Crying at Christmas carols getting out of control

[stealthbanana]

ds will be 4 this week. I remember having this moment of...emotion...when I was heavily pregnant with him and at a carol service and they sang silent night and suddenly just being overcome by thinking about the gentleness and innocence of a newborn baby (I KNOW).

Since then I have found carols progressively more emotional, culminating in, to my horror, this year, where I find myself uncontrollably welling up at ANY carol in ANY context. My kids were watching mickey’s once upon a Christmas this morning and I cried. Michael Bublé came on the radio and I cried ffs. MICHAEL BUBLÉ!!

Have I developed some kind of weird problem? How do I fix this? It’s embarrassing and mawkish. I’ve got a reprieve this year as not doing any in person carol services but will have to wear sunglasses to next year’s at the rate I’m going.

I cry at Christmas carols. Even burst into tears listening to Hallelujah by Alexandra Burke one Christmas in ASDA! You have my sympathy but no advice I’m afraid!

Children singing is my number 1 crying trigger! I was at an end of term celebration last week and two children sang the a lovely song and the woman next to me was weeping - I know her well and she’s the most down to earth no nonsense woman and she just looked at me and went “I KNOW, WTF is it with kids singing?”
Last year all the kids sang this song about being the future and the world is in their hands and I don’t know how I made it out of there in one piece .
Next year my son is auditioning for the school choir so I am going to have to toughen up. Luckily I’m not the only one!

I'm ok. I hate the sound of children singing (properly trained boy sopranos excepted) like some hate nails down a blackboard. But a brass band at a distance and I am all tears and snotters.

Oh god the Salvation Army Brass band in the supermarket set me off crying every single year. I have to wear sunglasses

This time of year in torture for me - runny mascara, snivelling, and embarrased laughs.
The story of soldiers in WW1playing football, and singing Silent Night on Christmas Day HAUNTS me. Everytime I hear it I weep. I am MORTIFIED by it. The simplicity of the tune combined with the age of the men washes over me. I simply cannot get it under control.
This part of Fairtale of NY gets me too -
"You took my dreams from me
When I first found you
I kept them with me babe
I put them with my own
Can't make it all alone
I've built my dreams around you"
I find it such a tragic song, the immigrant story, hopes and dreams gone - ugh. I do a lot of throat clearing on that one.
Oh Holy Night gets to me also - the momenteum to a glorious finish is very moving.
I am SURE that menopause opens that door, I was much more composed as a younger woman.

@Bloodybridget

It's quite embarrassing when you're at a carol service in church, singing away and then your voice cracks and the tears start trickling down your face . . at least that won't happen this year (bursts into sobs at missing all lovely Christmas singing opportunities)

Hahahaha

There is a very silly, cheesey, upbeat pop song that was played at my beloved Nan's funeral. She used to dance around to it so it seemed appropriate.

Now everytime I hear it I start crying uncontrollably. It's a really shit song and it's so embarrassing. I have not figured out how to stop it. She died 8 years ago so... I'm starting to think that it won't get better with time.

I'm sorry OP but I think you're just going to have to accept that you cry at Christmas Carols. There is no way out.

My family are used to me dissolving at the ballet / Maria Callas recordings now. For some of us, beauty is a trigger to cry. I get it, OP.

I had DS3 on Christmas Eve 2006. He was born at 4pm and by 7pm I was in bed with him peacefully sleeping in my arms. The post natal ward was pretty much empty apart from me.

Then in the doorway to the ward, standing in the corridor appeared 4 people from the Salvation Army band, softly playing carols (with mutes I suppose).

I was a snotty, red faced mess. And still am when I hear them any time now.

I cry at everything. My kids laugh at me for it “mums crying again!”.

So can you imagine the WRECK I was when I went to my kids assembly and the whole school sang that Gary Barlow song “here’s a thousand voices shouting love” (is it called Sing? Oh my life I couldn’t see through my tears. Afterwards my daughter said “omigosh MUM why were you crying SO much??”

