally have your own money to get what you want now or the items are too expensive to be a gift anyway. The gift giving is just supposed to be something fun to do, not necessarily the content of the gifts themselves.
I wonder if maybe you could set up some sort of white elephant exchange some time in the future? I’ve wanted to do something like that with my family, but my mom doesn’t seem to be entirely on board. If you have enough people, it’s fun to do and then you don’t really have to worry about what someone may or may not like.
The fact that you were so distressed that you had to leave the room is a bit concerning to hear though tbh. Feels very entitled.
You don’t want to sound ungrateful but you clearly are.
