Parents....do you expect to get a gift from your children?

I don’t expect anything. I raised my children to be their own people…make their own decisions based on their own views. My kids live about 4 states away so gifts are optional in my view. It is nice to get a Christmas or Birthday card, though.

I don’t really expect one but they always give me something.

Yes, and the gifts better not suck or I’m writing them out of the will.

Well, yeah, because we have always exchanged gifts. In my family, nothing is required, gifts are freely given and accepted with love and affection. I expect it because it has always been that way, but if someone doesn’t, I am more concerned with why the pattern of behavior has changed than the fact that it has changed.

No indeed. I am SO grateful that my kids are independent and self sufficient that I could care less about them giving me stuff. Well—that isn’t exactly the truth. I DO shamelessly extort cookies and cakes from my helluva baker daughter-in-law, and ruthlessly cheat the grandsons out of their cut through gambling on card and board games unbeknownst to their parents. The younger one snitched me out when his mother grew suspicious by the fact that the only thing her sons regarded with deadly seriousness was “games with grandpa.” It’s just as well. Things at “the casino” were getting out of hand. The boys’ skills at games were mounting at a frightening pace, as they shifted the demand that their winnings be paid in otherwise monitored and rationed bottles of root beer. So now I’m “cut off”, with only a meager clemency allotment of a dozen toll house cookies to see me through the holidays. There IS no justice.

My adult “kids” give me something. It could be food, cheese, an interesting toy… something. Even if it is only $5 It shows they are thinking about me and what I like.
One kid gave me cheese this year. The other got me Amazon Prime because he thinks I need it.

I love getting gifts from them but I don’t expect them. One is fairly consistent about cards and gifts; the other one, not so much.

I did start a tradition of donating to charities in each other’s names on Christmas and both are fairly reliable at doing that.

No, but I expect her to make some effort to show she cares. A homemade card is fine with me.

As a teenager, I expected my daughter to not care at all (“Like, whatevs.”), but this Christmas she was like an elf on speed. She made a list for me and my wife that, if I let her get everything, would’ve been about $2000 worth of stuff.

Well, no. None of them are terribly well off and they have children to consider first. I rarely get a gift but when I do I’m just tickled pink.
Just being with them is gift enough for me.

However, having said that,everyone of them is available at the drop of a hat if I need something. I rarely call on them, but when I do they’re there.
Just this weekend I was given a very expensive pillow top queen mattress set by a friend whose husband was put on hospice rather suddenly. She needed to get it out of the house to make room for the hospice bed. She graciously offered it to us first and I said, “Yeah!”
We called my son, asked if he could help, he said yes, so we went to this house and he and I traded places. I watched the 4 kids while he and Rick fetched the mattress. He didn’t hesitate. ♥
We never hesitate to babysit, either. For any of them.

This is a good example of us thinking about each other through out the year. We were visiting last week and Chris went to his truck and pulled out a hug box out of his car. “I got books for ya, Ma!”
“Just put them in the car! Thanks!”
Well, today I got around to unpacking them. My shelves have been sadly bare since I gave away all the books they grew up with to Chris and his family.
But now it looks like THIS! RD condensed books are so attractive. And…I’ve read most of them! LOL! And I have more I need to find room for….
And when the time comes I don’t think anyone will feel compelled to save them. They have no memories for any one, but they sure look nice so it will make things a little easier.

No, and I encourage them not to buy me things. I have enough, and they work hard to get by.

^^^ Right.

I too have enough. But, I can always use cheese, batteries, nuts from Hickory Farms, even socks – anything.

Just something to let you know they’re thinking about ya! I understand that feeling but I just won’t put that kind of pressure on them at the holidays. They get enough pressure from her side of the family.
Man, I walked in the house and there, neatly folded, still with the tags on, were several size 18M little sweat pants on the coffee table.
I said, “What are those for?”
He said, “Her Mom bought those for Cooper.”
I looked at him and said, “But he’s 2½ years old!!”
He just shrugged his shoulders.
I don’t need to add to the crazy!

When I had my family, they are all late now, we never expected gifts. My parents might gift me at Xmas, or might not. It depended on the financial climate. What was more important were the day-to-day living issues. For example, I helped support my elderly parents for 10 years. They would help me out of a financial issue or whatever years and years ago, if really bad.

I certainly did not gift friends, unless they were super special and never extended family. This was an accepted thing for ‘us’ and many of us were cash-strapped. Christmas was seen as a kids thing and kids get gifts.

Oftentimes just making a meal and extending your love and good wishes cost money time and effort. (Whether you like it or not).

My SO is very much caught in a trade-off gift situation, where his family (extended) and parents expect gifts and return crappy gifts that most times I don’t want and end up being given to charity or dumped. I find it stressful as we are battling financially. Last year my partner and I did not exchange gifts as we decided the family and extended family were to receive gifts instead.

I’m not a big Xmas person feeling it can be a farce in many ways, but there is something magical about a tree with gifts under it!! So, there is a time and a place for it I suppose.

No I don’t expect a gift from my child at all, he’s 36.

No, but they do it anyway no matter how many times they are told not to.