The holidays are upon us once again, and for many, it’s a time of the year they spend alone. There are many reasons this occurs, whether it be because we can’t afford to go home, or we have no “home” to travel to. Sometimes we just find ourselves alone for the holidays.
I’ve been alone for Thanksgiving, and I’ve been alone for Christmas. Sure, it’s easy to fall into a funk and begin to feel sorry for yourself and your situation. Sometimes it was by choice, and other times it wasn’t. In any case, when I was alone for Thanksgiving, I found a way to make the most of my situation and looked at it with from a very short-term perspective — I may be alone this year, but who knows what will happen by next year.
It’s also a great time to do something completely different and go outside of your comfort zone or shell of security. If you’ve never volunteered at a food bank or kitchen, give it a try. Gather together a few fellow co-worked or friends you think are also going to be alone for the holidays and throw your own little holiday pot-luck dinner. Sometimes the plans made at the last minute can be the most fun and exciting.
One year when I was alone for the holidays, I spent a day helping out at a local food bank. It wasn’t something I ordinarily do, and I’m always a little nervous going into a situation that I’ve never been in before. But it was great — it took my mind off of being alone for the day. It helps that I often feel at my best when I’m doing something, anything. I like to help others, too, so this was the best of both worlds for me.
Other people might not enjoy volunteering, and I understand that. So here are 10 other suggestions you can try if you’re alone for Thanksgiving or Christmas. And if none of those things float your boat, well, here are even more suggestions on how to make the holidays a little less lonely. Remember, you can be alone for the holidays and not have to feel lonely.
And if you feel like you’re missing out on the ideal holiday Hallmark scene, it helps to be brought back to reality. For most families, holidays are often a time of stress combined with a time of togetherness. It’s not all flowers and sunshine, and some people absolutely dread getting together with their family because of family expectations of “togetherness.”
That’s part of the problem — this sense of “togetherness” comes part and parcel with the holidays. As psychologist Dr. Elaine Rodino noted in this article about coping with the holidays, “There’s so much hype for this wonderful time of togetherness, that it accentuates the feeling of being alone and disconnected.”
Although we may sometimes feel very much alone in the world, we are the makers of our own reality and feelings. If you’re alone this Thanksgiving or Christmas, change your expectations — change something up this holiday season — and you can change your holiday from one of feeling lonely and sorry for yourself, to one of feeling alone — but content.
49 comments
Nice timing. Yes I’m in the enviable position of being invited to a beautiful family get “together” and am fighting with myself, because I don’t want to go. I end up feeling 10 times more alienated from them, alone and miserable than if I stayed on my own…
I agree. I am invited too. I’m not going. Usually I make the dressing, most of the side dishes, etc….but I have a daughter in law and her mother…..two against one….and
they lie about everything to me, ….both hate to cook, and both have some very big psych problems….and they cause me to have them too!!!!! Ouch!
Who needs it.??? I’m staying home…having a ribeye, enjoying my books and watercolor painting and my dog, a standard poodle. I am thankful that I can do this without feeling guilty, sad, or unhappy.
This year, like last, I will be home alone with my cat. This is by choice, so I’m not complaining. Loneliness and being alone are two very different situations. Being alone is about the body; being lonely is about the spirit.
Well Happy Thanksgiving to everyone, whether you’re with family/friends or by yourself.
Never alone with a cat! I enjoy her company most of all.
I went to my sister’s house, not far away, for Thanksgiving, and she did a great job hosting. It was traditional but casual. There were 8 of us: Sister (age 50), her daughter (24), sisters b/f (42), his daughter (8), my mom (80) step-dad (85) and my husband. I came home and cried, even tho the day went smoothly, because my only brother (age 55) is in a federal prison (since last February) awaiting his sentencing hearing in January, and his daughter (age 29) died suddenly in late August (unrelated incidents.) My brother called towards the end of our dinner today. We get 15 minutes, and then the call is automatically cut off (“Thank you for using Evercom: Good bye.”) He’s in there, I can’t help him, he made a stupid decision while under the influence of alcohol one night and is looking at 15-30 years. Of course, with federal time, you don’t know where he will serve it. He’s in pre-trial detention about 4.5 hrs. from here. He could be a couple of days drive after he’s sentenced and transferred. It’s hard to help keep his spirits up when mine are so low. He raised his two kids as a single father, and he said that Thanksgiving was always a fun day in the kitchen with his kids, watching for the turkey thermometer to pop up, and is not only in prison, alone, today, but grieving for his daughter, dead three months this week, and remembering … .
