Jean Gendreau

I once made up my mind to get a divorce on Christmas morning. My alcoholic husband had not come home. It wasn’t the first time and Christmas wasn’t his holiday, but this was my Christmas morning. It wasn’t what I deserved and it wasn’t what my little girl deserved.
Another Christmas, my heart hurt so badly I could barely go outside. My new baby had died. I had his blanket but he was gone. I didn’t want to live because it hurt too much. And Christmas — every image of Mary holding baby Jesus — made every cell of my body shriek with pain.
When your heart is broken, Christmas can really hurt. It’s easy to drown in the hype. Sometimes it feels impossible to swim against the tsunami of “should’s” and “if only’s.”
Here’s how to survive a blue Christmas.
The first step is to see the media hype for what it is: lies told by advertisers. Every advertisement wants to sell you an emotional image because that’s how the companies make money. They don’t know you personally and they don’t care about who you are. But they know that manipulating people’s dreams increases sales. Images of happy families and romantic couples sell products but do not tell any truth about real families or real couples.
So shut out the false images. Turn off your TV. If you watch old movies, remember that the movie producers needed to make money too. You can sing “White Christmas” all you want, but in the real world, snow is cold and needs to be shoveled.
Next, try taking your mind past the Christmas season. January is real so go there. Make concrete plans to start new things in January. If your heart is broken, try experimenting with online dating in January, just to see how it feels. Maybe you’ll learn something new. Is there a hobby you’ve always wanted to try? Sign up for a class in January, and do it now.
Family dysfunction is a third source of Christmas pain. Even if we only see our family once a year, Christmas really rubs our noses in the yuck. Not only do we get all the old patterns shoved in our face, but myths about so-called happy families make everybody crazy.
One way to handle this is the “I can do it for a few days” technique. If it makes your mother happy that you go to church with her, you can try doing it, telling yourself that it’s only one day a year. As you sit in church, you can plan amazing and creative January rewards for yourself.
But what if sitting with your belittling, criticizing father makes you feel hopeless and crazy? There are good people who do not go home for Christmas.
Maybe you need to find other family. Not blood family, but people who support you and care for you. And you need to talk to a therapist. Many family patterns destroy individuals with their cruelty.  A therapist’s job is to support you while you learn how to love yourself better.
Just because it’s family does not mean it is good. Just because someone says they love you does not mean they know how to love you in the best way.
Finally, what if someone you love has died? There’s no quick fix. Turning off the TV and making new plans won’t touch that pain.
Think instead about love itself. The love that person had for you still exists because love itself never ends.  Yes, it’s easier when they have their arms around you in physical form. But real love is an unseen, eternal thing. Once there is love, that connection lasts forever. You still have that and you always will.  If you sit quietly and close your eyes, you can still feel the love.
Buddhists teach that after death the family or loved ones should send thoughts of encouragement and love to the dead person. The idea is that the one who has died can then feel that it’s OK to move on into another level of existence.
Try sitting quietly and sending your loved one a message of encouragement and gratitude. Even if your loved one died in pain, you can feel gratitude that the pain has ended and that your loved one is free and at peace.  It doesn’t bring them back, but it might help you see today in a new way. And if there is just no relief from your grief, then see a therapist. The death of a loved one can feel like trying to carry 1000 pounds. You don’t have to carry it alone.  Grief therapists exist to help you carry the weight.
In the end, Christmas — like life — is about light in the darkness. I’ve been in despair. What I know for sure is that, if I get help and keep breathing, the year turns. It happens slowly, but the light comes back. Not in the way I wanted, maybe. After all, my marriage was really over. My dead baby was really gone. But eventually something changed because things always change. I had three more perfect, exquisite babies. Eventually I found a partner who cherished me as I really was.
And so sit with me now in the darkness. I know your despair. Life is sometimes cruel. Families hurt us and loved ones abandon us. And no matter how much we love someone, bodies stop working and people die. I know that darkness.  It seems that the light will never come back.
Here, take my hand.  Breathe with me. Let yourself open to the things you have never imagined. The darkness around us is complete and that is OK.
Darkness is the source of all birth. Darkness is the womb of hope. The year always turns, the sun always rises. Breathe slowly with me. Be gentle to yourself. Wrap yourself in kindness like grandma’s quilt and wait. I know something that you don’t know. The love inside you is a seed and your only job is to wait for the sun.
Christmas matters because it is the darkest time of the year. Our job is to trust that change happens. Sit with me. I promise you that the light will come again.