To really not want to do Christmas, at all?

[willowriverwander]

I know I sound like Scrooge here, but hear me out.

I just don't like it. I am vegetarian and I feel a bit ill at the thought of the turkeys being killed. I hate the "stuff your face" sort of mentality that's seen as acceptable. I mean, in Dickensian England, fair enough. People had nothing for the other 364 days. But today we are so greedy anyway. I actually find the food thing really stressful.

I like buying things for my children but again, I am so uncomfortable with this idea of them tearing through hundreds of pounds worth of gifts. I hate the way everywhere is crammed at this time of year.

Tentatively, I'm wondering about just having a tree, and then just a chilled out day with a nice dinner. Maybe one gift each.

We are going skiing in the New Year so that should be nice. I wish it was over Christmas itself!

Or will I be considered shocking by today's standards?

I could do definitely do without it. It's got out of control.

I think it’s easy to get sucked in to thinking everyone is doing this big excessive Christmas thing and spending masses of £££££, and feeling pressured that you’ve got to do the same. But they aren’t, and you don’t have to.

If you want to keep it simple then go for it. But be careful with you children, they may already have certain expectations depending and what you’ve done in previous years.

KimmySchmidt might have been blunt, but there’s more than a grain of truth in it. My dad had v similar feelings to the OP when I was growing up- feeling guilty about the largesse/ issues about too much for the kids or sweets or food. But we were just kids and didn’t know any better- rather than the weird guilt and feeling (obviously uncomfortable), it would have been a heck of a lot easier if they had just scaled it back and been super happy!

Yanbu I know exactly what you mean (except that I’m a bit of a glutton). It’s a big out of control monster and I wish it could be scaled back, but I don’t know how. I really want to go abroad somewhere where it is just another day without all the expectation and pressure and waste.

I love Christmas but I have never and would never pass judgement on how any one else spends Christmas Day,each to they're own.

I can only imagine how awful that time of year must be for your poor DH,I've lost my Dad this year and I'd already lost my Mum so I'm having to really dig deep for my Christmas spirit this year but my poor parents died because of ill health I don't know if I'd ever want to celebrate again if my parents had been killed.

Find a way that works for you and your family,sod what anyone else thinks.

YABU.

I don't get this 'I hate Christmas because it's a commercialised spendfest that's full of debauchery and booze and debt and misery' mindset. It's what you make it.

Last Christmas we spent £150 including booze and food and gifts for each other. (That amount didn't include gifts for family and friends, but that was only about £160 for them all collectively.) THIS year, we intend to spend even less.

The whackjob woman over the road from us who has 3 kids, spent £2,500, (on food, booze, and gifts.) Yeah - that's what I said. Two point five fucking grand.

I know how you feel, OP. There's nothing wrong with having a low key christmas.
Personally I couldn't bring myself to just give my kids one present, unless they're very young, because I was always the kid who hardly got anything while all the other kids got a nice big pile of the latest toys, and it felt really shit. So I do make an effort to get them a certain amount of presents. I don't care if other people think its commercial.
As for the rest of it, I really don't like any of it but I pretend I do for my kids sakes. If I lived on my own I would just ignore the whole thing.

I like Christmas but I don't like the fact that it is celebrated by indulgence and greed. Kids expect too much. It's all very well people saying do you own thing but if this was the case I'd buy my kids a couple of reasonably priced presents but I can't because their friends will be getting shit loads and my kids will be 'but I didn't get the latest iPhone! I didn't get a grand like so and so did!' So I'm caught up in the game! Ugh I hate it!

Kids expectations don't need to be micro managed. Ask them the best bit about xmas.... take it from there

My kids are all in agreement for once.... for them it's the xmas dinner ( especially Brussels sprouts and pigs in blankets!) and the home alone movies

Job done!

Oh yeah..... presents! Nope. They didn't mention those as being there favourite thing. So I'm not getting angsty about it. A gift or two each. That's it

You don’t have to any of it, it’s such a pile a wank, such a tacky waste of time, money, food, resources. Everyone gorge themselves on the same food on the same day, blow your wages on mindless shite, snap at each other, consume. Or, don’t. None of that shit is in my house and I eat what I want on any day of the year. Whatever is making you feel like you have to do what everyone else is doing, ignore it.

I’m wary of writing this as I might be being hugely naive here! I only have one dc who is just about to turn 3, so maybe my view will change.

