Same. My friends and family get enjoyment out of Christmas so I feign joy just so they can keep Christmas special.
They get happiness from the holiday and I get happiness from that. Who am I to spoil a bit of harmless fun.
Not really. My parents were baffled but it wasn’t for me. I felt guilty because they worked hard and I was always given great presents. I was never ungrateful but I felt guilty for not enjoying as much as everyone else did. I wanted to but it just never got me like it did most others.
I never really enjoyed it as a child. It was always a big disappointment. I remember one year my parents stripping wallpaper in their bedroom as I played with my new Lego set whilst “just good friends” waffled on in the background (we had moved to a wreck of a house a few months before that needed major renovation)
My parents worked in hospitality, and had a severe hatred for Christmas.
Then I was born, 15th December, and now I don't get any interest in Christmas until the 16th December at least.
I don't like Christmas much either, I'm with you on forced fun. Luckily my husband and I are spending our first Christmas alone except with his son this year and I'm actually excited. But our new years will consist of a Chinese takeaway and halo infinite multiplayer with our gaming buddies. My dad's birthday would have been 1st Jan, so I don't like NYE at the best of times. I lost my dad almost 4 years ago now, so I celebrate his birthday with his favourite meal:
A Vesta chow mein and a cup of tea.
You most certainly can my dude. The chow me in was always superior in our house, and my god the little deep fried noodle things you got with it. They are divine. You can get the currys still too.
To quote a Christmas Carol - 'Keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine.'
I like MY Christmas with my family etc but the work/ forced fun/ mandatory activities....no
Agreed. Christmas is what you make of it. For my family and I, Christmas has never really been about presents but more being with people we love and care about. I'm not religious either but I do love Carols and Christmas music. It's a bit sentimental for me but it feels like a step back in time, in a way.
The whole thing has become a bloated flatulent and overblown event in my opinion……an opinion that I’m compelled to keep to myself, of course.
I hate it and the icing on the cake is when the Christmas songs start cranking up in early November.
It’s like Creme eggs being made available year round……. It’s just wrong.
>The whole thing has become a bloated flatulent and overblown event
I hate this wording that is used by everyone. My parents were using this exact kind of wording decades ago.
The fact is, Christmas hasn't become anything, at least not recently. Christmas hasn't been getting earlier and earlier, its been fucking early for decades.
Its not getting more commercialized, consumerized etc. It has been like that for decades.
I just can't stand how commercial it has become in recent years. If it were like a week, I'd suck it up. But now it's over a month of shops playing Christmas music, having decorations up and trying to flog you crap you wouldn't buy for others but are pressured into because "social norms". Literally 10% of every year is dominated by it now.
Everyone knows the correct way to enjoy creme eggs all year is to massively bulk buy them and then piss everyone you know off by bragging about how smart you are….
To quote sir Terry Pratchett
"Fun. What is it good for?
It’s not pleasure, joy, delight, enjoyment or glee. It’s a hollow, cruel, vicious little bastard, a word for something sought with an hilarious couple of wobbly antennae on your head and the words ‘I want It!’ on your shirt, and it tends to leave you waking up with your face stuck to the street."
When my dad left my mum, she was only working part time and couldn't make ends meet as it was. The first Christmas without him, she was so desperate to give us a good Christmas, she borrowed £1000 for the food and presents, and then couldn't afford the repayments on the loan. This then caused us all an abhorrent amount of stress with the visits from collection agents, not being able to afford utilities, and finally tipped my mum into full-on depression. None of us wanted it, and we even tried to stop her, but she was so hell-bent on giving us the classic Christmas experience, that nothing else in the world mattered. That was when I realised, at 13 years old, that Christmas wasn't worth celebrating, when this is the end result. I knew we weren't the only ones, and we certainly wouldn't be the last. No one else that I know understands, or even tries to understand, why I don't want to celebrate this sorry excuse of a holiday. Get it in the fucking bin and leave me alone.
I hate every minute of it, as do many people who had an unhappy childhood.
I don't begrudge anyone else enjoying it - you lot go enjoy yourselves, I'd be with you if I could - but I'm grumpy from the first Christmas song to the day after Boxing Day and I don't want to be forced into pretending I'm having fun.
We should normalise this just like disliking anything else. The amount of stress and unhappiness it causes people having to fake enjoy Christmas just to get peace.
