Christmas 2023 was a reckoning on TikTok for dads who forgot to buy stocking gifts for moms

• Christmas 2023 was an uncomfortable time for some dads on TikTok.
• Moms have been filling their own stockings, or had them left empty.

Christmas this year came with a wake-up call for husbands everywhere.

Throughout the festive period, they started to get criticized for failing to fill their wives' stockings with gifts.

While dads and kids were getting stockings filled with cute little presents, moms often didn't, or had to fill their own.

The idea was that, while dads often came through for big-ticket items, the smaller touches like stocking presents eluded them.

In November, a content creator named Aubree Jones kicked off the conversation with a video of her family on Christmas day last year.

She titled it as a PSA [public service announcement] "for husbands everywhere." She showed how disappointing it can be when everyone in the family is opening up their stockings while moms don't get anything.

Her husband Josh was the one filming the video. He caught their kids happily opening their gifts and Jones sitting on the sofa without any.

"Is this an extra one?" he asked, holding up a lowly, empty stocking.

"No, that's mine," Jones responded.

Josh then asked her why the stocking was empty.

"I don't know," she replied. "Santa didn't come for me."

In the caption, Jones explained it took her husband "10 years to notice it's been empty this whole time."

The video hit a nerve, amassing over 12 million views. People left comments bashing Josh, saying he should have been "embarrassed" he let this happen.

"I swear I will never let a man treat me this way," one person wrote. "As if I don't even exist. So sorry to all the forgotten moms and wives."

"This is why I'm divorced," said another. "I refuse to live in the background and never be cared for while in a lifelong commitment."

Other moms also shared their own experiences of waking up to an empty stocking.

One mom, named Becky Wax, posted a TikTok showing her family's stockings all hanging up and full of presents — except for hers.

"There's nothing more sad and empty than a mom's stocking on Christmas morning," she said.

Fellow moms commented, including one named Candy.

"I quit including mine years ago," she said. "It's just easier and less painful when you remove yourself from the equation to begin with."

Another creator, named Mara, said she tells her kids that Santa doesn't come for moms, a cover story so the kids "aren't sad I'm left out."

Kids weren't off the hook either. Some spoke up on TikTok after realizing what had been going on, admitting they had never noticed the dynamic before.

One TikToker, named Kenzie, said she thought the conversation was just happening online, and not in her own house. But she said she then asked her family if any of them had put gifts in her mom's stocking, they all said no.

Kenzie said she went straight out to buy some gifts, including a hairbrush and some of her mom's favorite candy.

"Stop being lazy and go get your mother some gifts," she said. "Thank you."

Another creator, who doesn't share her name publicly, said she was helping her mom fill the stockings, and she noticed that hers was "the least full" and only contained things her mom had bought herself.

"She's the least selfish person ever," the creator said. "Realizing she did this our whole lives makes me even more sad. Let this be your reminder to get some small things for your moms' stockings."

While young people said they were going to be more mindful this year, and followed through with buying their moms lots of small gifts, some said it was the fathers that should have set the precedent when they were younger.

Some even said their dads failed to get their moms anything at all on Christmas, or even on their birthdays.

Some husbands seem to be getting the message.

Jones posted an update on December 2, saying her husband Josh was ready and prepared to fill her stocking this year.

Jones said she'd received hundreds of messages from people "more upset with my husband than I am."

"This was supposed to be a call out to other men who might not realize their wife doesn't have a stocking," she said.

"Everyone can relax. He won't forget my stocking this year."