Making Christmas Magical for an Adult

[Stephisaur]

DH confessed to me that he doesn't really find Christmas all that Magical, and struggles to get excited for it the way that DS and I do.

I'm not trying to force him to love it or anything, but DH's mental health hasn't been great lately, so I'd like to do something to restore some Joy in his soul.

So what Christmassy things does everyone do to give them that warm fuzzy feeling inside?

Go to an organised Christmas lights event, the ones we’ve been to have always been lovely. Lights, carols, mince pies and hot chocolate! It always cheers everyone up.

Maybe you can find out some things he enjoyed about Christmas when he was a child?

Our breakfast on Christmas Day is directly related to my childhood, hugely fond memories of excitement and having to exercise patience whilst waiting for my parents to finish feeding all our animals. Now I do what I did then, on purpose for my family.

I keep trying this, but he's an only child whose parents didn't really 'do' Christmas. Every other year they went to Spain for a week instead of doing anything at home 🙄

I will keep poking though and maybe ask his Mom what they used to do on the years they were home.

Lots of reasonably priced Christmas market packages available, LastMinute.com, etc., if you can manage something like that (Bruges, the German markets).

My DH is the same. He's just not in to it and there's nothing I can do to make him like it! The only thing he really enjoys is extreme sports - he's an adrenalin junkie. I'm not going to try and incorporate sky dives in to our Christmas traditions. He gets no pleasure from sitting around, opening presents, eating turkey, Christmas lights, Christmas music etc. So be it. He'll just have to endure it for a few days a year.

That's a shame, perhaps ask was there anything he felt he missed out on? Even something small he wished he could have done that other people talked about in school etc.

@MrsSkylerWhite sadly not in the budget for this year, but I will consider that for next year maybe :)

@WeirdPookah great idea, I will ask him. He might be more likely to remember what he didn't get to do.

@SallyWD Skydiving while opening presents could be...interesting ;)

My DH also isn’t fussed. Slightly different scenario- he grew up in another country where they don’t have Christmas trees and ‘Christmas day’ was a fish stew he hates. Gifts minimal, more a religious thing. He doesn’t find it magical either, it’s just a day off work.

You need to accept that Christmas PJs and twinkly lights and minced pie making isn’t going to do it for him, there is no basis for it and it won’t invoke warm fuzzies.

instead, for our own magic- we just spend December doing some nice things and treating ourselves.

• Doing the big Christmas shop and filling the cart to the brim with all our favourite foods.
• cooking some nice, slightly more labour intensive meals
• nice treats in for movie nights
• having crement and a nice bottle of whisky in for nightcaps throughout december
• he is a runner, so I have encouraged him to sign up to a 10k race in mid December. Me and DD will cheer him on with hot chocolate and people will undoubtedly be wearing Santa hats.
• a nice Christmassy date- this year we a day off work on one of DD’s nursery days to have a spa day at a hotel that will all be decked out with trees and lights. Midweek so not massively pricey.

Just use it for a nice time to treat yourselves as adults, focus it around both your interests rather than expensive hallmark style ‘Christmas’ activities.

DH is not as mad about Christmas as I am, but then one of my parents is from a country that is really big on Christmas so it lasted the whole of December and January growing up.

I would suggest getting him to do as much stuff as possible, ideally with your DS - putting up decorations, wrapping presents, going to a show. The more he sees your DS's enthusiasm, hopefully the magic will spread.

@Razorcroft I like this. I think I focus on the wrong things sometimes. I love Christmas because I love spreading joy. There's nothing that makes me happier. I like the idea of doing this in not necessarily Christmassy ways, thank you :)

@AnnaMagnani Yes that's my thinking partially too. I let him off a lot of activities last year and I don't think that helped his Christmas spirit. I may threaten to put the outdoor lights up myself and see what happens 😂

something that used to work well for us on family holidays, which might work here...we used to have a day "each" where we got to choose what we did and where/what we ate, so there would be a DS day, a DD day, a Mum day etc. Could you fit some of those in between Christmas and New Year, so your DH gets a day feeling it's all special stuff for him?

DS is currently begging for a "yes day" but having seen the film a few times now, I'm going to hold out on that for a bit longer!

Maybe just let a grown adult man not be bothered by it?

I like Christmas and some of these suggestions are making me cringe.

If he has poor mental health he might not be up for being dragged around lights displays the freezing cold.

I just don’t think it’s the kind of thing you can force. Either people are into it or they’re not. Insisting he take part in all sorts of activities when he would rather be doing something else might have the opposite effect, making the period into more of a chore and generating resentment rather than positive feelings!

I think the warm fuzzies are often bound up in nostalgia and a connection to your childhood memories, and he doesn’t have that, so it just doesn’t have that emotion for him and there’s nothing you can do.

