Early on, I convinced myself my stepkids would end up spoiled from all the gifts they were receiving. They had double the parents, so that meant there were *four* generous sets of grandparents to indulge them with gifts, plus lots of extra aunts and uncles on all sides!
On a phone call with my mom, I unleashed my sentiments.
“Mom, I know you want to give my stepkids nice Christmas gifts, but they are getting so many presents from all sides of the family. It just seems so excessive! I’m not sure what to do!”
It wasn’t that I was upset that so many people loved my stepkids and wanted to bestow them with nice gifts.
It was the attitude of entitlement I feared was developing in my stepkids.
In stepfamilies, the complicated custody arrangements combined with extra family members, and maybe even some feelings of guilt from the bio parent(s), can mean stepkids get an abundance of gifts over multiple days. Of course, there are exceptions to this. But for many stepkids, Christmas just keeps going and going! And going…!
Of course, as a new stepmom, I feared the worst!
I couldn’t see into the future enough to know if all the gifts would make them entitled and demanding. Would my stepkids would be gifted expensive, fancy things and forget about all that mattered?
I was convinced that my assumptions about my own stepkids were correct one afternoon after school when my stepson ripped open the card his aunt had sent him in the mail for Christmas.
Without even bothering to read the card, he opened it expectantly, catching the plastic gift card before it could slip out of his grip.
Until I urged him to actually read the card, all he had been concerned with was the gift that lay within.
As time went on, I realized my stepkids were just like any other kids. Kids are kids, after all; they love getting gifts!
And yet, as parents, if something doesn’t sit well in us, one of our jobs is to look for ways to teach the kind of behavior we expect to see. Kids will be kids, of course, but I wanted to make sure that I was teaching them to appreciate the thought behind the gift and how to be grateful.
Reading between the lines
I began to look closer at the “why” in my stepkids’ behavior, and why it was setting me off. Most importantly, I had to be careful how I addressed the issue so they didn’t feel like I was accusing them of being greedy little misers. I wanted to reach their hearts, first and foremost!
Both of my stepkids loved getting gifts. But each went about it differently.
My stepdaughter had learned the power of very specific list-making for family members who preferred not to guess. If she wanted a winter coat from a grandparent, for example, she wouldn’t leave it up for interpretation. Rather, she sent out the exact link for the exact coat she wanted.
This was all good and fine, and probably really helped the people shopping for her. But when I noticed she had received something from her grandparents between holidays in her later high school years, I carefully brought it up to her.
As it turned out she was trying to help them take advantage of a good sale on an item she found for her birthday. Only thing was, her birthday was still months away…
Yet, all it took was a quick chat with her. I wanted her to know that even though her grandparents were probably happy to bless her with a nice gift, I wanted her heart be in the right place. I wanted her to value people for who they were instead of what they could buy for her.
Lo and behold, a few days later, my stepdaughter casually mentioned that she had emailed her grandma and apologized if she had seemed greedy. She expressed to her grandma how much she loved and valued her.
I told her I was proud of her and how much that probably meant to her grandma. And of course, my heart swelled.
In the case of my stepson, I had noticed him paying a lot of attention to the prices of things he was asking for and receiving. Price shouldn’t matter, should it?
Except, I was learning something about my stepson: He viewed love through the lens of a price tag.
I mean, which preteen or teen kid doesn’t want the real brand vs. the generic knock-off? Which kid will take the plain socks when they can have the fancy sports brand ones? At the same time, it frustrated me when I found a really nice item that he still rejected because it wasn’t exactly the one he wanted!
And yet, I learned something else by observing him. I saw that he put a LOT of time and thought into every gift he gave to others.
Watching him put so much time and care into giving gifts showed me that he gives (and receives) gifts as an expression of his love.
I realized gift giving was his love language.
On the one hand, while that can be a very sweet thing, the emphasis he placed on gifts also risked ruining holidays for him if he didn’t get what he had hoped for. It also cast doubt over him about how much people really loved him if his gifts didn’t meet his expectations.
He was telling himself a message: If the gift was “too cheap,” he equated that with the value the giver placed on him as a person.
Furthermore, it propelled him to ask very intensely (read: beg and negotiate) for the things he wanted every birthday and every Christmas to make sure he had a chance to get that quality item.
Thus, this following (very typical) discourse ensued many times over the years:
Him: Can you get me this [*very expensive* item, usually electric] for Christmas this year?
Me: And how much does this electric such-and-such cost?
Him: “$1,400, but it could be for my next two birthdays and next Christmas, too!”
Me: “Hmm, I think by next year you’ll be ready for something else and be disappointed if we say you already got your present last year!”
Him: “Maybe. So how much would you contribute to it? I could ask everyone else to pitch in for it, too!”
Me: “You know, we love giving you gifts you really want. And so do your relatives. But even if we had that kind of money, we probably wouldn’t buy that expensive of an item. And it has nothing to do with our love for you. It just means we want to teach you that expensive things like that requires a lot of thought and planning and saving.
We always try our best to get you things you want. But if we happen to get you something you didn’t want, that doesn’t mean we didn’t try our hardest or don’t love you. And I know that it’s the same for others who try their best to give you presents you’ll like!”
Finally, I implored him to relax and enjoy what he was given and to focus on ways to bless others.
I tried to help him shift his perspective to focus on the thought behind the gift, even if it wasn’t what he was hoping for.
Over the years, slowly but surely he started focusing more on the giver’s heart instead of the gift itself.
He started showing true and authentic gratitude toward the giver.
But you know what?
Even if gift giving hadn’t been his language of love, we still would have had the same conversation. Because at the root of it, it’s easy for any of us to feel loved or unloved by the gifts we receive!
With my stepson, I have also seen this shift in perspective transfer over to other things.
For example, if someone does my stepson a favor, he is quick to show genuine appreciation, where in the past he would probably have taken it for granted.
Remember, he sees gift giving as an expression of love? He has gotten really good about realizing that any kind gesture done for him is a gift. And he is quick to show gratitude.
Just as I was writing this, in fact, he ran home to grab a bite to eat between shifts at work. As I handed him a Tupperware of dinner on his way out the door, he made sure to catch my eye and tell me he appreciated it.
And I know he does.
There was a time I was worried that the excess of gifts my stepkids received for Christmas would spoil them. But it became an opportunity to speak into their inner need to be loved and understand that love can’t be bought with a price.
It became a way to teach them to see past the gift and into the heart of the giver.
And it became a way for them to pass it on and bless others with gifts.
Oh, and as you can imagine, on the phone that day with my mom, she shushed me up pretty quickly. She said she was buying her bonus grandkids gifts regardless of how worried I was.
Smart grandma.
Of course, she didn’t let on to it, but I’m pretty sure she taught my siblings and me the same lessons when we were young!
But grandmas don’t worry about spoiling. They just worry about loving their grandkids, whether step or bio…and that’s the way it should be.
Do stepkids get spoiled at Christmas? Probably. So do most kids!
But, it’s how we as parents/step-parents take the opportunity to teach to the heart that makes the difference in the long-run.
The excess of toys and gifts will always be there, but it’s how we shape their perspective that matters!
