I got thru Christmas...

well, Christmas was hard for me obviously.

For the better part of a decade I have been doing Christmas the same way with Eva. We would go and do Christmas at her mom's on Christmas day after having Christmas morning together as just the two of us. We would find some times to visit my family, and her dad over the season of course.

But, it was the morning together and her Mom's house that ultimately made it feel like Christmas. Watching Christmas Story all day Christmas Eve while Eva made Christmas cookies and deviled eggs for the next day. Listening to Charlie Brown Christmas, and other records on my vintage record player, while we opened presents Christmas morning. Spending time with Harper's little ones at Eva's mom's house. And of course eating a shit ton of food.

Knowing that none of that was going to happen this year, and it was because of shit that I did... that was hard to face.

But I got thru it. So fuck you Christmas! I made it thru without drugs, without alcohol, and without cutting. I win fucker!

I did have Christmas Eve with my family, and that was fun other than My bother-in-law's son and a friend of his and my sister's (who is a young girl) spent the whole night adding as many "Fuck" "Shit" and "Mother-Fucker" in each sentence as possible, and sometimes to the point I had no idea what they were trying to say. I really don't care how people talk, I honestly use that kind of language myself, but there is a time and place. around me, or my sister's family, or my brother and his wife... fine. Around my mom and step dad... ok. Around my grandmother... have some fucking respect. I understand that she is not YOUR grandma. But I wouldn't talk like that around your grandma either, and I would hope that you wouldn't. But, I don't know your grandma, and I don't know if you have any respect for anyone. So, I just had to be fine with it, and try to have a conversation with her, with you screaming "fuck you" to each other a foot away from the back of her head... and just in case either of you read this... FUCK YOU!

The one thing that made my entire Christmas experience better was I did get to go to Eva's house Christmas morning, and we opened a couple of little things. She got me an awesome Shit Emoji piggy bank. I love it! I got her the Passion Translation of Psalms. She loves it. It was hard to leave after spending the morning with her knowing that she was going to spend time with them and I had to go home to my empty room. But I went home and focused on the positive things in my life.

Skills I used:

I did a lot of urge surfing all week, and tried to stay in the wise mind. I also did some self-soothing, and of course turning the mind, Teflon mind, Radical Acceptance, and Attending to relationships.

here is another page with links to explanations to skills list.