But, I think the tide is turning. I think most of my peers, whether they are parents or not, don’t go in for the masses of rubbish at Christmas. A lot of parents I know say they are worried that their children get too many gifts from other relatives and definitely don’t encourage the crazy consumerism that seems to be associated with Christmas.

I love Christmas and, in my view, go a bit overboard. Compared to some of the people on the Christmas threads though I’m positively restrained. Do what’s best for you.

Everyone gorge themselves on the same food on the same day, blow your wages on mindless shite, snap at each other, consume

The fact is though, that everyone doesn’t do that. I imagine some people I do, but no one I know. It just seems to be something that people say, but it is not something I see in real life or relate to at all.

Do what you want, but do you have to be nasty about what other people do?

I think you do protest too much and you actually may be rather jealous of what you percieve to be other peoples xmases.

I do hate the escalating commercialism. This year M&S are selling matching pyjamas for family snuggling. (Tho', typical M&S, the only women's size available in my store was 20-22.) And Xmas cushions? You can even buy a special reindeer plate for Santa's mince pie.

And I hate the new custom of a big pile of presents and letting the kids go wild, tearing off the paper like mad things and tossing the present aside to open the next one. It just seems so greedy, like giving a toddler a whole birthday cake and taking photos of the results.

But you don't have to do the same and there's a new generation who'll enjoy making their own paper-chains and choosing a present for Mum and Dad, like the John Lewis ad. Do it your way.

But, I think the tide is turning. I think most of my peers, whether they are parents or not, don’t go in for the masses of rubbish at Christmas.

Lots of people don't and never had. I don't think it's anything to do with tides turning at all, it's just people now openly say we dont do it that way.

That however doesn't make headlines or front pages of newspapers.

And Xmas cushions? You can even buy a special reindeer plate for Santa's mince pie.

That sort if stuff has been available for donkeys years. It's not new.

Our Christmas was stress free last year.

I'm also vegetarian and neither of us like Christmas foods. Last year I had Quorn and DD had ribs. We don't eat traditionally, we just eat our favourite foods. I bought chocolates, wine and gift cards as presents for everyone we know. I spent about 3 hours putting up the tree and decorations. Every year I buy DD less and less presents, she doesn't seem to mind. This year she's getting one main present and a few stocking fillers that I buy throughout the year. I always have a Christmas smelling candle, which adds more to the Christmas atmosphere than anything else. We did make some wreaths and a chocolate cake together for fun just before Christmas and we usually go to the theatre once or twice.

Don't invite people round - that is the key to having a lovely relaxing time.

Can people stop with the hell in a handbasket nonsense about how everyone does this awful thing now and how it was never like that in your day? For a start you sound like you are 150 years old, and its all bullshit anyway.
Some people have always gone OTT and some have not, exactly the same as now. You could buy santa plates 50 years ago. You could buy Xmas crap a hundred years ago.

It's all bullshit.

The whackjob woman over the road from us who has 3 kids, spent £2,500, (on food, booze, and gifts.) Yeah - that's what I said. Two point five fucking grand

And? I dont get why it seems to annoy/bother some people about what others spend and do at Christmas. As long as you are having the Christmas you want does it matter to you if someone has spent £2500?

Ans so many judgy posts like You don’t have to any of it, it’s such a pile a wank, such a tacky waste of time, money, food, resources. Everyone gorge themselves on the same food on the same day, blow your wages on mindless shite, snap at each other, consume just because others have a different idea of Christmas.

I always feel sad and emotional around Xmas time and I honestly don't know why

Sarah- I know exactly what you mean. I think for me part of it is the hype about having the 'prefect' christmas (that an actual real life person will rarely live up to). From being in my teens I've always felt that somehow everyone else is doing it better (in my younger days that everyone else was at loads of amazing parties, looking perfect, with tons of friends and the perfect boyfriend- now it's that everyone else is making christmas more exciting/fun etc for their family).

I also always have the uncomfortable feeling (which is totally at odds with my feeling that I should be doing christmas 'better') that the overindulgence/spending on unneccesary tat etc is rather distasteful when there are people in this country (let alone the rest of the world) who can't afford the basics.

So I always feel conflicted and somehow failing in the run up to Christmas.

The whackjob woman over the road from us

Nice.

But you don't have to do the same and there's a new generation who'll enjoy making their own paper-chains and choosing a present for Mum and Dad, like the John Lewis ad

Eh? So if you spend lots of money on presents and food you dont do these things to?