Eight days til Christmas. Some year, because I have hope, I will have a Christmas where I can actually enjoy and celebrate the reason. Today I am reminding myself over and over what this season really is. It isn't easy. I made a crucial mistake in my banking and ~poof~ all of my Christmas funds are gone!! I have barely begun shopping for the boys and right now, today I do not know how I will make it happen. They, of course, have no idea and are just little boys jumping with excitement. It isn't easy keeping all of this from the two of them. I keep smiling, I help out when they want to make a special Christmas craft for their Grandmother. I smile as I mix up yet another batch of holiday sweets.
I feel as though I am beaten down. I really thought last year was going to be it as far as stressing out over the whole Santa Claus thing. But nope, here I am once again in the same damn boat - or sleigh I suppose. I know I always manage to pull it off but man, I am tired of doing that. I know there is probably some message being sent to me in all of this. I know what the true meaning of Christmas is and that I should be rejoicing. I also have always believed that the Lord never gives one more than they can handle. But dangitt, I don't want to handle this again. I don't want to be out on the day before Christmas trying to figure a way to make my boys smile on Christmas morning. I want it to be easy. I want it to just flow....it never does though.
Negativity. Yep, I've got an extreme case of it. I look at the huge list of Christmas wishes my boys have posted on the refrigerator and I want to throw up. My head is pounding, probably from stress. My stomach is a knot. I am ticked off at myself that I made a stupid mistake and caused all of this. Usually I can usually just nag on the Mad Sci because it is his fault. Not this year. It is my own damn fault.
I have a trillion excuses too. I have been running the boys to their dental appointments, working on school projects, building snowmen to keep the boys occupied, running them to basketball......I don't know, none of them are good enough but there they are. I have never been perfect, never will be and now I have to fight my way out of this latest error of mine.
At times like this I always think of a good friend and former boss of mine and how he describes me. It goes like this: "You can find the most difficult position, and I would think there is no way out and then you find the way'. Yeah well, I am sick of that too. Why can't life just go easy. I don't expect it to be easy all the time but just once in my adult life is it too much to ask for a Christmas that I can smile, breathe and enjoy.
I know I have much to be thankful for. I have two awesome little boys who are happy, healthy and have bright shiny white smiles. I have both my Mom and Dad here to celebrate with and my sisters and their families. This year the entire family will be together including a brand new baby -a miracle baby no less! The Mad Sci and I will be celebrating 15 years of marriage on December 31. And that always makes me laugh-if we make it through the holiday season we get to celebrate another year together. Yippee another year-lets do it again for another 365 days-next Christmas will be different. And then...it never is....
The worst thing about all of this is that I really don't want the people who care about me to know how much stress I am under. I don't want them to know how bad I messed up. I don't want them to see the miracle I am going to pull off to see my boys smile on Christmas morning. So I go along, keep it all to myself, smile and pretend the world is a grand place and hand them a cookie!
4 comments:
((((Julie))) I'm so sorry :(
but I think its awesome you'll be married 15 years on New Year's Eve!! that's an accomplishment in this day and age! Happy early anniversary
and Merry Christmas! it really will be okay......
betty
So sorry you are having such a stressful time! Christmas can be like that for a lot of people. We never had much money when my kids were growing up and so Santa was never able to bring them much of anything. But we had always told the kids that Santa could only bring them one gift anyways, and so they always had pretty realistic expectations. We also told them that we had to pay Santa so that he could bring gifts to the poor kids too. That also helped to keep them down to earth. They never seemed to question why they didn't get as much as other kids. I guess we were lucky!! Christmas for us as a family was more about being together and the food and family and service to others. We always put together a box for someone which we would deliver on Christmas Eve and the children always really enjoyed that. I hope you start to feel better soon. ((((hugs)))
Debbie and I are having it rough this Christmas but just as long as we have each other things will be alright!
Have a very happy 15th Anniversary
And very Merry Christmas!
I know you don't want to let your family know what stress you are under, but you know, that is what family is for. If you share, your burdens will be lightened. Hugs to you and best wishes for a very blessed Christmas and Happy Anniversary! 'On Ya'-ma
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