Our cat got a full urinary blockage, so we’ve been at the vet dealing with that. My mom’s horse got colicky, and seems like she’s got twisted guts, so she’s been dealing with that. Dad broke his hip last week, and has developed a foot infection that he can’t deal with properly, so he’s been at the emergency clinic dealing with that. I got socks though, and I’m super jazzed about that. And donated a bunch of money to the food bank, so at least some people can eat today.
Well done for giving despite all the crap you’ve had to deal with. Sorry about all the bad luck. I am also pleased about your socks. Nice socks are far rarer than they should be.
Thanks. It’s been a hell of a year. We went from pretty financially secure in July to basically unable to pay bills in December, and we haven’t changed anything. Then the food bank put out a call that they have 5000 new visitors this year, on top of the 12000 regulars. If we’re in the shit, then everyone below us is deeper in it, and need cash more than we do. Not sure how we’re gonna pay for our little guy though, that set us back two months wages.
Disneyland was charging $1850 for five people for one day at Disneyland and one day at California Adventure, genie plus (some kind of fast pass replacement), and then has the gall to make some rides ineligible for the genie plus and instead you have to pay $28 a head for the fast pass. Why can’t we just wait in line? Why did the mouse feel the need to monetize every single interaction in the whole park? As great as the design is in Disneyland, definitely left a sour taste in my mouth knowing that a poor family has an objectively worse experience than a rich one, especially on Christmas. Some rides had a 90, 120 minute wait.
The fun part is that not only do you skip the line with Genie Plus but also the folks letting people into the ride will legit let an entire stream of Genie Plus payers in before letting someone who waited in line go. With the old fast pass system they were really good about alternating lines if there was a line for both fast pass and genie plus
Last time I went to Magic Kingdom in Disney world, the park was IMO legitimately too full of people. Seemed like every single space was wall to wall people and every ride, even the shitty ones was like a 3 hour wait. And it wasn’t even a holiday or a peak season time. Just a miserable experience. Feels like they just need a daily cap or something on the number of visitors because there’s definitely a point where it gets too full to be worth it for anyone.
Man, I read these comments and I can relate to so many of them. But honestly, this year, nothing. We’ve recently moved to an area that’s more healthy for our family. I have a partner who’s not abusive. My kids and myself are getting the mental healthcare that we need. It’s snowy outside! We have a Christmas tree and presents! It was not amazing; there was nothing over the top or spectacular. But there was nothing bad. Damn, that feels nice.
That’s about how I feel. I know I am blessed and that makes me happy. I don’t take it for granted.
Sorry 😔😐 that someone down voted your comment. That’s not very holiday so Spirit like lol… But I think almost half the comments on here always have at least one downvoted so don’t feel bad 😞
I truly thought we were going to get through Christmas with zero racism. Then grandma and grandpa came over. Luckily I was able to steer the conversation away pretty quickly, but it always puts a damper on things.
We just had some mild racism too: “There’s just too manyethnic restaurants in this town. Why can’t we just have American food?!” “There’s a Denny’s down the street…”
This makes my head want to explode. I grew up in a white ass family of wealthy-ish English descent and nobody knew what the hell good food was unless it was an expensive steak or fancy seafood which don’t really need much cooking skill to be yummy, it is inherently yummy you just eat it. Ughhh the food I grew up on was tasteless, soulless crap and every time I have good Mexican, Thai, Indian or some other type of food I am deeply thankful I don’t live in a barren wasteland of uninspired shit food. The fact that people actively desire that blows my mind.
White american food is fucking trash, I mean Italian food is good but Italians weren’t even let into the white people club until very recently so that barely even counts. England should just have their cooking license revoked. Choose the type of boiled mush you want and either add salt or pepper but not both because that would be too spicey! Don’t even get me started on the inability of white American cuisine to comprehend the concept of a meal without meat.
Yeah… English desserts can be pretty nice though. I grew up much the same and the only cherished family recipes we have are desserts: Trifle, bannoffee pie, persimmon pudding, cherries jubilee, custard pie with lemon curd, summer berry fool, toffee cake, hard sauce. Yorkshire pudding made with beef drippings is a delightful savory dish.