After reading your post I had to reply. I know it was last year. I hope your brother had a reduced sentence. I am alone on this Thanksgiving. My only son went to prison last year for having relations with his underage stepdaughter. This has been so shocking and horrible but it happened, he made a stupid mistake and there isn’t any way to take it back. He accepted a plea bargain with a reduced sentence from 25 years down to 15 to 20 years. With that plea deal he cannot appeal or recieve a reduced sentence. I had 4 grandaughters but now my son has lost parental rights so I lost my Grandaughters too. I had 2 sons. My first son died when he was 13 years old. I was married once for 18 years until my husband cheated with another woman. I remarried 6 years ago but am now separated because he cheated too. All of my family are gone, except a sister but she lives 3 states away. Mom died last year. It is hard to keep going sometimes. I Googled alone for Thanksgiving to find some relief that is how I found this site. I hope things are going better for you this year.
Well here I am alone at Thanksgiving with 2 cats. My husband passed away in 2008 and the holidays bring back all the memories. I live in OH and my only family are 2 older sisters in TX. We were unable to have children and I have retired after working 47years full time. I have in-laws in PA but I have Parkinson’s and don’t think I could drive to visit. I went to a free community Thanksgiving meal today and won as a door prize a 12 lb turkey. The pastor at the community meal said “Don’t worry about anything, pray about everything.” Best wishes to everyone.
I will be alone for Thanksgiving again this year. and I was feeling sorry ro myself about that which led me to read the above posts. Reading the posts helped to shed a new light on the idea of being alone. I know these posts are from last year but they still apply.
I remember having Thanksgiving dinner at my house and inviting everyone in my extended family to come. I have always put more importance on the gathering than other people in the family. The complaints are always guaranteed, like my mother complaining about having to bake pies when no one ever asked her to in the first place, or my sister impatiently looking at the clock because she told her boyfriend she would be over after dinner. And then there is the uncle who wants to watch the game sitting in his own recliner, in his own house, …”What? I have to smoke outside?”,…”Why did you get that kind of beer?” My brother isn’t here yet because he had to have dinner at his wifes house first. “What did you put in the dressing? This isn’t how we make it. Now Uncle Bob is starting one of his know-it-all arguements with someone so now we get to hear a shouting match. Then there is the clean up and all the while kids are running around and screaming, something always gets broken. Who dripped gravy on my linen tablecoth and who spilled wine on the carpet and just left it? If you load all the dishes so high in the sink I can’t even get to the faucet. Where does this go and that go, where do you keep your…God help me!!
This whole idea of having our expectations met by having the perfect holiday is crazy because those expectations can never be met. In reality if we were to have a perfect Thanksgiving, we would have to pay actors to play a scene as if in a stage play. We could write the script and direct the show to our own preference. That is the only way we can ever have it right, or our way. Don’t let fantasy ideas about holidays make you feel like you are missing out on something because you are not. I like the idea I read above about watercolor painting. I will be alone this year and I will do something productive instead of working in the kitchen for 8 hours until my back hurts and stuffing myself with food until it hurts or listening to bickering and complaints. I’ll just have peace and quiet, ahhh!
I fell out with one of my relatives about a year and a half ago. Due to that fallout, the rest of my relatives distanced themselves from me. I actually hate all of them now. I will be by myself for the holidays, but I would rather be alone than to be with some hypocritical women who are really selfish and two faced. I will be moving out of state soon and hope never to see any of them again. I hope they all choke on their thanksgiving food!