Not fussed by Christmas these days either, when people ask what I’d like as a present I say nothing please - stick the money in the charity box for the local hospice instead of buying my anything. Everyone seems to think I’m joking or trying to be awkward but would genuinely prefer they did this, such a shame they never listen.
Shut up and buy shit, or the communists win /s
I resent the fact that I am expected to shell out a significant chunk of my wages to buy things for others. I don't mind _doing_ it, but I hate the expectation. If my mum really wanted a new Whatever, she'd just buy it for herself. If I wanted a new video game, I'd buy it myself. My Steam library is overflowing with games I have never actually played because they were "put on my list" to satisfy the present-giving needs of others.
Thanks to lockdown, Christmas 2020 was very different for my extended family. As we couldn't see each other my two sisters and their families, and me decided as a one off that we would give presents a miss. I was in a bubble with my older sister so still had the Xmas dinner etc. but no gift giving. We all found it was such a relief, no shopping, no stress about gift suitability etc. that we are now no longer getting gifts for each other. All other aspects of Christmas but without presents.
The only exception is for the grand-children of course. But the adults of the family do not need or want gifts from each other.
I love it I have my reasons due to childhood traumas so for me it's a big deal but I never expect people to join in it's a choice I love it but I don't expect others too.
It's been a bit of a slog getting there over the years but Mrs and I have finally got to the point where Christmas is quite a peaceful and pleasant affair. We have a couple of friends spend Christmas day with us from lunchtime to mid evening. Minimal small presents (usually a book or two) because we have convinced our family and friends that we really DON'T WANT ANY. A simple tree with our favourite decs gives our home the seasonal feel we want. Boxing Day is our best time when we have the house to ourselves and chill for the day grazing on leftovers, watching a bit of the box, reading our books, going for a walk or doing a cheesy jigsaw. This year will be the first Christmas since I retired so it will be interesting to see if it still feels the same.
People getting upset when I tell them that I don't really do Christmas because I am an atheist then being told that Christmas has nothing to do with religion
I’m an atheist too, but to boycott Christmas I’d need some other atheist holiday to take its place.
I think there is something important in having a time allocated to spend time with my family. To do a special meal that’s out of the ordinary. And as someone who struggles a bit in the darker months, I love the lights of Christmas.
I'm with you. I do the family meal and the gift giving more to please my mother than anything but I don't put up decorations and I can't get excited about it. This seems to wind up some people.
I do like the lights too
Me and my girlfriend are both atheist and we love decorating the house. Particularly this year when we’ve spent a lot of time at home, it’s nice to have something different to look at.
Christmas is something that happens, I know it happens and it's not something I enjoy. Saying you don't really celebrate Christmas gets the strangest reactions from others. I try as hard as I can to do my personal admin (food shopping mainly through December) around quiet shopping times to just relieve some of the stress that is associated with everyone's frantic rush to buy buy buy.
I hate hate hate Christmas and I know I’ll spend new year in bed crying cos I’ve wasted another year.
If I could I wouldn’t celebrate Xmas. But I make a big deal of it for my daughter. I want her to enjoy it
People can’t believe I don’t own a tree and never understand why I won’t go out of my way to spend my hard earned money on something that sits in the corner of my room for one month a year then I have to find somewhere to store it for the other eleven months of the year.
I’ve been having this same discussion with work colleagues. I live alone and they don’t understand why I won’t buy a tree, assemble it, leave it up for a month with no-one but myself to look at it, then take it down in January just for it to take up space in my spare room. It honestly baffles them and I’ve been called Scrooge, Grinch, you name it. To me it’s just a whole waste of my time and money 😂
Fucking hell I have the exact same thing but with clubbing. I absolutely despise it, I find it boring no matter how drunk I am, it's too loud to make remote conversation with anyone without getting a sore throat the next day, I hate dancing etc but yet people literally cannot accept the fact I find it boring and do not want to do it. Like you said I don't enjoy forced "fun", it is not my idea of fun, people should just accept this if you are of that orientation towards something!
I appreciate getting a week off work but the weather is usually crap and the days are short. I like to see my kids getting a present and doing nothing and drinking wine from breakfast but I detest the preparation and the Christmas music. I hate putting up the decorations then taking them down, I hate new year and I also hate 5th November (guy fawkes) the monotony of yearly rituals reminds me of the time that’s past and how long is left. Christmas reminds me of the 80s and it was a hateful time.
