Christmas burnout

[tiredofchristmas]

I’m sorry but I really hate this time of year. It doesn’t help that I have 2 young kids who are up all night (4-5 times usually) and work full time in a stressful job, but my goodness I hate this time of year. The constant battle to think of meaningful Christmas presents for relatives you don’t particularly know well but have expectations of the perfect present. The endless shopping, the money dripping away, the social expectations (off no sleep and long hours at work), the to do list 10 x longer than normal, the relatives emotionally blackmailing you into contorting yourself into doing things (visiting people mainly) when you have no time and no energy, feeling pressured into eating and drinking unhealthily and your kids being fed non-stop junk, trying to stop your kids pulling the tree down on themselves. I’m so tired I can’t talk. I’m getting more and more depressed by the day.

Christmas is supposed to be a Christian festival to celebrate the coming of God’s son. Can we go back to that please? I can do a carol concert and maybe cook a roast, eat some mince pies and spend more time with my husband and kids. The rest is beyond me.

The thing is, you can do whatever bits of christmas that you choose to do. No one is forcing you to eat and drink unhealthily, or feed your kids junk, or visit everyone under the sun, or go to social events that you don’t want to go to. You can do a Carol concert and mince pies if that’s what you’d like to do.
I’m not religious in any way so Christmas is a mid winter festival for us, but we pick and choose the bits we actually want to do.

Just tell relatives you doing your own family christmas
Eat a mince pie
You are in control of what you choose to do here

So stop. Tell your relatives you are no longer giving presents to adults and don’t expect presents either. Say no to any parties you have no desire to go to. Say no to visiting if it’s not convenient. Sure a few will be pissed off but so what? If you don’t care for these people why do you care what they think? They’ll have to accept it and a few more people may take the opportunity to do the same!
And no one is forcing you to eat - stop being ‘polite’ and make a stand! It may be awkward the first year but next year expectations will be tempered and the following year hopefully they won’t bother asking you. Result.

Yep- I’m with you!
People say “don’t do it all”, but that doesn’t seem possible. There are so many commitments.
We’re nearly there!

I felt like that when dc were small. Everything is better when the kids sleep through. How old are they?

Quite a lot of what you're complaining about is within your control.

Don't use your energy on presents - ask for a list. If they don't give you one then they get a voucher of your choosing.

Say no to visits.

Next year follow the organised mum Christmas plan because she is wonderful and should be knighted for her services.

I think ‘just say no’ isn’t as easy as it sounds. If I said no to my PIL coming over for Christmas, MIL would be MADE to cook a Christmas dinner by her bullying bone idle husband and she’s really not physically capable due to illness. It’s other people endlessly feeding my kids junk. My relatives wouldn’t be pissed off off I don’t visit, they’ll be sad. I want to go too, but there’s not enough time. It’s tricky.

I agree. I'm feeling so burnt out and overwhelmed!

Kids 2 and 4. Neither have ever slept through

Hi OP.

I feel for you. It's shit, I know.

I think we woman have to start to say "YEP. Fuck. We are not doing it any more"

Otherwise, what was Feminism all about really?

Nothing changed really from the 70's. Even women in executive positions get moved out bassicly. (Spelt wrong, I know).

What about all the social commitments? The eating/drinking junk yourself? Surely there are some things you can say no to, the sky won’t fall in if you say no to a cheese board and a bottle of wine.

You can say no things. You have to be part of the change you want to see. For all you know some of the other people might be relieved as they may be feeling it too.

You have to learn how to say no. We are doing Christmas Day the four of us for the third time now this year and I can’t wait. I’m a very sociable person but I am overwhelmed by all the December school admin, plus lack of sleep due to similar sleep thief children, and a very busy job. I can’t wait for a chilled day on Christmas Day and that will kick start our festive period.

Say no to visiting family, say no to the junk food, say no to buying gifts for people you don’t really know or care about. You will be much happier!

That said I’m also looking forward to January and the pressure being off - never felt like that pre kids.

Every year more and more people get stressed over one day.
Dont put pressuer on yourself.
Its not a race who can do better who got the most gitfs, etc.

Just enjoy the day have a roast a few gifts for the kids.
Tv and chill.

I gave up with christmas when it stopped being chrismas its more of showing off, who can out do the next, its not 1 month of christmas its like 4 now.
Over the years you see its not chrismas that as lost the spirit its the people that have lost it.

Changing it to only kids get presents has been the biggest stress saver for me. We get nieces and nephews presents and my siblings buy for mine but in terms of adults, each family just gifts the other family a box of nice biscuits or chocolate. Even that's an unnecessary token, might cut that out from next year as well.