I agree with you. This is something that happens in almost all holiday gathering in some way. I will be alone this year as well. After 30 years of marrage my wife has decided she was not happy. I married her to make her happy so what ever it takes to make that happen is what I will live with or without. I still am not sure what I will do this year. It will be a first for me for sure. She has invited me to their family dinner. Ijust would not be very comfortable sitting at the table with my (seperated) wife and her family acting like everything is just fine. She has told me she has not been really happy for a long time. I just can’t fake a smile as good as her I guess.
Listen to the song “Christmas For One” included in the album “It’s Time For Christmas” on Startune Records, ITunes and Amazon.com released on Nov.15th. The writer experienced lonely times at Christmas after losing his loved one.
Spending Christmas alone is pritty hard. I’ve got to spend it with my daughter. While my partner goes down the line. She hasn’t offered. My mother only talks to me when she wants something. I really want to just live my life with people that care enough to make me feel wanted. I live with my partner and her parents. Me and my mum and brother hate each other.
Well I spend many Christmases alone, mostly in foreign countries. This year going to be harder for me. Got a double fracture in my left upper leg, due to a motorbike accident earlier this year. It’s still very painful and I need another operation at some time. Living in the countryside with no means of transport doesn’t help.
I really really hate the idea of being alone on holidays, because it doesn’t live up to the ideal Hallmark holiday. I didn’t have any of those ideals growing up, but I had a few when my daughter was little and I was newly married. She’s grown, and I’m long divorced. But the actual being alone situation, well, I actually like being home alone on the holidays because there is no one complaining, arguing or sniping. My dogs are very agreeable. And I don’t have pressures about cooking or cleaning. I stopped accepting invitations to spend holidays with a friend’s or neighbor’s family, but they aren’t my family and it makes me miss the ideal more. This year I met a couple of similarly older 50 and 60 something singles who were passing through town, separately, and we went to a movie and then a restaurant on Thanksgiving. I liked that better than with families that aren’t mine because we had more in common.
You seemed to be the ‘sanest’ to reply to. I’ve had some ‘problems’ in my life….that affected my children’s lives…which they still (after 12+ yrs. of sobriety) hate me for….which is justifiably understandable. They tolerate me & sometimes we have ‘civil’ holiday get-togethers. Not this year. Alone for Thanksgiving & Christmas. Thankfully, I read a lot – so, I stocked up on books.
Wow! The sanest? Those are the sorts of judgments about people that create the very problem that often alienates them from family. The comment was not relevant and the fact that you are capable of publishing it says a lot about you.
I’m going to be alone this Christmas, I have family around but they all have their own families and don’t think about me. I haven’t received any invitations to join any of them. I have no partner and no children. Past holidays I have always locked myself in my house and watched television and played video games. I’m getting tried of doing this every year. Since no one comes to visit I have stopped putting up a tree for no one comes around to see and it’s a hassle to put one up. I know it’s not about gifts, but I stopped buying gifts since I never received any – to explain when we did get together for Christmas eve all the children got gifts, since I don’t have children for them to buy I still had to spend money for their children and never received anything from the parents. There are 9 nephews and niece’s and that’s a lot to buy for. In all – I have stopped celebration holidays and consider it just another day of the week.
I hear you, Jay. I had idyllic Christmases with family as a kid, though the day to day life was very dysfunctional and painful. Most of my relatives are dead, my siblings are all married with their own families in other states, and I have been divorced for many years and am single by choice. I have spent many holidays alone with my cat. Friends sometimes invite me, but it is actually harder to watch other people with their families than it is to be alone. I have no tree either and usually only get a gift from perhaps a co-worker. I hate November to January and usually try to forget the holidays exist.