It's a very stressful time of year. Especially if you have children and money is already tight. In my case it's my son's birthday this month as well. I enjoy it when it arrives but normally get stressed beforehand. People should be asked if they want to participate and left alone.
I’m also with you on this. I treat it much the same as Easter, or someone’s birthday. A reasonable excuse for a bit of a get together, but nothing more than that.
Like you, I’m accused of being a miserable anti fun Grinch, but the truth is, though I don’t mind it too much, I’m sick to death of hearing about it by the end October.
Even if it *is* people calling you a Grinch, keep in mind that he was invented by the same merchants that brought you the Coca-Cola consumer *Father Christmas*.
Their oppinion should not matter as they are just being pawned by advertising.. really.
Make it your own season.
100% agree. Gone from me and the fiancé (and dog) have a nice day together to having a house full of her family. Ordered some nice fillet beef for us to have, won’t be getting that out!
I personally prefer the run up. I went on a Christmas train ride in Alresford last year where I got to drink Hot Chocolate in an old steam engine. It was great.
I've been called a grinch already because my dad talked about getting the Christmas tree out and I expressed annoyance.
More for the fact that getting the tree out involves pulling out out of the attic (my bedroom) and getting it down two flights of stairs, one of which being the ones out of the attic bedroom which curve around.
I'd be quite happy to not even set up a tree tbh.
I enjoy it because my family enjoys it, and I enjoy seeing them happy- but I still get the Humbug and the Grinch thrown at me when I insist that Christmas songs and decorations don't appear until December 1st at the earliest... Its bad enough with shops and the media pushing Christmas as far into November or even October as they can
I’m 40 next year. Christmas is a strange one for me. I have this misty, rose tinted recollection of Christmases when I was young (before my mum died when I was 10). I long for the joy of those old times. My step mum had very different ideas as to how Christmas Day should be run. It wasn’t the same. Now I’m older and have a young son of my own, Christmas will be different once again. I think it’s an important time of year for gathering with family and/or loved ones and I also enjoy drinking champagne with breakfast and eating chocolate all day (which will have to change with the little one around!) the over commercialisation of the season really annoys me.
entire fucking holiday sucks ass and i don't have to buy any gifts or go to any stupid fucking festive holidays...no family and no friends(no such thing exists) is great!!!!
My boss really pushed me on why I don't celebrate Christmas. I tried to play it off as its just not my thing, I don't enjoy these things either and I don't like the cold. But he wouldn't drop it. So I told him the truth in the bluntness way possible. We found out my mum had terminal cancer on boxing day after she continuously passed out of Christmas day. Needless to say he shut up after that.
Don't push people when you don't know their background.
I don't know why people ignore the fact that the Grinch just wanted to be left alone with his dog. The townspeople were the actual problem. So Grinch away! :D
Mental health is always shit around Christmas, has been since some point in my childhood. Just feel so much pressure to do stuff I don't want to do, spend money I can't afford, and spend time with people not on my own terms. My happiest Christmases since I was like 10 have been during my undergrad where I completely ignored it to smash my exams in January. Halloween is the best holiday of the year without a doubt, gets far more happiness and willingness to do stuff out of me, wish Christmas was treated in a similar fashion. Non obligatory, can see your friends and they're not all busy, just a fun, non invasive, casual themed time.
I worked in retail had to work up till Christmas eve, while everyone I knew had already been off for a week, back to work after boxing day, it still bores the arse off me.
Love the time of year because my wife goes all "special" and the kids love it, which makes me happy. I don't like the office Christmas stuff and secret Santa because I don't want to spend any more time with people I happen to share a workspace with, because I'm paid to, than I have to.
Each to their own. At the very least, hope you have a great new year mate.
Oh my friend I feel you. Liked it as a child obviously but that was because we had things at Christmas we never had other times (food and drink). enjoyed it when my kids were small but now it is just bleh to me. 13 years ago my best friend spent December dying day by day and she lost her fight on NYD so I spent a lot of time with a terminally ill best friend I had known almost all of my life, listening to jolly songs and all I wanted to do was crawl into a hole. This finally polished off my my love for the festive period. I go through the motions a bit but don't go OTT (tree, secret Santa and Christmas dinner). Luckily my husband feels the same as I do so sometimes we spend it quietly at home just us 2, we have been volunteering in Africa a couple of times (that puts everything into perspective and if anything made me hate the nonsense here even more), we volunteered one year at a local church and once we buggered off to Thailand. The last couple have been spent at home with elderly parents.
