Merry Christmas to Me – the Gift of Peace

There are many benefits to having older teens. First is that I no longer have to wake up at the butt crack of dawn on Christmas morning to open presents, or to do the “Christmas” thing.

In fact, when I got home from work last night, exhausted, I asked my sons when they wanted to open presents, and my youngest said he was hoping we could open them that night. Perfect.

We opened presents and watched Toy Story 4 – not the Christmas movie I would have picked, but they were apparently in the mood. I lasted through that one and then the first 10 minutes of Toy Story before I had to say good night and make good on my intentions, and go to bed. 

But perhaps, I should rewind to earlier yesterday evening. I still don’t have a working vehicle, so despite that I got out of work early yesterday, my brother and my mother came to pick me up from work to take me home, and that took almost 2 hours. Not because there was traffic, because there was none, but because my brother and my mother don’t give a shit about the fact that I just wanted to go home, and took the extra scenic route back home. Which included a stop in a nearby town to take photos of the lights in the park. Holy shit. I fell asleep in his car waiting for them to finish. 

But I wasn’t mad because whatever, they’re giving me a ride home and eventually I would be home. However, my mother was in one of her “moods” because as we were driving to the park for her fucking photo session, she proceeds to regale me with instructions on what to do with the things she had for me in a bag, none of which I asked her for, but again, I’m not arguing with her because I don’t really care. However, we get to the part where she received a package from her sister, and inside there were gifts for me and my kids. I was like, okay, cool.

But no! There were instructions, and then she proceeded to suggest that I had to call her when I went through those because apparently one of the gifts contained money which was for my sons, half for each. Okay, that’s not hard to do. No! Her hesitation and insistence was because she was low key implying that I was going to keep the money for myself and never give it to them!! AND her implication of this was because she kept insisting that, my aunt might call me to talk about the gifts so, I better make sure I give it to them because she is going to ask. What the FUCK! 

OMG. This right here is why I am glad I did not invite them over my house for Christmas today. I got to sleep until noon. I was allowed to wake up and wish my sons a happy holiday, without the impending doom of my brother and my mother trashing on my day. 

I woke up at some point in the middle of the night, probably because I was grinding my teeth and the ache woke me. After I took ibuprofen (the ravages of old age lol) I was drifting off when I decided to peruse Reddit, because why not. There were a few posts wishing people a Merry Christmas. Folks reminding others to look out for people they knew were alone or may be feeling low during the holidays. All legit. And then there were those posts of people telling others to appreciate the family they have because they themselves were alone with no family. 

Well, there’s two sides to that coin. There’s the side where yeah, you are alone and you perhaps didn’t appreciate the family you had when you had them, and they were good people and now you lament that they are gone, passed on, moved away, whatever the case may be. 

Then there is the other side of the coin. My side. Where I have family, and I have tried to appreciate them, but all they do is make me miserable. The people who are responsible for pushing me further into the abyss of depression, the ones who rejoice in smothering me in the miserable blanket of their manipulative emotional abuse. Those are the family that you don’t need. I am here to remind those that are alone during the holidays to stop wishing for the shit they don’t have because there is no guarantee you are going to get the happy side of the coin. 

I appreciated them when times were good, but let me tell you, I do not miss them when the times got bad. And I do not miss them this Christmas. What I miss is the ghost of Christmas Past when I didn’t know how bad they were treating me and how shitty I in turn, treated myself under their influence. 

I placed a no trespassing sign on my life and uninvited them from the particulars of my life. They tried. My mother did her best to invite herself, or to look for an in to get invited to my house. I wasn’t lacking in the holiday spirit, I was lacking in the willingness to pretend that things could go back to the way they were. I was done fooling myself. 

This year, I gifted myself the gift of mental health. I am spending the holiday with the only family that matters, my sons. Being alone is not a curse when it is a choice. And despite all her attempts to make me feel guilty about it, I woke up today knowing I chose wisely. Merry Christmas!