And more specifically with the emotions that get triggered.
And more specifically with the emotions that get triggered.
As a child, I would love the holidays, the family dinners, the fireplace, the surprises, the extra attention and the gifts, the midnight mass with my grandparents, and hot cocoa at midnight.
As a teen and young adult, those family dinners sometimes turned into a stressful event, with pressure to get dinner right, heated discussions after one too many glasses of wine, slamming doors, and forced coziness due to all the friction in the air.
As an adult, I actually spent a few of them alone (on purpose) not wanting to participate because I did not feel in congruence.
Until my late husband came along. He was so excited about setting up the tree, finding gifts for everyone, and getting together with friends and family….
His childlike excitement was contagious and I did not want to spoil his joy. So I set my grinch aside and allowed the joy to take over instead.
This is the second holiday season since he passed.
And I have conflicting feelings.
To celebrate or not … that is the question.
I choose to celebrate.
The joy and gratitude I feel over the sadness that squeezes my heart at night.
The fact that I am near my family and get to spend precious time with them, period.
Dealing with contradicting emotions can be rough.
I allow them to exist.
I acknowledge the sadness, the missing, the pain.
I give myself permission to feel all of that and have a good cry.
And then I literally count my blessings.
All the things I am grateful for.
The opportunities that life has given me over the past 18 months.
To grow, to become stronger, to love myself, my daughter, my family, and my friends even more.
To find new challenges.
To find joy every day.
To live life with the awareness that every day is a gift.
It is not easy.
But the smile our little tree brings to my daughter’s face is worth the effort of resisting my urge not to set it up at all.