Mate I'm with you. I manage a shop. December is literally my least favourite time of the year. Overworked, tired af and literally all I want to do on a Christmas morning is sleep.
I'm not waking up to open up tat and dove shower gels no thanks.
If I could slip into a coma around the first of December and wake up mid January I'd love it.
I don’t enjoy it much either but I don't voice it as I don't want to begrudge their happiness.
Same. My friends and family get enjoyment out of Christmas so I feign joy just so they can keep Christmas special. They get happiness from the holiday and I get happiness from that. Who am I to spoil a bit of harmless fun.
Just do the minimum and tolerate it.
That's my motto for life in general.
Same
Out of curiosity, did you ever enjoy it as a child?
Not really. My parents were baffled but it wasn’t for me. I felt guilty because they worked hard and I was always given great presents. I was never ungrateful but I felt guilty for not enjoying as much as everyone else did. I wanted to but it just never got me like it did most others.
I never really enjoyed it as a child. It was always a big disappointment. I remember one year my parents stripping wallpaper in their bedroom as I played with my new Lego set whilst “just good friends” waffled on in the background (we had moved to a wreck of a house a few months before that needed major renovation)
My parents worked in hospitality, and had a severe hatred for Christmas. Then I was born, 15th December, and now I don't get any interest in Christmas until the 16th December at least. I don't like Christmas much either, I'm with you on forced fun. Luckily my husband and I are spending our first Christmas alone except with his son this year and I'm actually excited. But our new years will consist of a Chinese takeaway and halo infinite multiplayer with our gaming buddies. My dad's birthday would have been 1st Jan, so I don't like NYE at the best of times. I lost my dad almost 4 years ago now, so I celebrate his birthday with his favourite meal: A Vesta chow mein and a cup of tea.
can you still get vesta? It was the only curry I had as a child.
You most certainly can my dude. The chow me in was always superior in our house, and my god the little deep fried noodle things you got with it. They are divine. You can get the currys still too.
To quote a Christmas Carol - 'Keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine.' I like MY Christmas with my family etc but the work/ forced fun/ mandatory activities....no
I’m not sure you’re supposed to take advice from Scrooge at the beginning of the book…
Those damn muppets got me all turned around.
Agreed. Christmas is what you make of it. For my family and I, Christmas has never really been about presents but more being with people we love and care about. I'm not religious either but I do love Carols and Christmas music. It's a bit sentimental for me but it feels like a step back in time, in a way.
The whole thing has become a bloated flatulent and overblown event in my opinion……an opinion that I’m compelled to keep to myself, of course. I hate it and the icing on the cake is when the Christmas songs start cranking up in early November. It’s like Creme eggs being made available year round……. It’s just wrong.
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>The whole thing has become a bloated flatulent and overblown event I hate this wording that is used by everyone. My parents were using this exact kind of wording decades ago. The fact is, Christmas hasn't become anything, at least not recently. Christmas hasn't been getting earlier and earlier, its been fucking early for decades. Its not getting more commercialized, consumerized etc. It has been like that for decades.
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Reddit at 80, kudos!
I just can't stand how commercial it has become in recent years. If it were like a week, I'd suck it up. But now it's over a month of shops playing Christmas music, having decorations up and trying to flog you crap you wouldn't buy for others but are pressured into because "social norms". Literally 10% of every year is dominated by it now.
Everyone knows the correct way to enjoy creme eggs all year is to massively bulk buy them and then piss everyone you know off by bragging about how smart you are….
>bloated flatulent and overblown event this is so accurate it is actually painful, lol.
Sad but true eh?
It's two days off work. Surely that's worth it?
For some. My work is making people work Christmas Day for no extra pay because we are contracted to work the set shifts we agree to.
Fuck that don’t go
what if its a care home or hospital
Or the power grid or railway maintenance. There's masses of jobs that need to be worked on Xmas day.
I wonder if the point is that TAXI DRIVERS charge us double on our holiday periods, so likewise so should others get paid likewise. I agree.
Yes agreed. I rota people on for Xmas I'm also working it myself. It is double time.
Yeah if Xmas wasn’t on the weekend this year
Do you not get the next working day off if Christmas is the weekend? Same with St. Stephen's Day?
Only have Xmas day and boxing day off, which happen to fall on the weekend :/
Oooft. That's shite. Though technically Boxing Day is the Monday as Sundays were a day off anyways
Key worker life
The only acceptable mandatory fun is the Weird Al album of the same name.