Edited to add:
We also insist on doing our own Christmas lunch at home so that the kids can relax/play with toys and then we go to the in laws for puddings/drinks later in the day around 5pm, then back for 8pm (use the kids bedtime as an excuse to not stay for hours even though they're absolutely not going to bed until closer to 10pm). But our in laws are 10 minutes away so that works well for us

You have got to learn to say no.

To late for this year but if you can get people to agree then family secret Santa for grown ups is a game changer. Only need to get presents for the kids and the grown ups all do just one person each in a secret santa. Everyone shares a Wishlist in budget. Budget is higher (so not lots of little things you don’t need) but you only need the time and energy to shop for one.

Also you say your mother in law will be bullied into cooking if you don’t. Maybe seeing you speak up about what you want will help her to say no as well. Otherwise you are just bringing your kids up to think they also will have to do everything. Change it now and show them it doesn’t have to be this way.

"I'm so tired I can't talk. I'm getting more and more depressed by the day." Please take your burnout seriously. You are being given good advice here - commit to acting on at least one bit of it. Write down all your "shoulds" and "musts" in a column (getting a "meaningful" present for Bob, who you hardly know) and ask yourself what can be dropped, delegated or at least simplified in the right hand column (vouchers for Bob + note to self: stop with the perfectionism and unrealistic expectations! It's NOT POSSIBLE to get a meaningful present for a person you hardly know so don't even try!). For EVERYTHING you do, ask, "How can I make this easy on myself?" If you're cooking Christmas dinner, get creative with cutting corners. Get frozen roast potatoes, ready made this, pre-prepared that...delegate some food prep to guests. Plan your days off, looking at what you can comfortably and enjoyably fit into them, allowing for downtime.

When my children were very small I stopped doing any wider family stuff at Christmas, on the basis that it was too disruptive and complicated with twin babies - and twelve years on I've just never started up again. We have Christmas just the four of us every year and no apocalypse has occurred! I send cards & do a bit of home baking for neighbours and that's it. It's a question of, what's the worst that can happen? Someone might be disappointed in you for not visiting them? Maybe, but maybe they'll be relieved themselves not to have to cater. Adults might resent not getting a perfect present? Maybe, but you really don't have to accommodate such thinking in wildly expensive times - and again, a lot of people won't care or notice. If cooking for your PIL is a necessity, make that the focus, pull back on everything else, and try not to project what you think others will think. You do have the right to have an enjoyable time yourself and not feel martyred. Try to think a bit more like a bloke!! Good luck, it can be altered.

Putting everyone first means you’re putting yourself last. Putting yourself last means you can’t be the parent you want to be. You’re putting other people above your kids. You need to consider why. Is it social expectation?

I agree with a PP to follow organised TOMM Christmas. The first thing starts after Christmas this year. EDC Write a list of what you want to do and what you don’t want to. Start telling people in Feb and revisit in September.

Your MIL is not your responsibility. You need to put things in place for next year so you don't post the same thread.

I get that you don't want to let people down. But what is the cost? Could you spread the visits out over december? Something has to give because you are about to break.

I’m completely with you here! Things that have helped that maybe you could do next year, a few years ago I suggested a family secret Santa for the extended family, now that I have children I have quietly dropped out altogether so we literally buy for our children and that is it. Husband and I have agreed not to do presents for each other. Stopped writing Christmas cards. As soon as they release the slots I book a food shop delivery for just before Christmas, then if we forget anything or need anything else one of us just has to do a basket shop. Next year I will be booking a few days off work end of Nov/early Dec to buy and wrap children’s presents so it’s all done a month early. The family visits we do one lot of parents over Christmas and one lot over new year. See grandparents once a week all year round anyway. Everyone else, well they know where we live, if they invite us we’ll go but I don’t do just turning up/popping in because it’s Christmas.

You might want to coordinate the day off for sorting presents with Black Friday.

Ah OP! I could have written your post when mine were small.Women (and its usually us girls ) tie ourselves in knots for Christmas.When will we learn sigh! Tips from a pro : Tell everyone ,not doing Adult presents (save maybe some nice chocs for MIL). DC only .Cut Christmas Cards too (used to do 30 now about 12) Food shop online .All kiddie presents Amazon whatever on line.Wrap parcels as I go .Made my own Christmas cake for 20 years .Now M and S,same mince pies and pud .Have a good Christmas and relax .Aunty June will probably be relieved she hasnt got to shop for anything too!