The Holidays

The holidays are officially here.  Thanksgiving is actually my favorite holiday, but this year I am not so festive.  I am a little down because we are not in our house anymore.  Gone are our private traditions, my way of doing things, my own personal touches.  I find that I have to yield to someone else, which has never been my strong suit.  I suppose it should be a compromise, but since it is not my house and since this person is not someone who is inclined to doing things any way other than her own, I feel resigned to letting it be. 

I feel like I am forced to return to certain traditions of my childhood, which I intentionally shook off as an adult.  I was eager to do things my way when I had my own family, so unpleasant were my experiences during the holidays with my family.  I haven't wanted to cook this year, in fact have imagined not doing a single thing in my head, because I cannot cook the meal the way I do it.  My aunt seems to have these grandiose plans for the meal, which she speaks like she is going to cook herself.  She can't possibly considering she is disabled for the most part. 

Christmas will be different too.  The one thing I get to insist on keeping is that we open presents on Christmas morning.  When I was a kid we always did it on Christmas Eve.  Needless to say, we never really were allowed to believe in Santa as a result.  The presents were stacked under the tree days or weeks ahead of Christmas. We were done opening presents by 9pm the night before, so there was no glee at waking up to the motherload on Christmas morning for us.  It was all practicality--no one wanted to have to clean up the mess from the presents AND cook on the same day.  My kids will believe in Santa as long as I can get away with it.

I realized last night that a big part of my sadness and bitterness has to do with not being in our house.  I feel a sense of loss and that is not easy to manage in the condition I am.  I am better by leaps and bounds than I was, but I see that there is still a good ways to go.  I know I'm having a natural reaction to the situation, I'm just not coping as well as I could or should.  Today is going to be difficult because I am depressed and don't want to do anything.  I think I'm going to be expected to do stuff anyway, and that's not going to be a fun situation if I'm not coping well.  I hope I can hold my tongue and muster up the energy to do it.  It makes me nervous because I always got in trouble during the holidays when I was a kid.  I always did something that pissed someone off and I ended up getting my face slapped.  Consequently, I feel like this and am afraid that there will be a disagreement that turns into something bigger than it should be.   I certainly don't think I'm going to get my face slapped, but I don't want to have a shouting match, either.  I have felt close to losing my temper lately.  Maybe some hypomania seeping around the edges.  I don't know.

At any rate, I am hoping to just get through the day.  I don't have any delusions of a warm and fun afternoon with my family.  I don't think I have that in me.  I am probably going to need Ativan to make it through it.  That makes me even sadder.  Thanksgiving really is my favorite holiday.