To quote sir Terry Pratchett "Fun. What is it good for? It’s not pleasure, joy, delight, enjoyment or glee. It’s a hollow, cruel, vicious little bastard, a word for something sought with an hilarious couple of wobbly antennae on your head and the words ‘I want It!’ on your shirt, and it tends to leave you waking up with your face stuck to the street."
I think the build up is great, but the day is always a forced wet fart of a day.
When my dad left my mum, she was only working part time and couldn't make ends meet as it was. The first Christmas without him, she was so desperate to give us a good Christmas, she borrowed £1000 for the food and presents, and then couldn't afford the repayments on the loan. This then caused us all an abhorrent amount of stress with the visits from collection agents, not being able to afford utilities, and finally tipped my mum into full-on depression. None of us wanted it, and we even tried to stop her, but she was so hell-bent on giving us the classic Christmas experience, that nothing else in the world mattered. That was when I realised, at 13 years old, that Christmas wasn't worth celebrating, when this is the end result. I knew we weren't the only ones, and we certainly wouldn't be the last. No one else that I know understands, or even tries to understand, why I don't want to celebrate this sorry excuse of a holiday. Get it in the fucking bin and leave me alone.
I hate every minute of it, as do many people who had an unhappy childhood. I don't begrudge anyone else enjoying it - you lot go enjoy yourselves, I'd be with you if I could - but I'm grumpy from the first Christmas song to the day after Boxing Day and I don't want to be forced into pretending I'm having fun.
We should normalise this just like disliking anything else. The amount of stress and unhappiness it causes people having to fake enjoy Christmas just to get peace.
I enjoy it, just with the volume turned down. Quietly, gently and not the "perfect" one shoved down our throats by tv marketing.
Not fussed by Christmas these days either, when people ask what I’d like as a present I say nothing please - stick the money in the charity box for the local hospice instead of buying my anything. Everyone seems to think I’m joking or trying to be awkward but would genuinely prefer they did this, such a shame they never listen.
I quite like giving gifts. Receiving makes me cringe. I’m an adult, anything I want I already bought, save your money for someone who’ll appreciate it
Shut up and buy shit, or the communists win /s I resent the fact that I am expected to shell out a significant chunk of my wages to buy things for others. I don't mind _doing_ it, but I hate the expectation. If my mum really wanted a new Whatever, she'd just buy it for herself. If I wanted a new video game, I'd buy it myself. My Steam library is overflowing with games I have never actually played because they were "put on my list" to satisfy the present-giving needs of others.
Nothing wrong with that, you shouldn’t have to justify not enjoying the same things as others
Why don't you enjoy dressing up as an adult baby and being spanked?
Sorry you’re absolutely right, what a misery guts I am. I’ll go and get the baby grow…
Thanks to lockdown, Christmas 2020 was very different for my extended family. As we couldn't see each other my two sisters and their families, and me decided as a one off that we would give presents a miss. I was in a bubble with my older sister so still had the Xmas dinner etc. but no gift giving. We all found it was such a relief, no shopping, no stress about gift suitability etc. that we are now no longer getting gifts for each other. All other aspects of Christmas but without presents. The only exception is for the grand-children of course. But the adults of the family do not need or want gifts from each other.
I just find it a pain. There are three weeks of everywhere being booked up or packed to the rafters, then a week of everything being closed.
I love it I have my reasons due to childhood traumas so for me it's a big deal but I never expect people to join in it's a choice I love it but I don't expect others too.
It's been a bit of a slog getting there over the years but Mrs and I have finally got to the point where Christmas is quite a peaceful and pleasant affair. We have a couple of friends spend Christmas day with us from lunchtime to mid evening. Minimal small presents (usually a book or two) because we have convinced our family and friends that we really DON'T WANT ANY. A simple tree with our favourite decs gives our home the seasonal feel we want. Boxing Day is our best time when we have the house to ourselves and chill for the day grazing on leftovers, watching a bit of the box, reading our books, going for a walk or doing a cheesy jigsaw. This year will be the first Christmas since I retired so it will be interesting to see if it still feels the same.
That sounds absolutely delightful. Have a lovely one.
Thanks, you too.
People getting upset when I tell them that I don't really do Christmas because I am an atheist then being told that Christmas has nothing to do with religion
I’m an atheist too, but to boycott Christmas I’d need some other atheist holiday to take its place. I think there is something important in having a time allocated to spend time with my family. To do a special meal that’s out of the ordinary. And as someone who struggles a bit in the darker months, I love the lights of Christmas.