I know exactly how you feel. I will be alone for Christmas, just like I was alone for Thanksgiving. I have been alone for many holidays and don’t know what is wrong with family and friends, but I am tired of it. I have no partner but have grown children and grandchildren who live 3000 miles away from me but they don’t bother with me, not even a Christmas card from them. I don’t have people stop by either or get gifts so I too stopped buying gifts because it hurts when no one seems to care. I can’t afford to buy gifts too because I live on very little. I didn’t even decorate this year; in fact, I have DVR every show so I can avoid all the Christmas crap advertised. I stopped celebrating too and look at it as just another day. It is sad that so many are feeling this way. Hopefully, next year will be better for us.
Merry Christmas Donna and Dawn! Thanks for the reply and understanding. Donna, I have my DVR as well, I’m watch Dr. Who marathon all day.
I haven’t anyone else to say this to first but to you – Merry Christmas – I hope god bless you both – even though we are all alone know that someone is wishing you the best!
Merry Christmas to you JayC, Dawn and all who have to spend this Holiday alone. I am listening to the Ghost to Ghost 2011 show on coasttocoastam since I am a Coastinsider and at 6 I will be listening to my Doo Wop on Dish which I listen to every Sunday night. I did listen this morning to a special teleseminar by The Healing Codes which they did for people who may be spending Christmas alone. If you are interested I can type in the link and you will be touched by this. God Bless you too and I am thankful for the internet that we can communicate in this way.
I am completely and totally alone for christmas. I am not sure why, but I do not have anyone in my life that I can even call and say “Merry Christmas” to. I am alone all year long. I know that is abnormal. However, I don’t realize how abnormal it is until the holidays. People at work tell me that it is abnormal not to have anyone in your life.
I have been reading all of your comments and they start with, “I was invited”, or “My brother”, or “My family”. I have none of that. My Christmas will be spent in complete and total silence (except for the tv of course). Nobody will call me.
I don’t know what to do about this. It’s very strange to realize that you are not welcome anywhere.
Merry Christmas gdub – I am sending my day watch TV as well. I’ll be watch the Dr. Who marathon this day so you are not alone.
i lost my husband 21 months ago..and i will be eating thanksgiving dinner by my self…my daughter likes to sleep on this holiday because she works so hard..they don’t even cook..im really getting used to being alone and realizing its just another day…you can do fun things on those days or chose to be alone and try to just pretend its like another day..or you can try some way to make it special for yourself..im just going to watch tv, be with my dog..and eat a dinner and then go to bed…just another day…have to accept the fate i was given…june
Its been awhile since this was written..
.how are you today my friend??
I am alone this holiday. I didn’t expect to be and I am having mixed emotions. I was alone on Thanksgiving also. I just moved to a different city and have reconnected with some old friends but they are mere casual acquaintances it turns out. When you live your life as a rolling stone not only do you gather no moss you gather no true connections apparently.
I am alone this Christmas too. I could see my father, but it is just an awkward, terrible time spent with his wife who is loud, obnoxious, and psycho. My dad just sits there and barely talks. I decided it is better to just be alone. I was alone Thanksgiving too. I hate this time of year and just want it to be over. I will sleep through most of Christmas day. Christmas sucks. I dread it every year.
I’m alone at Christmas, and lonely. I don’t think I’ve done anything to be here like this, but perhaps I don’t pursue/or am agressive enough.Unlike some, I don’t have any options of being with someone, even if I don’t like them. Thank GAWD for charter tv, and of course that went out on me too. So, I’m ill fated. Need to find a good book to read, but otherwise I hope everyone is with loved ones and having a great Christmas.
Today is Christmas and I feel very depressed. Another one alone for me – and it’s been this way for many years. I just doesn’t get easier with time.
I am middle aged and never married. My parents are gone and my family has split up. I don’t have many friends. The friends I have live far from me. I had made one new friend, but he’s gone away for the week.
I don’t make friends very easily, and I don’t connect with women very easily either.
I went to church this morning. The message was pretty good, but I couldn’t connect with anyone. It seemed like they are all together. Also, I feel that my neighbors are doing well with people to see. They wouldn’t include me in on anything.
Well, it least it’s a nice day outside. I plan on going on a long bike ride after lunch. It may help my depression a bit.
