I was reading an article the other day entitled “The divorced parents’ Christmas guide” by a therapist and he suggested that you should spend Christmas day with your ex for the sake of the kids. This, in my opinion is a challenging prospect and one that we tried back in the day when the kids were young, but it was far from ideal.
Jean-Claude Chalmet (the therapist) says that “as I advise my clients, yes the couple have separated, but the family continues.” Does it though? After various attempts to do joint birthdays and Christmasses, I finally realised that we weren’t a family anymore. We were two parents who only wanted the best for their kids, but were no longer together. The family dynamic changed. Then he remarried and so sharing a Xmas together became virtually impossible. A new partner wouldn’t want that and neither would the additional children. For years, it was unbelievably painful for us all to forge a path that worked and the thought of not having the kids for Christmas was devastating, so I know how hard it can be for so many of you out there.
But we found a different way to make it work. Just as Chrismtmas lights can be different wherever you are in the world:-
It’s often quoted that children of divorced or separated parents are better off in two happy households than in one miserable one and I tend to agree with that. Not everyone can rise above the issues they may have with their ex, even just for one day and it’s better to find a way for it to work for everyone, not just for the children. They may develop a false hope of parents getting back together and certainly the therapist’s suggestion of agreeing to just buy shared presents for the children would have horrified my kids. For them, one of the few positives in the early days was that they got more presents than they would have had otherwise.
He also suggests that if you’re going to spend the day together, you need to avoid alcohol. WHAT?? IT”S CHRISTMAS!! You can’t enjoy Christmas without fizz and Baileys surely? And you can’t do your wild kitchen dancing with all the young and old unless you’ve had a few drinks to loosen everything up.
We found a much better way early on. Because Christmas is very painful if it’s the year you don’t have the children, we decided to share them every year. One year I have them for Xmas eve and Christmas Day morning to open presents and the next year they do the same with their dad. It means that every other year we have them arrive at midday on Christmas Day to spend the day and the night for the big Christmas traditional meal, games, dancing and general silliness. It actually works really well as we all get to see each other every year. Despite the kids having to drive for half an hour, they feel it’s the best possible solution and even though they’re old enough to make their own decisions these days, they still choose to do it that way.
This year I have them all arriving on Xmas day for the full on celebrations and I feel extremely lucky. My firstborn is getting married on Friday and so he will be coming with my new daughter in law for the first time. I’m so excited. So much to look forward to.
So if you’re still in the mire of finding a way through this that doesn’t make you feel wretched, then maybe this way might work better for you. Of course all being together is the ideal if you can make it work, but in reality, that’s possibly a step too far and you don’t have to feel guilty or selfish if it means you’re not going to enjoy yourself. Be creative, something will work!
