It's hard to be sexy when there's stress about. For me, the entirety of November and December is nothing short of hell. I haven't written specifically about this before, but it's hard to avoid. For you non-USAmericans, USAmerica has come up with the idea to push our Thanksgiving to a month before Christmas, give or take. We expect our families to come from wherever it is they may be, to visit with the entirety of their family over four days in November, and then come back and do it all over again a month later. So in November and December, the whole country is financially crippled. Before Thanksgiving is when many people do their shopping, but most wait until 'Black Friday'. That's the day after Thanksgiving, when you're supposed to get up to go shopping at 4am to get good deals on a limited number of things, that you WILL have to fight other people for.

It IS dangerous. You have to have a SAFETY PLAN. For shopping! People have died in the line of duty, and not even soldiers. The entire country goes apeshit, with people fighting over stuffed animals, starting riots that cause stores to shut down, and it's so bad, that the city of Dartmouth, Maine has had to pass an ordinance to keep people in line.

And this isn't even the only problem many people will deal with. For millions of Americans, dealing with family in this high a capacity is simply too much. I, unfortunately, am one of them.

Master's mom.... well, I don't specifically know what her problem is with me. He thinks it's that she thinks I manipulate him (I've worn a collar since the day I met her, so I don't understand that), and I just think she flat-out hates me. See, being an empath, I get a pretty decent idea of what people feel. For most people, I just shove it aside and block it out. But for Master's mom.... she is an intense person. There is no just blocking her out. She has stormed out of our house, leaving an emotional wake that made me physically ill and vomiting uncontrollably, and she has an aura of control, self-entitlement, and contempt that rings her entire being.

 She's excluded me from family things, insulted me and my relationship with Master, and made me cry at least THRICE for each day we've been there. She's held us hostage, insisted that we find our own way to pay for the things that she doesn't give us a choice about doing, and last year, when she had Christmas dinner catered, there was only a single thing I could eat, because she ordered a vegetarian extravaganza. She's ignored and even mocked my food allergies and dietary requirements, because "I'm just not trying hard enough." Last year, she treated me so poorly I swore to never stay in her house again.

This year, we made arrangements so that we wouldn't have to. We'll be staying with Keegan's aunt, in her vaguely Escherian house. It's huge. I get lost EVERY time I go there. There are SO MANY STAIRS. But they're nice to me. They empathise with me, having grown up with her and her.... personality.

However, she has a problem with this. Not just with us staying with them over her, but that the rest of her family likes me. They'll take me aside and joke with me, reminding me not to let her get to me, or rescuing me if need be.

She called last night, mad that we had opted to stay with her family instead of her. Master's been composing a long talk with her that's necessary, and while it could potentially fix things, I'm afraid it will make them worse. Part of this talk will probably contain the information that when we marry(or married, as the case may be), both of our names will be changed. He will change his last name to his father's, removing the hyphenation, as will I. Maybe some good will come of this; Perhaps she will see her mistakes and opt to fix them. Or, perhaps, she will become angry with us and try to absolve all blame from herself. But no one's fooled; You can't punch someone in the face and pretend that your bleeding knuckles are coincidental.

Do you guys have judgemental inlaws? How do you deal with it?