My question was why wasn’t anyone else crying as much as me?? 🤣

I was shopping yesterday and I thought about the last episode of Big Bang Theory and I fully welled up and a fat tear slid down my face.

@BigusBumus I’ve just welled up at the very thought of that!

Oh you're not alone! Been blubbering away since first giving birth 16 years ago. I wept in the street the other evening as I passed the community hall and heard the Police band of South Australia playing Hark the Herald...it was all brass instruments and I was suddenly so moved about it all...it sounded so ENGLISH yet here I was in the middle of Australia.

I’m the same.

Ds school carols (or when he was in the singing group) set me off and as for a brass band 😭

I have a Christmas playlist it has Silent Night by Elvis no matter how many times I hear it over a few weeks it will always bring tears to my eyes (and bring on a good sob if no one is around) and I’m not even an Elvis fan

I’m not religious but I love a carol service I will always cry I think it’s something about all being together

My husband was out in Iraq in the army and that song Get Here was played on the radio lots at the time “you can reach me by sailboat etc” and it was such a stressful worrying time and every time I hear that song I have to turn it off.

Also, when our first son was born there was a song by Shannon Noll called Shine which was used for the Commonwealth Games so it was on tv all the time. It’s a nice song and has the line “this is the moment you’ve been waiting for when all the world will stop to watch you shine” and the world felt a bit like that as he was my PFB and I can hardly listen to that song now as it reminds me of that time so strongly. I like it as an song, it just makes me feel so emotional!

If you stand in the church porch at any Christmas Day service, there will inevitably be several people standing there and sobbing. I discovered this over the space of four babies.

Sometimes Christmas, and carols, really hit you. My Dsis died 12 years ago, and for no particular reason I started howling during last year’s Christmas service.

Mind you, this year even Noddy Holder is setting me off

I'm the same, Christmas is emotional for me due to the loss of my sister four years ago and my mum being poorly. When I was little I always remember my mum crying at carols and being puzzled by it, now I totally get it !!

@BrandyandDeath

My family are used to me dissolving at the ballet / Maria Callas recordings now. For some of us, beauty is a trigger to cry. I get it, OP.

Bloody hell...Casta Diva sung by Callas.

Michael Buble tends to bring me to tears too...Not happy tears though!

children singing Away in a Manger can have that affect on me,

Did you see the Secret Lives of Kids at Christmas special a few years ago?

I AM THE ANGEL NIGEL!

Amazing stuff.

Oh I'm like this too.
Only Christmas carols though. Children singing them is even more emotional.

I'm a TA so this is particularly embarrassing! I thought it would wear off if it was other people's kids, or with the endless rehearsals, but no . I even found myself welling up at one I'd never heard before . Generally at school I try to repeat my times tables or pretend I have a cold so I can have a tissue in hand.

Away in a Manger gets me. Carols from Kings will do it...all those choirboys.

Yes to Casta Diva ...some muso snob told me it wasn't flawless once. PErhaps that's the beauty?

This year has made me more emotional for some reason. Perhaps one's been rather too stoic, coping with all the issues that have arisen?

I cried through 'Scrooged' yesterday morning. Cried through most of it actually, it is supposed to be a comedy. I also cried through an Amazon film about a widowed father and his daughter. So it's films getting me this year aswell. Carols and Christmas songs usually do to varying degrees anyhow.

It's been a tough year - we can forgive ourselves a little bit

I don't know OP, but I am the same!

I'm not religious and had never thought about this before but it started with the tiny baby lyrics and has progressed to me feeling overwhelmed by the love the songs show for Christ

It doesn't help that I live in a non English speaking country and most years a group of expats meet up to sing English carols. That gets me as well.

ds year 6 leavers do, they sung to Thank you for the Music by Abba,
one of the mum's had tears rolling down her face, it was so emotional