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December 15, 2006, 10:09 am PST
If it's too much for Santa, it's too much for Dr. Phil
Watching this show, I resonated with the young women who couldn't get along for just one pleasant Christmas day. Absolutely, they are playing a part in their own miserable time and they need to make some decisions, like, whether to spend the holidays with their family. It seems only fair, if the mom has the option to cancel Christmas or dis-invite those of her children she'd
rather not be with. That, and a lonelier Christmas, ought to get them to the nearest shrink. And hey, that's an option too.
I was lucky. I had some pretty nice holidays, until the first year I did not. There where signs that this was coming, but how was I supposed to know? I had just turned twelve. My mother chose that day to "nervously collapse" and the day ended with myself and my three older sisters locked out of the house at midnight. Dad brought us back to his place to sleep, after sending us four children to have dinner by ourselves at a restaurant earlier, while he and his live-in girlfriend had several guests around their very large dinning room table (Pool table, literally.). The next day he sent us home and nothing more was said for many years. I went on a suicide watch of my mother that lasted well into my 20's and that became my normal. Suicide watch aside, I made my own attempt at ending my life shortly after that Christmas.
For my twenty-third Christmas I got a diagnosis of Crohn's disease and a dis-invitation to family Christmas with my mother and sibs. Dad, now married to said girl, wouldn't have me for Christmas saying that it was all kids there or none. What did I do to be dis-invited? Don't know. The good news is, neither did my mother. Oh, there where the excuses, mostly my my mother scape-goated on my sisters', but they weren't true.
What was true was at this time that I needed my family most, but we hadn't recovered from the Christmas now half a life time ago for me, or from one more recent holiday when my mother beat on daughter number three and I came home to our Christmas tree out on the lawn, the smell of putrid water all over the hall carpet and my mother in her darkened bedroom having killed most of a bottle of wine (She didn't normally drink.), crying for my sister and later waking me from sleep
screaming for my sister.
That was twenty years ago and in that time I've spent the day with friends I love, friends who've become family, family of friends, friends I liked, no one at all, and very ill with no one at all.
After my mother dis-invited me, I did try to reconnect. I kept my mouth shut as Dr Phil suggested to those girls, and for one Christmas I watched as gifts where given to my sisters,
but not to me. I was in need of anything that year, hell, underwear would have been gold. The Crohn's added to pre-existing financial and vocational lackings. And another year, the last attempt, I was shut out with silence for choosing to spend the morning with sister-friend (Everyone knew of my plans well before hand.) and came later in the day than was expected
due to not having a car and being too far to manage travel on my own. Silence is a horrible Christmas gift.
My sisters have now have switched allegiance to my dad and now exclude both my mother and myself, but for different reasons. My dad changed the rule of all or none to suit himself. As near as I can tell, my mother had issues with Christmas that she passed down. She hurt us terribly other times of the year, but at Christmas these woundings become heightened by the relief holidays are supposed to provide. These wounds and betrayals have become the rationalizations for staying apart and are too complicated for the holidays to bare or to heal. Too bad, too sad.
There are lingering resentments to this day felt by all of us. And despite my having come close to death twice in the past 5 years, nothing is changed. I matter no more to my family now than I did 10 or 20, or 30, years ago.
I am not a bad person, I didn't steal from my family or do anything that could justify my being excluded; I wonder about those who are lucky enough to have been forgiven their humanity, and their sins, and who have loving family to be with. Do they know how blessed they are? I suspect that they do. I was smart enough to come up with the same ideas Dr Phil advised, and they didn't work; in so far as working means being included, welcomed, by my family for Christmas. The best Christmas wish I carry is having my family be happy to be with me on Christmas, hell I'll take a Saturday in June . But that's like expecting Santa to show up for real.
The holidays cannot meet the expectation for our mothers, fathers, sisters or brothers, to see us and love us and reflect us, unless they are already doing that. Despite the metaphor of this Christian day, there is no hope for the holidays when you are shunned by your family.
I have made my own decisions and compromises. I have endured the days alone when I've had no other choice, mostly due to illness and not wanting to inflict that on others on Christmas. I know my limitations and respect them. I hate to decorate Christmas trees, but I'm good with one in the house. I cook and buy gifts when I can. I listen to Christmas music on the eve and day only and sometimes I'll sing along. I sit at the table and at least nibble, even when I cannot eat without pain. And I surround myself with whomever will understand that I cannot eat now or that I need to
sleep for a bit to get through the day, and that I'm going to have my blue moments when my losses surface unbidden.
Last year I was days away from a four month admission to hospital, but I got through the day and gave of myself what I could. If I had been with my family they would have shamed me for not doing more and resented me for coming, for being so ill, for lying on the couch and participating only by watching and listening; there would have been subtle punishments for spoiling their good time. So I know being with family is not an option, but knowing that solves nothing, heals nothing and quite honestly hurts like a bastard.
Each year I fight to keep at bay the past images and feelings of anger and abandonment. I live for a month depressed, waiting for December to be over, but smiling every chance I get.
I will see the members of my family who want to see me . Even if it's only obligation on their part, or because they want to alleviate their own guilt, I will not bring up the past or the present hurts.
I will always miss the idea of "family," if not the reality. I will know that I am willingly excluded, despite the obligatory calls.
I love the one's I'm with on Christmas day and am grateful that I haven't turned bitter (feeling anger is not the same as being bitter) or biting because of all that has happened to me.
Dr. Phil's advice missed completely, and that is unfortunate. I know, it's impossible to solve a family's litany of problems in just a couple of segments. But I saw that mother's face, and the daughters, and there was not a lot of love there. The girls seemed willing; they even said out loud what it would take, but the mother was not asked if she was willing to keep her mouth shut, listen, or act with care.
Mother daughter wounds are deep and I think it's possible, despite Dr. Phil's offer to provide therapy, that this may have done more harm than good. Will it, I wonder, give the mother more justification to abandon some of her children? I hope not.
It would have been nice to see Dr Phil help these women to listen and see each other with more understanding; it would have been a Christmas freaking miracle to have them know that this year it would be different. But, like I said, there is no segmental healing for this kind of wounding...
Not even Christmas has that power.
I wish the mother and all of her children Peace, , but most of all the ability to respond with an understanding that grows love and heals wounds...,
Blessing to you, estranged mother's and daughters,
Blessing to you, whom have taken the time to read this,
Blessing to those who don't see themselves as blessed.
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The holidays are here, but some households never experience “peace on earth.” Dr. Phil’s guests refuse to embrace the spirit of the season, and say Christmas is the worst time of the year! Joyce has been married to Rick for 27 years, and has hated the holidays for 26 of those years. She refuses to put up a tree, decorate her house or listen to Christmas carols. Rick says Joyce even flipped out when he tried to dangle some mistletoe over her head! Joyce has succeeded in ruining her family’s joy, but is she about to destroy her marriage? Then, Val has 11 kids, but says her three daughters stop at nothing to wreck the holidays. One daughter even resorted to breaking her sister’s finger on Christmas day! The constant fighting has pushed Val to consider something drastic. And, find out what special event Robin and Dr. Phil hosted to help celebrate the true holiday spirit! Talk about the show here.
