I must begin by saying that for me, Thanksgiving kicks off the Happy Month. I am a December baby, and so is my father and another cousin or two. Then I married another one. Plus, there was Christmas, and New Year's to finish it all up with a bang. For me growing up, it meant the season of special dinners at Grandma's with people being happy and getting presents every single weekend, and then there was Christmas where EVERYONE got to give and get presents, and then a last happy party at my aunt's house before we took down the tree and returned to normal life. I still love the season, even though time has taken my grandparents' generation of relatives and my others are far-flung these days, and don't get together at all. I still enjoy it, decorate, bake cookies and give them away, and delight in doing my own birthday the way I want it, and that of my husband, the way he wants it.
If he'd be clear about it.
He has PTSD and depression. I know this. I know he misses the gatherings of his childhood. I do too, and that's life. We have a holiday (Samhain) for grieving, and then we move on through the year.
We had planned to have open house for a joint birthday party. The place our friends all used to congregate closed; I can't have it there, and I want to see people and just be happy and have fun. He doesn't want it to happen. He doesn't want his birthday celebrated. He sent me a recipe for a cake, and when I said, "Oh, is this what you want for your birthday cake?" the answer was
NO.
No birthday, no cake, no presents, no dinner out, don't mention it. Which is his choice, but he'll wake up December 5th and want it all to magically appear. This puts me in a tight place, because I can't pull that all out of my ass without preparations beforehand. Taking him at his word means that I have a 50% chance that he'll sulk all day because I didn't do anything special. Going ahead and doing things means that I'll do them with depressed heckling from him, and a 50% chance on the day that he does it all with the very visible attitude of "I have to go through this charade, but I don't have to like it" and be a jerk the entire time. This is also stressful and not leading to happiness for either of us.
He will apply this to my birthday too. Somehow we always seem to run out of money just before my birthday so we can't go out to eat for it, and he doesn't want to go where I want to go when we do. And if he does, he grumbles. And if I want to open presents with him in the room, he bitches and says, "Okay, NOW can I go back to the movie I was watching?" and has a pain flare so we can't go over to Mom's for me to see them on my birthday, or if we do go we have to leave much earlier than I'd like.
This also applies to Christmas.
I put up the tree. I do the baking. I do the decorating. I do any special cooking. Now, I don't mind this as I do enjoy these things, but it would be nice to have him help or even acknowledge that I'm doing this stuff to make OUR space pretty and nice. I'd like to be able to purchase things for him and me and everyone else without him grumbling about the cost or that he wants to use it now goddamn it. It would be nice to be able to listen to Christmas music, which I adore in season, without him groaning and grumbling and requests to turn that fucking shit off. And the thing that maddens me is that on the day....
he'll want to eat the special breakfast
and unpack his stocking
and open LOTS AND LOTS OF PRESENTS!
and see me open presents he bought me that make me happy
and see the boys open presents and be happy
and play games with them
and eat the special dinner
And somewhere along the line he will have a large fit of depression about how His Grandma Is Dead And He Misses Her So Much (she died 25 years ago, just before we met) and grump through the rest of the day but get shitty if I cut it short because he's being a grump and not enjoying it.
I am tired of my own enjoyment of Christmas getting systematically shit on, and the double bind I'm always in around holidays. I want to be able to enjoy myself, and if he can't be helpful, at least he could shut up. But I do love him and respect his feelings and honor his right to have them.
So. You wise people got any ideas about this?