I think I have hated Christmas most of my adult life, because I never had a partner, children, or friends. Because it is promoted as a “time to get together with….” Christmas just makes it more obvious that I have nobody to get together with. For about ten years I had a part time waitressing job that got me out of the house in the evenings, and gave me somewhere busy and bright to go for Christmas lunch and Christmas dinner, and I had a good excuse in that I could not go to any Xmas parties or lunches, because I was working, so people did not pity me for not having any family or friends.
Now, because I am disabled, I no longer have a job, not even an ordinary day job to provide me with a pseudo social group, and I obviously do not have the waitressing job, I have become that poor woman in the house on the corner who is alone all Christmas, except for her dog, I have become an object of pity which is something that I have feared all my life. Christmas just exemplifies everything that has gone wrong in my life, and draws attention to the fact that this is a time for families and people who have friends, not for lonely singles who have no friends. I HATE Christmas.
i lost my huaband 8 months ago. we were together for 28 years. i only had a relationship with him. this is the first thanksgiving without him and i thought i would cry but instead i decided to make this day my friday and i went out to take dog on two walks and went to buy pizza but ended up at dunkin doughnuts. there were single people out and about. it really wasn’t so bad, if you have the right mind set. happy holiday to all.
Sure, it’s great to be alone for the holidays. Anybody who believes that also believes in the Tooth Fairy. “Just have the right mindset, and everything will be hunky-dory.” Go to Dunkin’ Donuts and your holiday will resemble a Norman Rockwell painting. NOT.
The author of this article has no grip on the differance between lonliness and aloneness. The article expresses the word alone, but then goes on to say “gather coworkers or friends.” Alone means having no coworkers, no friends, no family, and no hope of any this year, next year, just like every year past. So the author is really just lonely. A temporary condition. Try being alone in life, which is a permanent condition.
It’s coming upon the holidays with thanksgiving just a couple days away. I’ve been crying all day. Im SO tired of this loneliest. Indeed the author hasn’t a clue. Gather friends/coworkers, I wish!! & the thing is I do have friends, some treasured three… BUT they are sprinkled throughout the country and they have these very full lives and spouses. I’ve tried reaching out to some ‘friends’ in the city I’m at now, New York City — the loneliest city in the world– and I realize these people here aren’t really my friends. One particular person blew me off like I’m being dramatic because as he says I have people. But yet I spend every night and weekend alone. I’m extroverted by nature and get along really well with coworkers and acquaintances, but that’s as far as it goes…I’ve TRULY tried, but everyone is too busy and have their own families, spouses, loved ones. Like the rolling stone above, I’ve bounced around the country to live some sort of exciting life, but now in 2014 I turn 40 and I’m simply alone. Im so disappointed in myself. The excitement I’ve tried to achieve didn’t pan out. In the midst of it all I stopped drinking when I arrived here in NYC 4 years ago. Sobriety is supposed to strengthen oneself and while it’s certainly allowed me to attain a job I wouldn’t have gotten while drinking it has completely depleted my social life. I’m so utterly bored and lonely that I’m seriously considering drinking again. NYC is the WORSE place to try to make friends and forget about dating; as a single woman it’s brutal. The thought of watching ANOTHER TV marathon on netflix makes me want to scream. This will be my 4th Tday in solitude. I wonder if I’m just a miserable person and I don’t realize it, but honestly I think I’m a nice, decent girl. I help get cats adopted and always give my seat up to those in need on the train. Ha. I’m rambling now…. Maybe I should just do some writing…
I’m alone, again. No family, a couple friends. The friends I do have are busy with their families. I absolutely hate the holidays. I just want to sleep thru Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s. Oh yeah, I went to the local food bank a few days before Thanksgiving to see about volunteering and they told me they had too many volunteers and did want anymore as space was limited. Well, I tried. Rejection and loneliness, the theme of my life.
