Friday, December 21, 2012

Trapped in Tradition


When I was a kid I loved December. It meant pretty lights and good cheer, presents… and more presents because it also meant my birthday. I kinda hated that my birthday always had to get lost in the Christmas celebrations, but I still really enjoyed the season.

When I became a Mom that all changed and I can’t help but dread December these days. It’s just too much damn mandated celebration at once. We start the month… right after Thanksgiving mind you… with our Anniversary. I have to admit that this is usually very nice. It did take several days of schedule rearranging to carve out some time for us, but we did it. By then I’m already worrying about how I’m gonna get what we need for Hanukkah and Christmas and birthdays though. As if two holidays aren’t enough, I married a man who also has a birthday in December. The stress starts mounting, and it’s hard to relax and enjoy the day.

Hanukkah isn’t too bad and can happen while normal life continues, but there are presents and candles and gelt and sometimes a party or two. Christmas is a tradition I decided I couldn’t not celebrate when we got married. I’m not a believer, but I couldn’t give up the tree and everything that went with it.  Now I wish I had never started with the whole crazy thing. I mean, each little thing is no big deal (stocking stuffers, personal presents, Santa presents, etc.), but I spend most of December worrying if I have enough gifts, if we are going to get the tree up, if I filled the Advent calendar, and if I can get my baking done in time for the extra parties and celebrations we need to go too. Also, the house needs to be cleaned before our Christmas/New Years guests arrive (still not done). Cards… forget it.

I get to do all of this while also continuing to shuffle the kids around to their classes and getting them to do their schoolwork, and shopping and cooking as usual. Birthday!? Bah humbug. Don’t make me celebrate any more please. I haven’t exercised in days and I’ve had way too many sweets and the scale shows it. Also, I’m supposed to be happy about being a year older?! Somewhere around 35 another year became a cause for mourning, not a celebration in my head.  Again…Bah Humbug.

I should be counting my blessings though, right? Now that I got all of that complaining out of my system I think I can do that. Here goes…

I get to see my extended family, people I love but don’t see most of the year. They all come to see me and I don’t have to go anywhere. Pretty cool, right? I’m sick of driving.

Right now my immediate family is downstairs making me a birthday breakfast. I’m often so frustrated with my daughter, but I love her so, and I love that she wants to do so many things for me, even if I don’t really want a cake or a yarn bracelet and I’m always cleaning up her creative messes.
 
I’ll get a big hug from my son, which will be worth 50 gifts. I’ll also probably get a lovely dinner out from my husband.

I’m thankful that I don’t have to worry about how we are going to buy gifts. My husband has a good job and for that I am very thankful.

Everyone in our house is mostly healthy, and for that I am particularly thankful.

If I could hire another me to do all of that holiday froohaahaa I would. Then I could really enjoy the season again. Maybe after today I’ll have some time to catch up on things and not feel so stressed. It’s the particular curse of the Mom (or other responsible adult) in America to be caught in this holiday tradition treadmill. It’s just particularly bad for me with all of the extra stuff thrown in.

I need to rant every now and then, but I know I am blessed.

How do you survive this season? Are there things you do to save time? Are you so good that you get your shopping done in November? I’d be interested in hearing your ideas.

3 comments:

  1. That sounds terrible, but partly familiar.
    Too many presents, too much shopping and gifting, too many obligations and expectations, would make anyone miserable.

    It is ok to simplify, delegate, and opt out of things.

    Find out what your, and your family's, favorite traditions are, and come up with a smaller core list of important ones to keep, and then find out how making them happen can be delegated or at least shared, instead of all on you.

    Your daughter's craft messes are her responsibility to clean up. After all, if she can get it out, she can put it away. If she spills it, she can wipe it up. It's harder slower going to do this instead of taking care of it for them, but it will pay off in the end. I have a creative daughter too, who is 8 (we're also homeschoolers) and I still sometimes have to remind her to clean up after herself, but better reminders, and not allowing her to do anything else til she gets it done, than the alternative.

    As for overgifting and overshopping, you can try a Yankee Swap (names in a hat, each person draws a name and gives, and gets, 1 gift) or you can talk about banning gifts that are objects, in favor of experiences. My kids just want Theater Camp, and another Discovery Museum membership, for gifts.

    Birthdays can be pared down more easily. We don't invite anyone (and decline invitations) to birthday parties, but the birthday person gets a special dinner by request, a homemade cake, and a few gifts, and that's it. Otherwise, with families who have too many birthdays in the same month, a single birthday party, with cake for everyone and presents for each birthday person, makes more sense.

    If inlaws and relatives will take the kids on errands to bond, while you have quiet time to get things done, great.

    If the kids want to decorate the tree themselves, and the house too, they may do it messily, but they'll love having that experience, and you'll have one less thing you have to attend to personally.

    And if anyone offers to help clean up after the dinner, accept gratefully, and then let them help! Maybe even use it as a chance to chat as you work together and make it a cheerful tradition, that everyone cleans up together.

    Good luck!

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  2. Thanks for your comments. I do delegate what I can, and birthday celebrations (for us adults) have been distilled into dinners out. There just isn't time for much else. We are hosting 8 additional family members right now, as we do most years, and it's usually ok because most pitch in to do dishes and cook. It can even be helpful in that the kids get occupied and I can catch up with record keeping and other tasks in the meantime. Now that most of the festivities are over, I'm feeling a bit better. It's more the mental energy involved that gets to me. If I could stop the internal worrying I'm sure it would all be less stressful.

    I do tell my daughter to clean up, usually multiple times a day. Things aren't nearly that simple. I'm always trying to do three things at once and her definition of cleaning is not what mine is. I get distracted and/or we run out of time and need to be somewhere. It's something we continue to work on, and I know I need to have more patience to let her wallow in her mess a bit.

    Holiday stress is something I talk about amongst the moms I know, but I rarely see much acknowledgment of it online. It feels like something that should be talked about, and I wonder how homeschool families in particular deal with things. In some ways it could be easier (less school related distractions), and in some ways more difficult (no time to get away and shop). Everything you mentioned seemed like good suggestions, at least for some.

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  3. I did start shopping in November, but I'm not sure if that really saved much of the craziness of the season. I printed off a bunch of holiday worksheets, and we did a few craft projects, but for the most part homeschooling consisted of Kitchen Chemistry (baking holiday goodies), Language Arts (reading holiday stories, watching holiday videos and chatting about them, Physical Education (basketball practice on Saturdays and playing in the snow), and Math (logic via board games, computer games, and puzzles). I don't think that any amount of pre-planning can counter the busy-ness of the season completely. I'm pretty exhausted right now. We're taking a break until mid January (since we school year round). I'm hoping for a 2nd wind by then.

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