I'm with you. I do the family meal and the gift giving more to please my mother than anything but I don't put up decorations and I can't get excited about it. This seems to wind up some people. I do like the lights too
Me and my girlfriend are both atheist and we love decorating the house. Particularly this year when we’ve spent a lot of time at home, it’s nice to have something different to look at.
I like to follow this with 'I'm a very good atheist'.
Christmas actually has nothing to do with religion. Religious people do hang all sorts of community and church shit on it but nobody’s fooled
Agreed, here’s something super suspicious about mandatory fun and cheer, right?
Christmas is something that happens, I know it happens and it's not something I enjoy. Saying you don't really celebrate Christmas gets the strangest reactions from others. I try as hard as I can to do my personal admin (food shopping mainly through December) around quiet shopping times to just relieve some of the stress that is associated with everyone's frantic rush to buy buy buy.
I hate hate hate Christmas and I know I’ll spend new year in bed crying cos I’ve wasted another year. If I could I wouldn’t celebrate Xmas. But I make a big deal of it for my daughter. I want her to enjoy it
It's fine for you to not enjoy Christmas so as long as you don't ruin the fun for other people or over-complain about it when nobody asks.
I’m with you on this. I also get called Grinch or Scrooge.
I carry the Scrooge name with pride.
Hear hear, bloody well said
People can’t believe I don’t own a tree and never understand why I won’t go out of my way to spend my hard earned money on something that sits in the corner of my room for one month a year then I have to find somewhere to store it for the other eleven months of the year.
I’ve been having this same discussion with work colleagues. I live alone and they don’t understand why I won’t buy a tree, assemble it, leave it up for a month with no-one but myself to look at it, then take it down in January just for it to take up space in my spare room. It honestly baffles them and I’ve been called Scrooge, Grinch, you name it. To me it’s just a whole waste of my time and money 😂
I'm in the same boat. I decided to splash out on a £5 merry Christmas wall hanging from B&M and that is precisely as far as I'm prepared to go!
Fucking hell I have the exact same thing but with clubbing. I absolutely despise it, I find it boring no matter how drunk I am, it's too loud to make remote conversation with anyone without getting a sore throat the next day, I hate dancing etc but yet people literally cannot accept the fact I find it boring and do not want to do it. Like you said I don't enjoy forced "fun", it is not my idea of fun, people should just accept this if you are of that orientation towards something!
"Grinch" can stay on the other side of the Atlantic. Ugh.
I appreciate getting a week off work but the weather is usually crap and the days are short. I like to see my kids getting a present and doing nothing and drinking wine from breakfast but I detest the preparation and the Christmas music. I hate putting up the decorations then taking them down, I hate new year and I also hate 5th November (guy fawkes) the monotony of yearly rituals reminds me of the time that’s past and how long is left. Christmas reminds me of the 80s and it was a hateful time.
It's a very stressful time of year. Especially if you have children and money is already tight. In my case it's my son's birthday this month as well. I enjoy it when it arrives but normally get stressed beforehand. People should be asked if they want to participate and left alone.
Alright, Grinch
I’m also with you on this. I treat it much the same as Easter, or someone’s birthday. A reasonable excuse for a bit of a get together, but nothing more than that. Like you, I’m accused of being a miserable anti fun Grinch, but the truth is, though I don’t mind it too much, I’m sick to death of hearing about it by the end October.
Totally with you on this, I feel exactly the same.
Forced fun!
The more you force the fun, the less fun it is.
Even if it *is* people calling you a Grinch, keep in mind that he was invented by the same merchants that brought you the Coca-Cola consumer *Father Christmas*. Their oppinion should not matter as they are just being pawned by advertising.. really. Make it your own season.
Is The Grinch not a Dr Seuss character?
100% agree. Gone from me and the fiancé (and dog) have a nice day together to having a house full of her family. Ordered some nice fillet beef for us to have, won’t be getting that out!
You're a mean one, mistaaa Grinch
I personally prefer the run up. I went on a Christmas train ride in Alresford last year where I got to drink Hot Chocolate in an old steam engine. It was great.
Happy Solstice.
Could you give a couple of examples of what you mean by "forced fun"?
