Holidays are supposed to be festive and fun. But I’m not getting that vibe at all. You just bring me heaviness and grief. While people hustle and bustle about, I feel like I’m moving in slow motion. I just feel flat and lifeless. And sad.
Couldn’t you skip a year? This is my second holiday season and I still can’t seem to find my footing. I have a hard time finding motivation to do anything about Christmas at all. I just want it to go away.
I had hoped to be at the point of tolerating the Christmas holidays by now. But I’m not there yet. I suppose it’s going to take a lot longer than I thought. Or maybe I’ll never get there. Never get to the point that I can look at those sweet homemade ornaments again. But I’ll have to look at them. Maybe I do that in the summer when I’m not feeling so down.
I want to like you again. Not resent that you relentlessly come around and assault me every single year. It’s just 30 days right? I can do that. I’ll have to do that. But take it easy on me will you?
No tree, no decorations, no joy. The world can judge me but it’s where I am. It is a struggle to do the things I ‘should’ so I don’t. That gaping hole in my heart is still so raw.
It is not against the law to not have a tree. I did no decor for three years. I haven’t put anything out yet and when I do it’s minimal. I just don’t have the energy and no one is giving me grief. At first just breathing takes all you have. And it’s OK.
Amen. And particularly when the loss happened days before, and the funeral happened days after.
I will never forget there was a Christmas special on the tv in Chip’s office while we waited for another call….I had just finished decorating his room so that it would be festive for him while he was home. There was a small tree with his homemade things, plus there were lots of ornaments that people had given him….now they’re on my tree. But it took 3 years for me to even have a tree.
I think grieving women feel this time of year more acutely, especially us moms. We are the Christmas magicians, responsible for transforming our family’s everyday lives into a beautiful festival. No matter how busy we are, we bear the burden of pulling a magical celebration out of the hat year after year…
It still sucks. Anne Moss, my coping mechanism for the last 2 years has been to keep myself busy during Christmas, and concentrate on the parts that I used to love. I love to decorate, and I love to wrap. So I do those things that I like. But I have been in my bathrobe way too much since Thanksgiving. Thanks for helping to keep me sane….
I wouldn’t say moms experience the loss of a child more than dads during this or any other time. This is a living hell for me.
I’m sorry if that was offensive David. I meant that typically moms are in charge of making christmas happen and that can make it hard.
No offense taken. Just sharing thoughts. And I know all of us in this boat will forever during this season have our backs against the ropes getting beaten to a pulp by the omnipresent theme of families getting together. We put on our stoic public face and take it in the gut.
Exactly David.
On a side note, when I first started doing this site, I made an error one time and said moms, instead of moms and dads. And that’s when I realized how many men I had here. They let me know right away. Not all of them comment or reach out as consistently as you do, David. In fact, very few of them do but they are here. I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank you for that. I see how important your comments are in my statistics. And you are not afraid of expressing your sorrow, your pain or your anger–all very natural emotions we’ve all felt but that not all men are comfortable expressing.
Good – I was worried – the last thing I want to do is upset someone dealing with all of this.
So true about the stoic face – the face that we keep “in a jar by the door”…
Thinking of you this month wherever you are. Be strong.
I had forgotten Whitten died so close to the holidays, Gray. And David, I know it hurts for the Dads, too. My husband is suffering. But he doesn’t buy the presents in my house so I’m trying to get up the motivation to give a crap and just get it done and I’m struggling with that. But I know over thanksgiving with his family he felt it. We talked about it. It’s a living hell this time of year for sure.
Living. Hell.