My father dying. Haven’t had very much contact, but the rest of the family expected some things from me apparently, still don’t know what exactly, I just left the hospital silently, like my father left my life when I was four. I’m not really affected by the whole ordeal, but it really really annoyed me over Christmas. That guy couldn’t even die without making a fuzz. 🙄
While I am a stranger and me saying sorry probably doesn’t help much. That stuff sucks and I am sorry you had to deal with it. People have it in their head that we are all supposed to love our family and just get along but people don’t realize that families are sometimes just people who didn’t love us or loved us less than we loved them or vice versa loved us more than we loved them. Family is tricky. It doesn’t sound like you were close and I don’t know your entire story but either way it is a loss and regardless of him not being there for you it says a lot that you were at the very least there for him. Which, in my opinion, is the most you can do.
I hope you are the person that carries that forward and uses that as a means to not walk out on others lives when they need you most and I hope in return they are a part of yours when you are on your way out of this world. Enjoy your holidays.
Lost my best friend of 35+ years to an overdose back in July, then my 15 year old dog on Halloween. Then my mother got sick a week later and was in the ICU for over a month. Turned out to be a severe liver disease but she doesn’t qualify for a transplant, so she moved to Australia for better healthcare and to live her remaining days with other side of family….
Then my girlfriend lost her job.
So, we didn’t do Christmas this year. Not even a tree. Fuck it. Maybe next year.
My supposed best friends gave me and my husband a bottle of wine for Christmas. I can’t drink wine because I have an allergic reaction to something in wine, and they are very aware of this after me having reactions to foods at restaurants we would go to together. So they gave ‘us’ a gift that I can’t actually have.
This comes after my husband and I have spent the last year being there for them through losing their jobs, their car, almost losing their house, and a bunch of other drama. It also comes after we spent all day making a meal free of their allergies, as I always do, and after I spent several days making Christmas cookies that are safe for them.
I don’t know if the bottle of wine is cheap or expensive, and it honestly doesn’t matter. Last year they got me an ornament for our tree, and it is one of my dearest possessions because it has a small poem about friendship on it. This year’s gift stung because of how much of ourselves we gave to them, only for them to clearly pick up something last minute and without any thought.
I don’t really have any family or other friends to celebrate with, so the most important people to me besides my husband are them. It hurts to see how little I apparently mean to them in comparison…
If you are asking if she knew beforehand, yes. We once had to rush out of a restaurant because a dish included wine and I didn’t know until my mouth felt like it was on fire. She has been there many times as I have had to explain it to others, and when I have been checking food to make sure it doesn’t have wine or vinegar.
If you are asking if I have mentioned it to her since she gave me the gift, no. I haven’t had the energy to try to deal with that conversation, I still have plans with people through New Year’s. I will probably bring it up in a few days, but right now it hurts to even think about and I just want to get through the rest of the holidays.
I understand, however, this is going to bother and poison you slowly but steadily if you don’t address it with her.
Just ask her straight-up: girl, you know I’m allergic to wine and felt not great when you gave the thing I’m allergic to as a gift and my partner can’t enjoy it with me. What’s up with that?
If its an oversight hopefully she owns up. If not, well, theres bigger problems and either way she’s signalling to you to get out of her life or whatever.
Keep me posted if you don’t mind, but make no mistake: you will basically almost certainly have to address this at some point in the future, don’t let it destroy you until you do it anyway
Oh I will be having that conversation in a few days. I am taking a lesson from my therapist and letting myself rest from the hurt and decide what kind of resolution I want. I have a history of crumbling when I get pushback for standing up for myself, so giving myself time to sit with the feeling for a couple of days helps my brain realize that what she did was actually bad, and not just me overreacting.
But, coming from a family where we all suck at gifts, it is somewhat relatable. It is unbelievable how difficult and anxiety-provoking gift buying can be for some people, and caring more about someone only makes it harder. In the end one could land on something awful and last minute after worrying about it for months, and it seems like one simply doesn't care.
I of course don't know this specific situation, and it is indeed a particularly bad gift considering your allergy. But don't read it as a sign that they don't care - it could be that they care quite a lot, and that it's a case of something else entirely.
That reminds me that one year, my cousin’s boyfriend got her a $1500 coffee machine, a flight of syrup and like a $500 giftcard to a local coffee shop for beans. Turns out, she was cheating on him with a woman at the time, and she broke up with him like 1 week later to be with her. It took all of us chewing her out to give the poor guy his present back so at least he could recoup the ~$2200 he spent.