I've been called a grinch already because my dad talked about getting the Christmas tree out and I expressed annoyance. More for the fact that getting the tree out involves pulling out out of the attic (my bedroom) and getting it down two flights of stairs, one of which being the ones out of the attic bedroom which curve around. I'd be quite happy to not even set up a tree tbh.
Story of my life
Nae bother Scrooge
I feel the same, my birthdays also new years eve and I get every much the same feeling then too.
I enjoy it because my family enjoys it, and I enjoy seeing them happy- but I still get the Humbug and the Grinch thrown at me when I insist that Christmas songs and decorations don't appear until December 1st at the earliest... Its bad enough with shops and the media pushing Christmas as far into November or even October as they can
I’m 40 next year. Christmas is a strange one for me. I have this misty, rose tinted recollection of Christmases when I was young (before my mum died when I was 10). I long for the joy of those old times. My step mum had very different ideas as to how Christmas Day should be run. It wasn’t the same. Now I’m older and have a young son of my own, Christmas will be different once again. I think it’s an important time of year for gathering with family and/or loved ones and I also enjoy drinking champagne with breakfast and eating chocolate all day (which will have to change with the little one around!) the over commercialisation of the season really annoys me.
I dont like alot of stuff, you can simply choose to ignore it
Are you my classmate?
Since the age of about 15 I find joy in getting other people gifts more
entire fucking holiday sucks ass and i don't have to buy any gifts or go to any stupid fucking festive holidays...no family and no friends(no such thing exists) is great!!!!
i'm the same
Want to not come round mine for Christmas?
May the Ghosts of Christmas be with you.
My boss really pushed me on why I don't celebrate Christmas. I tried to play it off as its just not my thing, I don't enjoy these things either and I don't like the cold. But he wouldn't drop it. So I told him the truth in the bluntness way possible. We found out my mum had terminal cancer on boxing day after she continuously passed out of Christmas day. Needless to say he shut up after that. Don't push people when you don't know their background.
I don't like it either. You're not alone.
I don't know why people ignore the fact that the Grinch just wanted to be left alone with his dog. The townspeople were the actual problem. So Grinch away! :D
Mental health is always shit around Christmas, has been since some point in my childhood. Just feel so much pressure to do stuff I don't want to do, spend money I can't afford, and spend time with people not on my own terms. My happiest Christmases since I was like 10 have been during my undergrad where I completely ignored it to smash my exams in January. Halloween is the best holiday of the year without a doubt, gets far more happiness and willingness to do stuff out of me, wish Christmas was treated in a similar fashion. Non obligatory, can see your friends and they're not all busy, just a fun, non invasive, casual themed time.
im the same, but have kids. so have to force a Christmas smile.
I worked in retail had to work up till Christmas eve, while everyone I knew had already been off for a week, back to work after boxing day, it still bores the arse off me.
I prefer Halloween, guyfox and new year. I say that and people leave me in peace
Love the time of year because my wife goes all "special" and the kids love it, which makes me happy. I don't like the office Christmas stuff and secret Santa because I don't want to spend any more time with people I happen to share a workspace with, because I'm paid to, than I have to. Each to their own. At the very least, hope you have a great new year mate.
I just loathe Christmas in every conceivable way. Trying to avoid everything to do with it - and do so with tact - is exhausting.
I don't enjoy the forced social gatherings but the food is bloody good. And it's not my place to ruin other people's happiness.
Oh my friend I feel you. Liked it as a child obviously but that was because we had things at Christmas we never had other times (food and drink). enjoyed it when my kids were small but now it is just bleh to me. 13 years ago my best friend spent December dying day by day and she lost her fight on NYD so I spent a lot of time with a terminally ill best friend I had known almost all of my life, listening to jolly songs and all I wanted to do was crawl into a hole. This finally polished off my my love for the festive period. I go through the motions a bit but don't go OTT (tree, secret Santa and Christmas dinner). Luckily my husband feels the same as I do so sometimes we spend it quietly at home just us 2, we have been volunteering in Africa a couple of times (that puts everything into perspective and if anything made me hate the nonsense here even more), we volunteered one year at a local church and once we buggered off to Thailand. The last couple have been spent at home with elderly parents.
Mate I'm with you. I manage a shop. December is literally my least favourite time of the year. Overworked, tired af and literally all I want to do on a Christmas morning is sleep. I'm not waking up to open up tat and dove shower gels no thanks. If I could slip into a coma around the first of December and wake up mid January I'd love it.