I’m alone, again. No family, a couple friends. The friends I do have are busy with their families. I absolutely hate the holidays. I just want to sleep thru Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s. Oh yeah, I went to the local food bank a few days before Thanksgiving to see about volunteering and they told me they had too many volunteers and didn’t want anymore as space was limited. Well, I tried. Rejection and loneliness, the theme of my life.
Hi ann..
I feel your pain, except I’m abroad. Pregnant, in a strange country… no friends no family and a husband who isn’t from america.. doesn’t understand thanksgiving and worked from 7am to midnight.. he should be home soon. So, I understand completely. I do know this won’t be this way forever and they will change for you too. When the new year begins and the dreaded holidays are over lets try to start new. I stumbled upon this blog in tears and I feel better knowing I am not alone. If anything, know someone over 4000miles away is thinking of you too.
I am 54 and have spent probably 20 Thanksgivings and Christmases alone. I don’t mind it really. I have had to work quite diligently and even desperately at times to reach a higher spiritual plane (something I only “broke on through the other side” on two years ago) as I got my rear end kicked on the “lower” ones starting in my teens. Most people who have not had to “plane” to survive still have a tendency to pull me backwards and down and until I gain a greater foothold on the level I am coming to, being alone is, and has been, where its at. Being alone can be a sign that you are chosen to rise spiritually and become strong in ways many others need to. Use it, relish it, love it and yourself.
Don,
I have had the same thought about rising to a higher spiritual level.
Would you mind sharing some of the steps you’ve done to grow spirtitually?
Hi Ann,
There is no e-mail notification here so just got your comment. I am actually a practicing Nichiren Shoshu Buddhist, and though I don’t believe it to be the only way, it works for me. I do think that our thoughts lead the way…and having faith in our “good” as human beings. So many people on this planet place their faith in their “lower good” instead. It is a bit lonelier at the top, but less and less so as I begin to have the strength to pull people up instead of them pulling me down. Please go to YouTube and type in Nam Myoho Renge Kyo and hit, listen to and read the one by “RobbieBobbyBoy”.
I get confused during thus season! I want to be with family but all I see is people being selfish and they seem to care only about themselves. That being said I ended up going and the cheese dip spilled all over the back of my truck. When I got there I asked my sister if I could use the hose to spray out my truck…. Her Blood sucking husband said I couldn’t spray it out on the driveway. I drove 30 min to get there and this is a brand new truck! So I decided to go back home to clean it. I just really cant stand people and I didn’t go back. I know I let him control my emotions but I am sick of people being this way. My parents are both not gonging to make it another yr. and here I missed out on Christmas. Expectations are my down fall because I expect people to be a certain way and it never turns out the way I want. Man I sometimes hate who I am.!!!!
I am lonely today. Holidays can be the worse. Just needed to say that.
I have not been invited to my brothers house for thanksgiving and the same will proverb be true for christmas. My dad is in a assisted living home. At one time he lived near me and we both were invited to my brothers house for the holidays. My brother lives 2 to 3 hours away. In fact all my family lives up there close together. I will eventually be living up there too, but I have to find a job first. I just feel so left out of not just the holidays bUT other things as well. I will be alone. My dad is living in the home up where the rest of my family is. So I really have no family nearby. My friends have families of their on so going to a friend’s house for the holidays is out of the question. I will have no one but my pets to be with this year for the holiday. I am so depressed about it I wish I was dead. I will not try to kill myself but I don’t care if I live or die, because this makes me realize that no one cares about me
Jane wrote:
Jane 1:58 pm on November 21st, 2011
I will be alone for Thanksgiving again this year. and I was feeling sorry ro myself about that which led me to read the above posts. Reading the posts helped to shed a new light on the idea of being alone. I know these posts are from last year but they still apply.
