This is Ask Lisa, a podcast to help people understand the psychology of parenting.

Psychologist Dr. Lisa DeMore, author of two New York Times best-selling parenting books, takes your questions.

And I'm co-host, Rina Ninan, a journalist and mom of two.

Some of what we talk about comes from raising children ourselves.

Most of the time, I'll be getting answers to your parenting questions.

So send your questions to Ask Lisa at Dr.LisaDemore.com.

Episode 57, happy holidays Dealing with difficult relatives.

The holidays are approaching and to gather or not to gather, that is still the question.

It is. It is. What are you guys doing? You know, we host my in-laws, and it's wonderful.

And we have a real, you know, kind of set routine.

Everybody brings the same thing every year.

We've got it kind of down.

And last year, we did it outdoors in mid-October.

And this year, thanks to vaccines and testing, we can do it indoors. How about you guys?

We're still trying to figure it out, you know, trying to see where everyone's comfort level is.

And we've been getting a lot of feedback from our listeners about help. They want help. And this letter came into us. It says,

Dear Dr. Lisa, last year, we skipped having my in-laws come

for Thanksgiving, and it was such a relief. This year we're back to our regular routine.

My husband's parents are fundamentally decent people, but having them come for the holidays

is always tense. They rub my 13-year-old son the wrong way because they're loud, opinionated,

and they talk down to him like he's a

young child. And they make me uncomfortable because they talk in front of our 10-year-old daughter

...