Not so Jolly Holidays

The end of the year is not a good place for me. I really don't like the Holidays at all.

I have had a lot of loss around the holidays. Both of my grandparents died just a little more then a year apart, right after Thanksgiving. I didn't get to say goodbye to my grandmother, and I still miss her terribly every day. Honestly it has sucked the fun right out of them.

I tried to work through that issue when Kent came to live with us, and for 2 years I thought it really worked.

I went all out with the tree, the house, the yard (if you call the 10 x 10 area outside of our then apartment a yard) I had a blast, sorta.

It is hard though when you have an older child who doesn't believe in Santa anymore ( I know, I still know he is out there to!!).

Since we got our house, I have always put up the tree, and the first year I pulled out the rest of the decorations. Since then, they have stayed in the shed.

Over the weekend I bought the most pathetic looking fiber optic tree. Our other tree is huge, and we were worried about the Turtle pulling it over, or pulling off the ornaments, so we decided to get this sad little thing that really doesn't need to be decorated. She loves it, and leaves it alone, maybe because it looks goofy.

I want to enjoy the Holidays, but I just can't seem to find the joy in them anymore. I need to find it for the Turtles sake. I don't want her to grow up not having the fun that I did when I was a little girl.

Christmas was the most amazing day of the year for me. I loved it. The awe was overwhelming most of the time. I came to love that day more then any other because I really felt loved by my father at least that one day of the year.

Of course now that I am grown I can look back and see that the day was nothing short of a buy out for the year to come. Behave, stay out of the way, and take care of my brothers. In that order. It was his day to buy me off for the next 365. Keep the secrets for another year. Hide the bruises for him. Pretend.

So, as you can see the Holidays have become a haunt for my ghosts, both physical and emotional, and I have decided that this needs to be the last year that I hold them at bay and let the memories of the good times take over and replace all the hurt. I know it will be hard, I have done it for the rest of the year, so now I need to make the last month just as safe a place for my heart.

This year, I have the Turtle to help me start to heal. I hope that with every year that passes from now on, I will make sure that she knows just what an amazing gift she has been for me. I want to make her every year more amazing then the last. She is my savior.