The tree, lights, decorations, presents, Santa, school concerts, Christmas carols, Christmas Mass, movies, turkey, ham, candles, sequins, parties, the elf, The Toy Show, Christmas pyjamas, Christmas jumpers, entertaining, visiting, days out, nights out, treats, alcohol, boardgames, advent calendars, four types of potatoes, gingerbread houses, raffles, gift collections, shopping, wrapping, making memories, maintaining traditions, Christmas cards, family, keeping the peace.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the most wonderful time of the year.<\/p>\n
And I say that without even a hint of irony. Or at least I did until I looked in exhausted wonder at that incomplete list. <\/p>\n
I adore Christmas. I think. I am she who believes it is perfectly acceptable to put up the Christmas tree on November 1st, watch Christmas movies in the summer, and play Christmas songs at Halloween, all in hope of a Christmas feeling rush.<\/p>\n
You\u2019ll know the one I mean. The one that clearly keeps us succumbing to the madness listed above. The one that\u2019s so revered it\u2019s basically unacceptable to say out loud that you dislike this time of year, lest someone hiss \u201cbah humbug\u201d at you or call you the Grinch.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I am the Grinch,\u201d one friend told me as I teased him about disliking Christmas. He\u2019s not particularly keen on people either so it\u2019s easy to presume that\u2019s why. Turns out it was a bit more than that.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hate it and nearly everything that goes with it. It doesn\u2019t help when people hear you don\u2019t like Christmas and say, \u2018it\u2019s the season of goodwill\u2019. Surely we should be treating everyone with kindness and compassion all year round, not just because we\u2019re celebrating the birth of someone most of us don\u2019t even believe in\u201d.<\/p>\n
There were financial pressures too, he said, explaining that his partner worried five presents for their child \u201clooked skimpy\u201d. But the cost mounts up.<\/p>\n
He, of course, isn\u2019t alone in feeling the season-to-be-jolly is overrated. \u201cJen, I\u2019m beginning to really resent it\u201d, another woman told me. \u201cI\u2019ve lists of lists. For both families. I\u2019m fielding questions like, \u2018have you got everything?\u2019 and \u2018have you thought about the Christmas dinner?\u2019 With no help at home my chest is tight. And the expense! I\u2019ve really cut back this year and I\u2019m still watching the cents. I feel like a real grinch and it\u2019s a struggle not to vent in front of the kids\u201d, she admitted. <\/p>\n
For one dad I spoke to, trying to ensure Christmas is special for his children means parking his own stress and loneliness. He\u2019s separated and is \u201cstruggling both financially and emotionally at this time of the year\u201d. The financial pressures of maintenance and supporting another home means things will be very different. \u201cI used to love Christmas and buying gifts. I just can\u2019t do it this year. Extended family and siblings won\u2019t be getting anything this year, unfortunately\u201d, he says.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe emotional load as a separated dad is huge. There\u2019s huge stress around where we spend Christmas. I\u2019m very lucky in that we have an amicable separation so we\u2019re well able to be in the same room together. But you\u2019re going to your ex-wife\u2019s house to spend some time in the morning, and it\u2019s not your house\u201d, he adds, explaining the different level of comfort that results.<\/p>\n
Outside of that time, he says, \u201cI\u2019m typically sitting on my own on Christmas Eve … and then again on Christmas night I\u2019m sitting on my own. It\u2019s lonely and it\u2019s difficult and it amplifies it around that time. For someone who loved Christmas all my life \u2013 it was my favourite time of the year \u2013 it has a very different meaning now\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI absolutely hate when people say, \u2018are you all set?\u2019,\u201d a mum told me in conversation. \u201cSomeone asked me last week and I said, \u2018no I\u2019m not, because I haven\u2019t a penny\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cEven when my own children asked me had I started buying presents I had to reply, no I hadn\u2019t because I didn\u2019t have the money. Financially, it is a big stress.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not only parents who find the financial and emotional toll of Christmas to be heavy. \u201cPeople wanting to meet at Christmas is stressful\u201d, one man admitted, not that he\u2019s averse to having a night out, it\u2019s people coming out of the woodwork just because it\u2019s Christmas, he explained. While primary schoolteachers, who had cajoled more carolers and shepherded more shepherds than any adult might reasonably expect to in a lifetime, told of the unseen work and long hours that go into making the memorable nativity and Christmas show experiences parents cherish, while balancing the fallout on young children of families struggling with the pressures of the season.<\/p>\n
\u201cStressed, anxious, nauseous, overwhelmed, frazzled, dread, panicked, exhausted\u201d, more adults chimed in \u2013 and the elf barely here a wet week yet.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The tree, lights, decorations, presents, Santa, school concerts, Christmas carols, Christmas Mass, movies, turkey, ham, candles, sequins, parties,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":222565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[9,10,13,14,6,11,12,15,16,5,2973,11997,7,8,65,66,67],"class_list":{"0":"post-222564","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-featured-news","11":"tag-featurednews","12":"tag-headlines","13":"tag-latest-news","14":"tag-latestnews","15":"tag-main-news","16":"tag-mainnews","17":"tag-news","18":"tag-parenting","19":"tag-parents","20":"tag-top-stories","21":"tag-topstories","22":"tag-world","23":"tag-world-news","24":"tag-worldnews"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115686219728795696","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}