I remember having Thanksgiving dinner at my house and inviting everyone in my extended family to come. I have always put more importance on the gathering than other people in the family. The complaints are always guaranteed, like my mother complaining about having to bake pies when no one ever asked her to in the first place, or my sister impatiently looking at the clock because she told her boyfriend she would be over after dinner. And then there is the uncle who wants to watch the game sitting in his own recliner, in his own house, …â€What? I have to smoke outside?â€,…â€Why did you get that kind of beer?†My brother isn’t here yet because he had to have dinner at his wifes house first. “What did you put in the dressing? This isn’t how we make it. Now Uncle Bob is starting one of his know-it-all arguements with someone so now we get to hear a shouting match. Then there is the clean up and all the while kids are running around and screaming, something always gets broken. Who dripped gravy on my linen tablecoth and who spilled wine on the carpet and just left it? If you load all the dishes so high in the sink I can’t even get to the faucet. Where does this go and that go, where do you keep your…God help me!!
This whole idea of having our expectations met by having the perfect holiday is crazy because those expectations can never be met. In reality if we were to have a perfect Thanksgiving, we would have to pay actors to play a scene as if in a stage play. We could write the script and direct the show to our own preference. That is the only way we can ever have it right, or our way. Don’t let fantasy ideas about holidays make you feel like you are missing out on something because you are not. I like the idea I read above about watercolor painting. I will be alone this year and I will do something productive instead of working in the kitchen for 8 hours until my back hurts and stuffing myself with food until it hurts or listening to bickering and complaints. I’ll just have peace and quiet, ahhh!
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Jane, I’d give anything to have my family back…sounds like my crazy family!
Wish I could spend one more holiday season with them.
Well a lot of what I read really doesn’t help me. I have my elderly Mother but she is married to an abusive man. I know that a lot of people won’t like what I’m about to say but how I’ll get by is reading my bible, deep prayer to heal my wounds cause there’s a lot of those real deep wounds. People can be so cruel. I can’t relate to a happy Christmas. What’s that??
Well, looks like I’m the first 1916 person to have made my mark on your comment site.
Since moving to the opposite coast of my family I have always managed to get past the Fall/Winter family holidays without any problem whatsoever. This year, however, is different. I’ll be hospitalized and in acute rehab, and sadly, expecting no visitors.
I guess I wish anyone would visit me.
The comments are so varied. I’ll add mine.
When I was a little girl my parents lived together and holidays were celebrated happily with our large extended family and it was great!
Then my parents divorced and the holiday drama began.
Sadly, many years later, my many siblings live far away and continue to quarrel about every little thing.
I am not married and have no children. I do spend most holidays alone. The family visits became so tense I began declining the invitations. It is sad that the family “tradition” is estrangement.
That’s okay. I remember the very happy times I once had and am grateful in Thanksgiving for the many blessings I have. That is what Thanksgiving is about.
Christmas is about love and the celebration of Jesus’s birth, the Prince of Peace.
Those are days to be grateful and happy whether alone or in the company of others.
Truthfully, I would rather keep my own company than be around others who do not really appreciate my company or the spirit of the holidays.
I enjoyed them enormously as a child but it has been quite different in my adult life. At least I have some extremely happy memories. I am grateful for that and if I have good company to share future holidays with, well that’ll be great too.
Meantime I am happy for good health and peace.
I just wish there was a way for me to avoid the holidays .I am dreading it .This Christmas and New Years will be my first alone.I feel like a failure.It brings on a pitiful feeling one that I would never wish on anyone .i have no family in the country I live and no close friends.the few acquaintances I don’t want to impose on them to beg them to accommodate me so I rather stay alone .I was suppose get married this December but since we broke up and the wedding called off and we don’t even communicate well that’s how the cookie crumbles for me .I am just depressed about the fact that I’m in this situation when more than half of the world spending the holiday with family and friends and here I am not lucky to have any to spend Christmas with .There is no one that will give me a gift and I don’t have much to enjoy but I will make do with what I have .I am sad .I am broken .I am the opposite of being merry this season and my 2017 looks even worst than 2016.Oh well .such is life .
I have no birthfmaily and it sucks I feel like the person who wrote this article is clueless and mean a lot of people don’t realize how hard it is on you to not have birthfmaily its a hard life not having birthfmaily and holdidays just keep reminding you of that
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