Home for the holidays

In class this week we talked a lot about adjustments or challenges that couple will face in the first month of their marriage, first year, and first child. One of the things brought up was holidays, especially when Christmas comes around. For a newly married couple this can cause lots of stress of wanting to spend equal amounts of time with all sides of the family and could leave other sides with feelings of resentment for not spending as much time with them or not being able to see all sides at all. But maybe its not too bad of an idea for a married couple to just do Holidays for themselves the first couple years of their marriage. If a couple goes back home for Christmas to visit the husbands side, it creates an atmosphere where he is put back into the role of child again. This can cause problems because his current role is husband, provider, and preside er. This can go the same way for the wife, to slip back into roles that may exclude the spouse in certain ways. May I suggest that it may be very healthy for a couple to spend the holidays just the two of them. This gives them my opportunities to create their own traditions for their future family. This also gives time for them to bond even more, talk about important things in their life, and give time for them to set goals together.  Now I am not saying that it would bad their relationship to spend some time with family around the holidays because those relationships are very important. What I am saying is that a newly couple really needs to do what is best for them the first couple of years so they can do all they can to build a strong relationship between the two of them. It is not something that should be taken personally, but something that should be looked at from the position of the new couple. The holidays are a great time for new couples to focus on their relationship and what they can do to make things that much more satisfying and rewarding in their marriage.