The title of this post pretty well sums it up. I’ve have a love and hate relationship with Christmas.
Warning: this post is a long rant, but it’s also a plea for help. I need an attitude change. I need some different thoughts other than what I’m thinking now, but I’m not coming up with any myself.
I used to love Christmas (the holidays) and in some ways I still do because I had a lot of good times around the holidays spent with family and friends. I love decorating my home – even the year the box fell from its perch and all the ornaments broke and we couldn’t get a real tree or afford gifts. That year we got a large dead tree limb that had many branches. We tied ribbons and hung colored rubber bands from its spindly fingers, ate a decent breakfast then played at the beach for the day and BBQ'd hot dogs. We didn't have enough money for gasoline that year to see extended family, but I did later.
Later years after alternated between traveling out of state to be with my large family with lots of aunts, uncles, adult cousins like myself, and all of our offspring. Until the ex refused to allow me/us to go.
My abuser’s family were“ good Catholics”. The kind that sat around watching a service on the TV then the Wizard of Oz while the turkey roasted; they’d decide what time to come over a day or so before the “blessed date” – they’d say come at a certain hour, but didn’t eat for hours later; drank copious amounts of liquor and made sarcastic jabs at each other while waiting for their meal, then exchanged unwanted gifts quickly, which no one wanted, kept, or remembered, then everyone left in a hurry. Christmas was/is very important to them. Very important because it is one out of three times any of them get together or “talk” to each other.
One time, when grandpa verbally abused grandma, I asked her how could she stand him speaking to her the way he did and why didn’t she do something. Her reply was that it didn’t bother her anymore and she had done something. Then asked me whether I thought 46 years without sex was enough. I think I bruised my chest when my jaw dropped open!
I hated being cooped up in a small place with a bunch of nasty drunk-druggies. I hated their (false) Christmas at their home, but it was obligatory. After the divorce, I thought things would be different. The ex could have Christmas one year and I’d be legally able to take our children to my family’s festivities.
It never happened. Christmas was one of the few times during the year that my children’s father would see them—didn’t matter that we were to alternate years, or that I and my family spent money on plane tickets to spend time with my family on one of “my” years. We’d be packed and he’d show up at our door. I’d let them go because it was one of the few times they got to be with him at all. I figured it was important for my children to be with their father at least a couple of times during the year; that it was more important than them being with their (my) extended family. Silly me! I'm hardly in touch with my extended family now.
When my children became adults I “got over it” (distracted myself) by feeding the homeless on Christmas Day and (maybe) seeing my children briefly in the evening. That’s not possible now due to distance (I live far from the nearest city) my health, lack finances and work schedule. Last year I spent the day alone: didn’t even decorate.
I vowed this year would be different, especially since my grand-daughter is now three. She’s come over the last few weekends and had a lot of fun getting ready for Santa—I enjoy the indoor scenery but it's so much better when others are around.
This year, I planned dinner for 1:00pm Christmas day at my place. I bought the turkey today. Since no one plans what they’re doing until just a couple of days before, I figured I was safe in contacting folks tomorrow. Then I got a call from my middle daughter-in-law, who had received a call from my step/daughter-in-law and my youngest son’s girlfriend.
Everyone (except me) is going to my eldest (step) son's home for his 40th birthday party on the 22nd.
On the 24th everyone (except me) will go to the step/daughter-in-law’s parent’s home for her 37th birthday.
On the 25th the eldest (step) and step-DIL are going to his father’s fiancé’s home for breakfast; the other two son's are going to friends’ homes for breakfast. The middle son will go to his father’s and his step-mother’s home at noon; the eldest/step, step-DIL and my youngest son (and GF) will go to the Very Important Christmas Family gathering at their grandmother’s at 2:00. It's obligatory.
Daughter-in-law says: Would you like to bake some pies or something and maybe have people come over around 7:00? Grand-daughter will probably be tired by then and may not make it; she, step-son and step DIL have to work the next day so they wouldn’t come, but maybe middle son (her husband) and my youngest son and his girl-friend would come. She didn’t consider my age, my needing to be at work on the 26th at 6:30am nor girl-friend’s mother invited GF and my youngest son to their home at 6:00pm.
At that point my phone started cutting out (ah-hem) and the call ended.
This is why I Hate Christmas. Planning something prior to the 22nd or after the 25th doesn’t work because I have to work and so do most of the others. Forget the gifts, preparations, cooking/cleaning – non of that bothers me. What bothers me is that my pea-sized PTSD brain can’t handle all the complications and confusion. I’m anxious as hell, can’t sleep (it’s 2:45am) and those are not visions of sugar plums dancing in my head (it’s pretty typical for my flashbacks to come back at this time of year). I’ve had some SI (probably associated with the S of my friend’s son last week) but won’t act on it.
I am needing help with how turn off the grumpy I Hate Christmas tape, the holiday snap shots in my head that aren’t pleasant, and to feel and think differently. Because I just feel “Aw, F – it!” and I just feel like totally giving up on ever having any semblance of a somewhat normal Christmas again in my life and make the plan from here on out that on xmas I’ll stay in bed, drink hot toddies and watch movies the entire day, and that’s a pretty pathetic plan.
