In december "Are you going home for Christmas?" or "Do you intend spending Christmas with your family?" are common questions. Couples quarrel over whose family to go to. Children are seldom consulted. Even during the year individuals and couples agonise about visits home. What puzzles me is to what home or family are people referring?

Surely, once you have left home, your home is where you now reside. At times you may choose to visit your mother and father's home, but it is not wise to continue to see their home as your home. Many young adults remain over-attached to their home of origin, going back too frequently and not putting their energies into establishing the solid foundation of their own base in life.

As a single adult you are no longer in need of parenting. Once you have flown the nest, the family ceases to exist. At times you may be in need of advice and support but that is a far cry from being parented.

The family is a social unit where parents, the family architects, create a structure for the continuance of their own personal and couple development and for the raising of children.

Once children attain adulthood it is not wise for dependence on the family unit to continue. When this happens the family structure is acting as a deterrent to the maturing of the young adults who remain under its umbrella. Parents have also fallen short on their parenting as they have not brought their children to a position of self-reliance and independence.

The parents themselves may also be too "stuck" in their adult offspring and not taking on the responsibilities of the enhancement of their own couple relationship and their own development.

The obligation to return "home" for Christmas can weigh heavily. Even though sons and daughters may be married and have children they still feel duty bound to go back to the family of origin for Christmas.

Rage, hostility, criticism, cynicism, sarcasm, sulking, emotional and physical withdrawal - guilt-inducing responses: "You're tired of us" or "Christmas won't be the same" or "You're spoiling Christmas for everyone" - are some of the reactions that greet the adult children's plans to stay in their own homes for Christmas.

Parents who have let go and are living their own lives may be disappointed but they will also want to encourage their son, daughter or young family in initiating their own way of spending Christmas. They will look forward to some different kind of contact over Christmas.

The important family is the newly created one of the young couple and their children. The family of origin no longer exists - it is an illusion. Another illusion is that the family was perfect: every family is dysfunctional to some degree. Acknowledgement of this provides for the mature development of all members of families. The young parents need to ask themselves where they would truly like to spend Christmas. When children are old enough they also deserve to be consulted. Leaving your own hearth out of obligation does not augur well for a loving Christmas.

It may also be that some individuals who are single or couples may prefer to plan a Christmas with friends who are more accepting, loving and valuing of them than parents or brothers or sisters. People may argue that "blood is thicker than water", but love is thicker than obligation and transcends blood and water.

It can also be that you genuinely and sincerely, without any feeling that you "should", want to spend Christmas in the home of your mother and father. It is wonderful when love has continued to deepen between adult offspring and parents and the relationship is adult in nature and, on visiting, there is no regression to childish dependence and behaviour.

Decisions on how and where to spend Christmas need to come from the heart, not from obligation. If you feel uncomfortable and threatened by an extended visit to your parents' home it might be far more productive to make a short visit in order to exchange gifts and Christmas wishes - you are more likely to hold onto your adult status and not be sucked back into the old hurts of the past and the ongoing enmeshment of the present.

Let the decision regarding what to do this Christmas come from a heart place; when it does, you and those around you are more likely to have a peaceful and loving Christmas. Home is where the heart resides.

Dr Tony Humphreys is a consultant clinical psychologist and author of The Family: Love It and Leave It