Holidaze
Here we go again...
I hate the holidays. October 31st rolls around, and I just want to go to bed until January 2nd. After I avail myself of the leftover candy, of course.
Obviously, I loved the holidays as a child. Halloween was dressing up and going out with your friends and eating Reese’s Peanut Butter cups in your room for a month. Thanksgiving meant time off from school, and the Macy’s parade ushered in the official start of the Christmas season. Then there was Christmas! Fun movies and lights and magic! It’s really hard to hate Christmas when you’re a kid. Yes, we get gaslit and lied to (I have never felt such betrayal as when I figured out Santa wasn’t real, and I also felt REALLY DUMB), but hey, we need some magic in this life.
Since I was a teenager, holidays have been complicated, for reasons I’ve written about elsewhere. As my therapist so often reminds me in sessions, the holidays are NOT a time I thrive. The past several years especially have been full of emotional landmines, and in some cases, literal death. In 2017, I lost my beloved cat Bean four days before Christmas. She was 16. Not to be outdone, my other cat Scampy decided to go almost a year to the day later. He was 18, and I adopted him a few months before I turned 20. They were the witnesses to my life that I built in New York, and my first pets as an adult. I still tear up when I think about it. Then in 2020, with COVID turning everything upside down, we lost my mother in law to cancer two days after Thanksgiving. I spent an awful lot of time grieving while staring at a Christmas tree. Last year, I was getting over COVID, and I damn near had a nervous breakdown, so it wasn’t exactly a banner holiday season, but at least no one died! That’s my litmus test now for a successful holiday!
Part of the reason I melt down over the holidays isn’t just trauma, it’s also the stimulation. There are parties. There are decorations. There are a million Christmas things on TV. The stores are blasting Christmas music from the second the clock strikes midnight on November 1st. There are a million tiny blinking lights. The subways are more crowded. There’s just no escaping it. I have always had sensory issues, but I always thought it was just my anxiety, or a weird quirk. I am now aware that the constant onslaught of holiday “cheer” sends me into complete overstimulation. I can no longer deal with any kind of in-person shopping this time of year, and I even get overwhelmed shopping online.
The holidays are just TOO MUCH. I think it’s too much for neurotypical people, too. Two huge holidays less than a month apart that require travel, planning, preparation… it’s just too much to ask of humans in the space of a month. We are oversaturated with the holiday madness before we’ve even gotten to the good Halloween candy. I look at my to-do list for cooking on Thanksgiving, and I’ve barely done any Christmas shopping, and it makes me feel overwhelmed in a way nothing else does. I do not think that the holidays are good for anyone’s mental or physical health, not to mention wallets. Who has this kind of energy when it gets dark at 4 pm? My husband thinks Christmas should be in February, which actually makes a lot of sense.
There are also the tasks. So many tasks. Even if you have a small family, the holidays involve things like shopping, going to the post office, writing cards, baking cookies, cooking, hosting, traveling, wrapping gifts, etc. If you struggle with executive function, it’s a nightmare. Not to mention that year-end at basically any job is one of the busiest times of the year. The list just keeps getting longer and longer, and that good ol’ ADHD paralysis is just waiting to ensure you are panic ordering from Amazon on December 23rd. I fully endorse this, by the way, and I also have Amazon wrap for me if need be. I don’t care if everyone knows I had Amazon wrap it.
Another obstacle for those of us with ADHD during the holidays is the level of masking required. The holidays are that weird time where you are thrown together in social situations with people you don’t see very much. There were years where I would go to at least five or six different parties, all full of the disparate groups of people in my life. In a week I’d have a friend's party, a theater company party, and the dreaded work party. That’s a lot of code switching and pretending like everything is fine, when really your brain is screaming and you think everyone hates you. Add booze and stir, and you get a witches brew of Fail. Family gatherings are a whole other thing, and everyone knows what that’s like, especially now that many of our family members are in an insane political cult and brainwashed by a certain news network.
Work parties especially are a minefield. It’s like hey, you’re technically at work, but there’s an open bar and your boss is doing karaoke in a Santa hat. ACT NORMAL BUT YOU ALSO HAVE TO BE FUN BUT ALSO DON’T DRINK TOO MUCH. What could go wrong? My very first corporate job (many moons ago!) rented out an entire nightclub for the party one year, and there was a Grey Goose fountain where you could just fill your martini glass with cold vodka. Needless to say, there was a strongly worded email about people’s behavior the next day - some crazy shit went down that night I was mercifully not privy to. I don’t think it’s fair to take a bunch of stressed out employees, work them 60 hours a week, and then give them access to a Grey Goose fountain. But I digress. Having to mask while also coping with Holiday Feelings while being Expected to Have Fun with people you don’t normally hang out with is…a lot. I have learned the very hard way that a club soda is a wise order for this event, and no one will know its not vodka.
By the time actual Christmas rolls around, I am peopled out. I do not want to do any more socializing. But alas, that is not how it goes. No wonder I melted down every year without fail. For this reason, I am keeping plans to a minimum. I am doing only things I absolutely have to do, or want to do, and losing the rest. I’ve always lived in fear of letting people down, but these days, especially after COVID, I think saying to a friend “I just cannot right now” is more acceptable. And it’s honest. I tell the truth a lot more now, because I no longer feel like a shit person for not wanting to do something. Sometimes I just can’t, and I need to conserve my precious energy.
The big difference this year is that for the first time in my life, I know I have ADHD, and I have new tools to take care of myself. I have given lip service to “taking care of myself” in the past, but I honestly don’t think I knew how. I was always so confused, stressed, and barely hanging on that I would go into survival mode. I’d ignore what my body was telling me, and would wind up sick or drunk or both. I’m not doing that anymore. I am going to rest when I need to, protect my sleep, cut down my social schedule, exercise, and not rely on substances to cope. I am not saying I will be perfect, but I do know by now what doesn’t work.
I’m not asking myself to love the holidays, because I just don’t think that can ever happen, but I’m going to try to enjoy what I can. I’m looking forward to seeing friends and eating an irresponsible amount of cookies. And hey, if it sucks, the good news is that like everything else in this life, the holidays do not last forever. That’s something to be thankful for!
I leave you all with a holiday gift, the one that truly keeps on giving, which is Patti LaBelle wondering where her background singers are at a National Christmas Tree lighting back in the 90s. If you have never seen this, you are in for a real treat. It’s one of my most cherished holiday traditions.