We are right in the thick of the annual holiday grief challenge.
The culture points to this day with so much anticipation and expectation. Dealing with that is hard enough without pulling the grief wagon behind us.
Some of us have grief anniversaries at this time. Some are facing the first "empty chair" Xmas remembering someone who died this year. For some of us Christmas is just another day, a day we are still mourning the loss of someone we love.
Welcome, fellow travelers on the grief journey
and a special welcome to anyone new to The Grieving Room.
We meet every Monday evening.
Whether your loss is recent, or many years ago;
whether you've lost a person, or a pet;
or even if the person you're "mourning" is still alive,
("pre-grief" can be a very lonely and confusing time),
you can come to this diary and say whatever you need to say.
We can't solve each other's problems,
but we can be a sounding board and a place of connection.
Unlike a private journal
here, you know: your words are read by people who
have been through their own hell.
There's no need to pretty it up or tone it down..
It just is.
I was never a big fan of Christmas after I got out of my early childhood, but my mom loved it so. I enjoyed watching her enjoy it, more than I enjoyed it myself.
Her last Christmas was bad. She spent most of the day asleep as I held her hand in a hospital bed. She did not get to open her cards or listen to me read them to her. I had wasted hours in the mall trying to find appropriate presents, but she never got to open them.
A few days after Christmas, she perked up and showed energy and even regained her appetite. They checked her out of the hospital. She ate tuna noodle salad. I remember it as if it were yesterday.
I should have brought her home! I should not have let them send her to rehab! If I had brought her home she never would have gotten the bed sores that made the last six weeks of her life so horrendously painful!
Some regrets die very very hard.
This year I wanted to try to bring back some happy memories by making her Christmas cookies. But I gained weight at my last check up so I put that plan on hold. I can't mortgage the future by holding on to the past.
I spent the day alone but talked to friends and family on the phone. Did not spend as much time listening to melancholy Christmas music as I have been doing for the last few days.
Less than six hours left in this day and then all the people who have been building up to Christmas since Halloween will take down their trees and move on, turning their attention to New Year's Eve.
Fortunately I'll be very busy in January, which could help me avoid thinking about mom's death anniversary in early February, and Valentine's Day, the hardest days of the year.
How are you handling Christmas today? Was it easier or harder than you expected? Has it been just another day? Did you spend the day with people? Did it help?
All of us walking the grief journey have almost made it through another Christmas.
Maybe next year will be easier.
I say that every year...
Blue Christmas soundtrack
Star Of Wonder by The Roches on Grooveshark
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas by James Taylor on Grooveshark