Christmas can either be a magical time or a time to dread.
Even though it’s just one day out of 365, it seems that earlier and earlier every year it’s everywhere you turn and sometimes that can be difficult for some. As I mentioned in a recent post, I’m more in camp dread.
I didn’t always feel this way about Christmas though. It used to be my favourite time of year.
As children, me & my brothers opened all of our presents at home on Christmas morning with my mum and dad, sometimes getting up at 3 am wondering if Father Christmas had been.
Then we would go to my Nan and grandads for Christmas dinner, usually taking one of our new toys with us and wearing a brand new outfit. After our delicious Christmas dinner, mountains of sugary goodness and a Christmas day film we’d walk around the corner to see my other nan and grandad for more gifts and sugar.
All the houses had Christmas cards covering every shelf, Christmas chains hanging from the ceiling and tinsel everywhere and there was a magical feeling in the air.
That was how I spent every Christmas until I reached my early twenties and I enjoyed every single one of them.
We lost my Nan when I was 23, the following year my other Nan and grandad moved away and my mum started to do Christmas dinner at home. I moved out and would get up early Christmas morning and drive over to my parents in my Pyjamas so we could still open our presents in the usual way. I clung to the remaining Christmas traditions for as long as I could.
But we were getting older and as expected, gradually things changed until Christmas didn’t really feel like Christmas anymore. I’ve come to realise that whilst I will never have those Christmases again, I am very lucky to have had them and have such wonderful memories.
For some reason, I have struggled to make my own Christmas traditions, it never feels quite right. I used to love sitting down to write Christmas cards with Christmas music playing in the background, but over the years it lost its appeal. Now it can be quite painful to hear those songs reminding me of people who are no longer here and a time when Christmas seemed less stressful.
But I have come to realise it’s ok to feel like that, it’s ok if you don’t feel like Mrs Christmas, it’s ok if you need to take a break from it all and it’s ok to take some time alone for yourself. This does not make you a bad person or a failure.
Christmas is a lot.
If someone around you isn’t quite in the Christmas spirit, try not to label them as a “Scrooge” or “grinch” but instead show a bit of compassion as they may be finding this time extremely difficult, try to give them what they need, it could be a hug and the chance to talk about their memories or it could be that they need space and don’t need to “forced” into playing that board game.
Wherever you will be this Christmas and whatever you will be doing, know that you are not alone in how you feel about the festive season, whether it be positive, negative or completely neutral, this time next week, it will all be over ❤️
