A survey by mental health charity MIND has concluded that one in five people suffers from Christmas-induced stress. “Many people find it hard to cope with the demands of Christmas,” MIND’s Julia MacPherson says. “We’ve found it’s as common as relationship problems and health worries for causing stress.”
Really?
There are only two people in my household, William and me, my kids and his kids being grown and either married or at university. Are we exempt from the one in five stress ratio? Or, are we, too, doomed to be stressed out? I suppose the best way to gauge our risk for stress this year would be to take a fine look at the ghosts of Christmas past. (Puts on thinking cap.)
Shopping is probably the numero uno stressor. (And paying for it, but that’s another topic.)
Eating and drinking too much (parties, big dinners) don’t help.
Doing too much at once adds to the fun. Cooking and trimming and cleaning take their toll.
Family feuds don’t do much for Christmas peace on earth, either. For some reason (maybe Christmas “cheer”), they seem to fester at Christmas.
Let’s take the stressors one at a time.
Shopping.
My kids have always said that Mom starts buying for Christmas on Boxing Day—and they pretty much aren’t exaggerating. If I find myself hurrying along the aisles of a shopping mall on Christmas Eve, it’s because I’ve gone to laugh at all the poor suckers who ignored every one of those “Only ten…nine…eight….two… shopping days till Christmas” warnings. What usually happens in my house is I buy a great gift for someone in the Boxing Day sales, hide it some place safe, forget I bought it, then buy something else for that person a few months later. My kids used to love that! Everything is usually wrapped (and colour-coordinated with my tree, because I’m a teeny bit OCD) long before we hear the hooves on the rooftop. Harried shopping ain’t gonna be my major stressor. The downside is, I sometimes forget that I bought that special something for a certain person until after Christmas! As for paying for it, I get an annual bonus that just about covers the lot.
Eating and drinking
Used to be, I could drink any guy I knew under the table. (Newfie genes.) The older I get, the less tolerance I have for any kind of alcohol. Besides, I have a slight allergy to most things alcoholic, but especially to wine, my drink of choice. Half a glass, and my face is red and hot, shining like Rudolph’s and Santa Claus’s noses. More than two glasses and I’m nauseous. Drinking may be a problem. Last year, we had about twelve Christmas parties to attend, not including family get-togethers. By the time December 24 dawned, I had had it with parties. This year we have tried to keep December a party-free zone until Christmas because we have a business to attend to. Eating? Well, maybe. I like my food and particularly like MY food. I’m a good cook, if I do say so myself. And I love, love, love my turkey and rosemary garlic mashed potato and giblets gravy. On Thanksgiving, because of various family & friends, I ended up eating three turkey dinners. I also ended up popping Rolaids for a week to ten days after. My daughter and I have an annual cookie-making day. We bake hundreds of cookies, a dozen different types. And of course, one HAS to taste-test, right? So, yeah, food will likely be a problem. I have the Rolaids ready.
Doing too much at once
I hate putting up my Christmas tree too early. I am conditioned by my childhood in Newfoundland, where we kids went hunting for a tree in the snowy woods with our Dad and an ax on Christmas Eve. Before the men got into the Captain Morgan.
A week before Christmas Eve last year, I trotted down to my storage locker to get my Christmas tree. Two hours of moving every single box (twice) failed to turn up a tree. That’s when I remembered that as I took it down the year before, I looked at my partner and said, “This is going in the trash.” That was after the angel fell off because the top branch collapsed. That was also after I couldn’t locate the foot and was forced to stick the tree in a pail of Styrofoam and hope no one leaned against it. That was also after I sat on a box of glass ornaments. (I know that’s not the tree’s fault, but hey, haven’t you heard of guilt by association?) So there I was, a few days before the big day, traipsing to Walmart and Costco and several other places, trying to find a suitable tree. It was like trying to buy gas on an afternoon when the price has dropped five cents.
I’d bought my partner a ticket to Florida for his Christmas gift. (I also bought a ticket to Florida for me for his Christmas gift.) Our flight left early Christmas morning from Buffalo. After Christmas Eve dinner at the farm, we slept for a couple of hours before trekking to the airport. The car ride and the flight were uneventful. Not a snowflake in sight. Not a sign of precipitation of any kind. Until we landed in Fort Myers. In the middle of a vicious wind and rain storm. Airlines being so strapped they can’t even spring for peanuts these days, by the time we’d arrived at his parents’ beachfront Naples condo, I was ready to chew off a portion of his arm. Someone (I think it was me) had the bright idea to walk through the rain squalls of Noah-like proportions to the shopping centre across the street. Surely we’d find sustenance of some sort. We needed Christmas dinner. The only restaurant open in the plaza was a tony, overpriced gourmet wannabee. We looked like two recently drowned rats. (No umbrellas in either our luggage OR the condo.) The girl on the welcoming committee, to her credit, offered to seat us in the main dining room, but we felt better being in the front area by ourselves, dripping on to the banquette. Now, if the food had been as good as the welcome, I’d have had a happy Christmas dinner. Unfortunately, I started with a gelatinous brown mess they called tasty lobster bisque. I suppose the chef may have once held a lobster in his hand, maybe even shown it to the pot, but if any fresh, self-respecting lobster had ever graced that soup, it would be embarrassed to admit it. Things went downhill from there. With the dinner, I mean. The rest of the trip was great except that one toilet didn’t work and the kitchen sink and bathroom sink clogged and we had to throw out packaged food from 2000. Plunging and lugging black garbage bags of cans and packets isn’t my idea of holiday fun, but it had to be done. Stress? A bit. On the plus side, there was only one cockroach and it was dead. The beach birds were fabulous, we had a magnificent time with fan boats, and we managed to sightsee a large area of southern Florida. I’d have to say the scales may have tipped into relaxation territory.
The year my son started chef school, he helped me cook Christmas dinner. When he removed the turkey (in one of those flimsy aluminum roasting pans) from the oven, the pan collapsed and turkey (and drippings, onions, etc.) plonked on to the floor and re-decorated my kitchen. The worst was: We salvaged the turkey (washed him off a bit) but we had no drippings for gravy. And everyone knows mashed potatoes are useless without rivers of rich, lovely, mouth-watering gravy. Stress? Oh, yeah! For about five minutes while I cleaned the crap off the floor, counters, cupboards and—uh huh—ceiling. When my family is around me, nothing is going to bother me for long. No gravy? Big frigging deal. Bring on the sour cream. Deck the halls! Sing a carol! Open the presents!
Oh, yes, the year R and I moved into our newly renovated house in the country with the kids, I had the turkey all stuffed ready to roast on Christmas morning. When I turned on the new oven of my new stove in my new house, nothing happened. Seems the workmen had forgotten to hook up the oven. We ate penne alla arrabiata for Christmas dinner that year. What are you going to do? You make the best of it because relationships are what matter, not turkeys. Not even the non-feathered kind.
Family Feuds
Now, there were a few Christmas nights, when my kids were with their Dad, that I spent the evening quietly crying and/or loudly singing in the back of the Anglican church near my business, while R did his thing, which sometimes included screaming at me. Water under the bridge. I’m now in a very stable relationship. Screaming doesn’t exist. Love abounds. It’s Christmas all year round.
Nope, I’m thinking Christmas will be pretty normal around our house. We’ll drink till we’re happy and eat till we’re stuffed, and if temporary intestinal upheaval is our main or only problem, we’re truly fortunate, aren’t we? God bless us, every one. And pass the Rolaids.