Warning: this post is a long rant, but it’s also a plea for help. I need an attitude change. I need some different thoughts other than what I’m thinking now, but I’m not coming up with any myself.
I used to love Christmas (the holidays) and in some ways I still do because I had a lot of good times around the holidays spent with family and friends. I love decorating my home – even the year the box fell from its perch and all the ornaments broke and we couldn’t get a real tree or afford gifts. That year we got a large dead tree limb that had many branches. We tied ribbons and hung colored rubber bands from its spindly fingers, ate a decent breakfast then played at the beach for the day and BBQ'd hot dogs. We didn't have enough money for gasoline that year to see extended family, but I did later.
Later years after alternated between traveling out of state to be with my large family with lots of aunts, uncles, adult cousins like myself, and all of our offspring. Until the ex refused to allow me/us to go.
My abuser’s family were“ good Catholics”. The kind that sat around watching a service on the TV then the Wizard of Oz while the turkey roasted; they’d decide what time to come over a day or so before the “blessed date” – they’d say come at a certain hour, but didn’t eat for hours later; drank copious amounts of liquor and made sarcastic jabs at each other while waiting for their meal, then exchanged unwanted gifts quickly, which no one wanted, kept, or remembered, then everyone left in a hurry. Christmas was/is very important to them. Very important because it is one out of three times any of them get together or “talk” to each other.
One time, when grandpa verbally abused grandma, I asked her how could she stand him speaking to her the way he did and why didn’t she do something. Her reply was that it didn’t bother her anymore and she had done something. Then asked me whether I thought 46 years without sex was enough. I think I bruised my chest when my jaw dropped open!
I hated being cooped up in a small place with a bunch of nasty drunk-druggies. I hated their (false) Christmas at their home, but it was obligatory. After the divorce, I thought things would be different. The ex could have Christmas one year and I’d be legally able to take our children to my family’s festivities.
It never happened. Christmas was one of the few times during the year that my children’s father would see them—didn’t matter that we were to alternate years, or that I and my family spent money on plane tickets to spend time with my family on one of “my” years. We’d be packed and he’d show up at our door. I’d let them go because it was one of the few times they got to be with him at all. I figured it was important for my children to be with their father at least a couple of times during the year; that it was more important than them being with their (my) extended family. Silly me! I'm hardly in touch with my extended family now.
When my children became adults I “got over it” (distracted myself) by feeding the homeless on Christmas Day and (maybe) seeing my children briefly in the evening. That’s not possible now due to distance (I live far from the nearest city) my health, lack finances and work schedule. Last year I spent the day alone: didn’t even decorate.
I vowed this year would be different, especially since my grand-daughter is now three. She’s come over the last few weekends and had a lot of fun getting ready for Santa—I enjoy the indoor scenery but it's so much better when others are around.
This year, I planned dinner for 1:00pm Christmas day at my place. I bought the turkey today. Since no one plans what they’re doing until just a couple of days before, I figured I was safe in contacting folks tomorrow. Then I got a call from my middle daughter-in-law, who had received a call from my step/daughter-in-law and my youngest son’s girlfriend.
Everyone (except me) is going to my eldest (step) son's home for his 40th birthday party on the 22nd.
On the 24th everyone (except me) will go to the step/daughter-in-law’s parent’s home for her 37th birthday.
On the 25th the eldest (step) and step-DIL are going to his father’s fiancé’s home for breakfast; the other two son's are going to friends’ homes for breakfast. The middle son will go to his father’s and his step-mother’s home at noon; the eldest/step, step-DIL and my youngest son (and GF) will go to the Very Important Christmas Family gathering at their grandmother’s at 2:00. It's obligatory.
Daughter-in-law says: Would you like to bake some pies or something and maybe have people come over around 7:00? Grand-daughter will probably be tired by then and may not make it; she, step-son and step DIL have to work the next day so they wouldn’t come, but maybe middle son (her husband) and my youngest son and his girl-friend would come. She didn’t consider my age, my needing to be at work on the 26th at 6:30am nor girl-friend’s mother invited GF and my youngest son to their home at 6:00pm.
At that point my phone started cutting out (ah-hem) and the call ended.
This is why I Hate Christmas. Planning something prior to the 22nd or after the 25th doesn’t work because I have to work and so do most of the others. Forget the gifts, preparations, cooking/cleaning – non of that bothers me. What bothers me is that my pea-sized PTSD brain can’t handle all the complications and confusion. I’m anxious as hell, can’t sleep (it’s 2:45am) and those are not visions of sugar plums dancing in my head (it’s pretty typical for my flashbacks to come back at this time of year). I’ve had some SI (probably associated with the S of my friend’s son last week) but won’t act on it.
I am needing help with how turn off the grumpy I Hate Christmas tape, the holiday snap shots in my head that aren’t pleasant, and to feel and think differently. Because I just feel “Aw, F – it!” and I just feel like totally giving up on ever having any semblance of a somewhat normal Christmas again in my life and make the plan from here on out that on xmas I’ll stay in bed, drink hot toddies and watch movies the entire day, and that’s a pretty pathetic plan.
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