I’m Jewish and never really cared for Christmas much because I always felt like an outsider- until I spent one in the UK, where it’s pretty much entirely secular and just about having fun. Such a different experience. I’d probably like Christmas in America if it was more like that.
As a Scandinavian, I'm genuinely super happy to hear that! As far as I'm concerned the Christians are very welcome to celebrate whatever they'd like, but they have no right to monopolize the festivities. It's winter solstice goddamn it, it's been celebrated since the beginning of time and belongs to everyone!
It sucks how much of it is Christian in the U.S. My whole life it was, “oh, you’re not a Christian and willing to do our Christian things for Christmas? You’re not one of us,” until I went to the UK. I wish people here understood.
My existence. I’d rather not celebrate Christmas, although preferably any other holiday as well. But I especially hate Christmas. I’d rather just keep going on as usual.
My mom’s a hoarder, so first thing is finding some space that will be enough for a Christmas tree in all that trash. That 2 decades old tree that will soon have no more plastic to shed really fits into that atmosphere. Then remove trash from table to put food there.
My parents will then pretend to be a moderately happy family for the next 2-3 days before returning to “normal”. (They can’t get a divorce “because God forbids it”)
There’s also the aspect of mandatory gifts. I don’t know what you want, you don’t know what I want. We could both save money (and generate less waste) by leaving that out. I don’t want anything. It’s by far worse to deal with unnecessary gifts than simply nothing.
Decorations. Why? It’s everywhere. Blinking lights, glitter, chains and whatnot. Just another thing to deal with, another thing to spend money on, more waste produced.
Music. It’s like 3 songs on repeat the whole Christmas. Everywhere I go.
TV shows. Suddenly it’s all Christmas-themed. All showing unrealistically happy families.
There’s a bunch of other reasons, but it’s hard to list those. I’d just rather not be conscious during these times, just skipping it.
At least I have a dog.
I’d just rather keep going to school. I wouldn’t have to be home at least. And almost all of my teachers are nice. School lunch is also generally good. Oh, and I can take train/bus rides. Those can be quite refreshing. I can be there for hours. If the school ends sooner, I can extend my commute. So far the best one I can take extends it from just 45 minutes to much nicer 6 hours. It includes 2 city bus rides, 1 intercity bus ride, 1 train ride and some time for a walk in a city further away.
It seems like you're going through a rough time, but that you're dealing with it in a healthy way and set to find true value in life. You will be out on your own soon enough, and you'll do great. Time goes by very fast at least in retrospect.
It seems your parents have their set of pretty deep issues, but it's at least cute that they are making the effort.
Sounds like you don’t hate Christmas, but instead the absolute fakery surrounded by piles of garbage that Christmas with your parents is. I hope you’re able to find new ways to spend time in the middle of winter doing the things you find enjoyable, with people who you find to be authentic, without mandatory gifts.
There were a lot of people I didn’t buy anything for this year because finances are extra tight. I liked that. Only bought for people that I know will enjoy and use what I got them, even though it’s cheap.
What 'ruined' Christmas this year was having to go home and spend it with my parents, one of whom is bedridden and non responsive from Alzheimers. It's more akin to a wake where everyone is focused on someone who is dead and there's little joy to be had. I've been doing it now for 5 years and there's no sign that it will end soon.
It is incredibly stressful and morose. Christmas isn't really joyful anymore because Mom could die at any time. The worst part of it is that all of us recognize that she's suffering and so are we, but the government won't allow any other outcome.
Still, the family shows up and puts in the work for caring for her for many reasons, the least of which is that she raised us for almost 20 years. She was a wonderful person and she's owed that, bottom line. It is uplifting in a way because we come together and work together for a purpose and while it's hard and sad, we've bonded over it nonetheless.
But.. what kind of Christmas will we have once she's gone?
Christmas isn’t really joyful anymore because Mom could die at any time. The worst part of it is that all of us recognize that she’s suffering and so are we, but the government won’t allow any other outcome.
I feel “lucky” because it only took my dad two years to die from serious symptoms starting to the end, but that’s two years too long. He was a university professor and he ended up doing 50-piece jigsaw puzzles. We should allow people to end their life with dignity.
Add comment