For many people, Christmas is the premier family holiday, when everyone comes together to exchange gifts and share their company and cheer. But as anyone who has ever had guests can tell you, hosting is often a lot of unseen effort.

A man decided that he was done hosting family Christmas parties after, inevitably, he had to spend days cleaning up later. Family drama ensued when his wife informed him that she had already sent out the invitations. Netizens were divided on his stance and how he chose to approach the situation.

For many families, a Christmas get-together is part of a yearly tradition

Image credits: Nicole Michalou / pexels (not the actual photo)

But one man had enough of cleaning up after 30+ people and decided he wasn’t going to do it

Image credits: RDNE Stock project / pexels (not the actual photo)

Image credits: IBAGRMyJnlass

Image credits: Nicole Michalou / pexels (not the actual photo)

Hosting a party is a lot more work than just some clean-up

It’s worth mentioning that hosting doesn’t just mean cleaning up after a party, it generally means a lot of preparatory work beforehand. There is pre-party cleaning, making sure there is sufficient space, which might mean dragging out more chairs that need to be cleaned. Snacks and sufficient cutlery and drinking utensils must be provided, parking arrangements made and instructions sent to the people who are coming.

If there are going to be overnight guests, that’s another story entirely, not to mention making arrangements for pets, both your own and the ones coming to the event. If there are babies, areas must be baby-proofed, people’s allergies need to be disclosed and this information must be disseminated if others are bringing food.

The act of hosting, while fun and rewarding, does come with added responsibilities. You have to be answering questions, and making sure people are enjoying themselves, fed and watered. No doubt you will be bombarded with questions like “Where is the bathroom,” “What is the wifi password” and so many more.

Image credits: cottonbro studio / pexels (not the actual photo)

The last thing most of us would want to do after a big party is picking up a mess

If all this sounds exhausting, just remember, you haven’t even gotten to the stage where everyone has left and you have to clean a house that, often enough, resembles a warzone. Furniture needs to be rearranged, bedding stripped and washed, and a mountain of trash gathered and thrown out.

Once kids, food and perhaps pets are involved, the mess often becomes heavy enough to require more intensive work, chemicals and some good, old-fashioned on-your-knees work. OP stated that this took around five days, although we don’t know if he literally meant five days of eight hours-a-day work. Either way, given the amount of visitors and the size of his home, it’s not hard to imagine the workload.

This is not necessarily to say that OP is in the right, but once you have dealt with this amount of work before, it’s easier to understand where he is coming from. While it might be petty to “count” who has more family present at the get-together, Christmas should be a time of celebration, not of dreading home cleanup all year.

Image credits: cottonbro studio / pexels (not the actual photo)

OP’s timing was his biggest mistake

Of course, the real controversy comes from the fact that he informed his wife perhaps too late. She had already sent out invitations, which now places her in an awkward position. At the same time, a good relationship requires honest and open communication. If he hated this part of Christmas so much, he really needed to make his feelings known much earlier. You can’t exactly blame someone for doing something you dislike if you never actually ask them to stop.

At this point, he should have realized that it was much too late to cancel without warning and instead prepared for damage control. As one comment said, if this upcoming Christmas is as bad as last year, he has clear and recent evidence that it’s not just in his head. Similarly, as the host he still can make some ground rules. It’s not unreasonable to ask other adults to be adults and make sure kids are making a mess.

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Ultimately, he might have to suck it up this year and go ahead with hosting. Stubbornness at this time is just going to ruin the mood for everyone. A solid compromise would be some help in cleaning or at least better behavior from his wife’s family. After all, guests are entitled to hospitality, but hosts are also entitled to some basic human decency.

Image credits: Nicole Michalou / pexels (not the actual photo)

A few readers needed more information before passing judgment

Many thought he had a right to boycott having the event in his house

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But there were some who thought he needed to speak his mind much earlier

Some shared similar stories

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