I would just do the things that bring you and your DC joy and excitement, and let him join in or not as he fancies, with. No pressure.

I agree with pp - he's not obligated to find it magical!

If he wants to find the joy in Christmas a bit more then I suggest buying Nigel Slater's Christmas Chronicles and reading it together every evening. It's a bit late now as the journal starts on Nov. 1st, but he and you might enjoy catching up on it.

Watching old films always gets me feeling the Christmas Cheer. It's a Wonderful Life and The Bishop's Wife are my two favourites.

Low-key, cosy, happy things also fill me with joy - baking, making simple decorations, driving or walking to see the lights in the neighbourhood, that sort of thing.

Yeah, just cosy nice stuff with DS. IMO that's the real magic of Christmas anyway. It doesn't sound like a big outdoor extravaganza is going to sway him, that's probably the kind of thing that puts him off.

Oooh I can help! My husband's parents never really "did" Christmas, it just wasn't a big thing, whereas it was the best time of year in my house. Nowadays he really does get excited and enjoys the whole season, proposes stuff for us to do, etc.

The biggest and main thing is that I just carried on with the Christmas excitement that I was used to and it really rubbed off on him. I didn't force anything on him but I also didn't stop doing any of the things I wanted to do, nor hide them away or do them only when he wasn't around, just because he wasn't excited.

Some little things we do that bring Christmas cheer:

• Start a Harry Potter marathon, we're watching one every weekend so will finish on Christmas Eve.
• Make Christmas cards (I make them, he ooohs and aaahhhs at them once finished)
• Slowly put decorations up, not all in one go.
• Drink boozy hot chocolate out of xmas mugs once November hits.
• Some xmas music every now and then.
• Put cheesy xmas movies on in the backgroup when we're doing chores, we inevitably end up on the sofa with the boozy hot chocolate enjoying/laughing at them.
• Go to xmas markets.
• Buy a new bauble/ornament every single year.
• We started a tradition of going to the big xmas markets in Germany whenever we visit his parents.
• Christmas PJs (for me)

Just carry on with your festive cheer and it'll catch on sooner or later :)

Make him do all the stuff you do to make Christmas magical this year. Then next year when he doesn't have to do all that crap he'll think it's magical. I know I would.

Totally agree - I'm totally into it and my DH is totally not, I had a childhood of Christmasses in this country whereas his was abroad and completely different.

We do some low key things together with the kids such as driving around seeing the lights etc but he's not fussed about a London day seeing the festive lights , panto and shopping (he's not fussed about shopping anytime of the year)

Drink boozy hot chocolate out of xmas mugs once November hits.
Some xmas music every now and then.
Put cheesy xmas movies on in the backgroup when we're doing chores, we inevitably end up on the sofa with the boozy hot chocolate enjoying/laughing at them.

Please don't! Why is hot chocolate seen as some magic elixir?

Xmas music and movies are shite and everyone knows it.

I just don’t think it’s the kind of thing you can force. Either people are into it or they’re not. Insisting he take part in all sorts of activities when he would rather be doing something else might have the opposite effect, making the period into more of a chore and generating resentment rather than positive feelings!
I agree with this.

I enjoy Christmas and we have family festive traditions, but the hype and adults gushing about ensuring every ounce of the season is magical leaves me with an internal sense of "WTF".

Instead of trying to convert him and put pressure on yourself to make him have appropriate magical experiences, why not focus on doing things that you enjoy together.

The magic of Christmas is about doing things with our nearest and dearest, not whether someone wants hot chocolate, the right festive box, watches the right Christmas movies, has Christmas jumpers, likes Christmas music etc.

This. You can't forcibly enthuse someone.

I don’t know if it’s the case for him but the people I know (including my partner) who don’t like Christmas had complicated childhoods/families, and as so much of Christmas in films etc is about a picture perfect family I think it’s a bit depressing for them. But they might not want to say that. I do love Christmas but just sort of do the things I want to do and hope some of it starts to have happy associations as something that we do together. Mine does like the fluffy reindeer socks I got him years ago, and is big on Christmassy biscuits and treats. But is not going to want to come to a carol service or bauble shopping!

To be clear, he's not a complete scrooge and I'm not trying to "force" him to enjoy something he's not bothered about.

He's told me that he wishes that he 'got' it like we do, but he just doesn't. So, I'm trying to find ways to help him enjoy something that he would like to see the magic in.

He also has the tendency to not join in with something (eg he never comes pumpkin picking with us) but then he regrets it afterwards because we've made memories without him. So... I do try to encourage him to join in a bit more than he might usually, within the realms of what he is comfortable with.

Quite agree. I'm not into Christmas either!