Holidays Stress Out Newlyweds Too
By: Nili Sachs, Ph.D
Ask newlyweds: What stresses you out most about the holidays…and you’ll get opposing views on many topics.
When newlyweds are faced with their first Thanksgiving and especially Christmas and even New Year’s, their anxiety, stress and helplessness are raised to such a high level that many fear they made the wrong choice in a spouse.
‘Tis the season’ when newlyweds seek help, advice, coaching and therapy.
Bob and Mary got married last June. As they are facing their first set of holidays, many unforeseen questions and issues are surfacing.
Bob wants a peaceful, small gathering and a modest dinner at home, while Mary wishes for a ‘going all out’ dinner with all the relatives and their kids.
Bob wants to give hand made gifts with symbolic meaning and Mary wants to buy gifts that actually fulfill the wish lists of her loved ones.
Upon examining their motivations, one understands that both, Mary and Bob are carrying an ‘agenda’ that has been present in their mindset, in regard and celebrations of holidays since their respective childhood.
Mary’s family could not afford lavish holidays and promised her that ‘one day we will celebrate all the way’. She feels that the day had arrived; now she wants to use her brand-new good china and show to her family how she masters the role of the generous hostess.
Bob’s family on the other hand, is still celebrating each holiday ‘loudly, crowded, drunken with the holidays’ meaning lost. He wants the guests to relate, to bond, and he is afraid of the intrusion of over-drinking that always spoiled the holidays in his family of origin.
Obviously, these newlyweds like the rest of us, are creating a new unit made of people of different ‘tribes’. Their backgrounds are diverse and that is why the holidays and other family/money/performance opportunities will bring along stress and anxiety.
One of the roles of being newlyweds is to create an identity to ‘us’ as a couple. Clarity about expectations, rituals, traditions and new boundaries will be a good start in the creation of a couple’s identity.
Solutions
1. The first solution I suggest to newlyweds is to take on the holidays as a marriage project. Before the holiday season begins, map the strategies, the budget, the wishes and most of all verbalize the expectations of each one.
The relationship will benefit from working together on what and why each one expects during the holidays.
The first holiday season for a new couple is not easy. Rules will be tested and boundaries will be crossed.
2. Another solution I suggest to couples: create your own new traditions, so actually, the old rules will be broken, and old boundaries will be crossed. The creation of new rituals and traditions will strengthen the bond for a new couple and will signal: we are a new family unit, and this is how we celebrate the holidays!
Dr. Nili Sachs is a relationship coach, a marriage therapist, an author, and a speaker. To learn more about Dr. Nili Sachs, please visit her websites at http://www.DrNili.com and http://www.boobytrapped.com Take the quiz: Are You Booby - Trapped? on the web site. Dr. Nili Sachs is the author of: Booby-Trapped, How to Feel Normal in a Breast-Obsessed World.