Family Holidays with Your Partner

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All right. What’s up, everyone? This is Jason Polk giving you some coffee shop relationship advice. Hold on one sec… I am going to talk about holiday situations but you may be watching this after the holidays and that’s okay. All of this still applies so check it out.

Holidays can be stressful. We all know that. We may have a drunk uncle, we may have parents giving us unsolicited parenting advice. So I want to share with you ways that you can manage that in your relationship. So first of all, I want to throw out this principle, is that no one is irrational to themselves. Even if your drunk uncle means well or if your mother gives unsolicited parented advice to your spouse, even though they mean well, your partner may still be uncomfortable with such interactions with them.

So what I want to stress for couples is first off to have a plan. So if your partner is trapped in a conversation with someone, have a signal. Do something where you help your partner out. You may want to be in the conversation. You may want to say, “Hey dear, come here. I need help with the bread” or whatever it is.

And also too, especially if your parents give parenting advice, that can be very stressful to your partner. And so even though they mean well, I want you to set boundaries around that. You may have to pull your parents aside and let them know that unsolicited parenting advice is not what your partner wants. Or you may have to do that beforehand or you may even have to do it when it is occurring.

Nevertheless, I want you guys to have a plan on how to deal with difficult people, how to deal with parents who may be offering advice. But first and most important is that if you guys do have a plan, it signifies that you guys are the top. You guys are the top of the food chain and you matter most. And if you do have a plan, then you are more powerful together as a couple and no one is going to interfere with your bond and your happiness during the holidays.

So thank you so much for watching.

I don’t know, I mean this is kind of choppy. I’ll get better at it, but it’s a good.

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