[Treasur]

Well, look at that, while I was heming and hawing, the universe decided that a 6ft white artificial tree for Miss Grace to admire/play with is just the ticket. A neighbour a street away was selling one they bought in lockdown for £5 because they have decided to go for a real tree this year now their kids are older...... 

My old boy Louis always used to fixate on one particular bauble each year.....no reason why that one and not another, and it wasn’t always the same bauble....in fact it became a family joke each year calling it Bob the Bauble. His sister meanwhile would simply sneer at the tree and stroll away disinterested. We shall see how.Gracie does it next month 

Just remembered a really lovely thing my former h did for me one year. We always used to make a bit of an event of getting and decorating a tree usually in the first week of December or so. But in 2014 I was working in Atlanta until a few days before Christmas....my then h got a tree and decorated it as a surprise for when I got back....lovely thing for him to do and i’d forgotten

[Dragonfly33]

I had my tree up first week of November. It just feels cozy to have a Christmas tree. I also have an artificial one now as I don’t have a lift and it would be a challenge to haul the tree all the way to the 2nd floor. Lol. Luna fortunately is quite behaved and the Christmas balls are still in tact. My xH was never interested in Christmas trees. It was just me buying the real Christmass tree every year and decorated it. I used to get the biggest one lol. Christmas is my favourite season, it’s the birthday of my grandma as well. It reminds me of our big family celebrating my grandma’s birthday.

[FaithWalker]

How is Gracie doing with the tree Treasur?

[Treasur]

So far, so good, Faith. I’ve been trying to outwit her so let the tree stand naked for a few days in the hope that she’d find it boring by the time I decorated it.....planning on doing that today so we’ll see lol

[Reinventing]

I read your Jan 2022 post as current by mistake. Nonetheless, your phrase about the holidays being a "time of echos" was poignant.

Sometimes that feels sad and sometimes it feels good to remember certain things. I've lost both parents now, one to dementia and one to a quick illness. And I lost a spouse to MLC.

My dad, fortunately, would say that "life is for the living".

That phrase helped me through MLC and the divorce once I had healed enough to build my new life. As many on this site know, healing became my #1 goal once I grasped that the old marriage was deceased, whether he "came back" or not. I put "came back" in quotes because there was no "back" to come to. There was only forward and new. Took me a very looooooooooong time to grasp that.

Life, although changed, is for the living. If you read that with a slight change in emphasis of the "for the living" part to mean "for the living of it", you can see why that was so helpful to me as I forged ahead to a new life that, at the time, was not my preference and was thrust upon me.

I've been very lucky to be a generally happy person. When MLC hit and I faced the pain and mental anguish the one thing I promised myself was to do everything I could to heal and get back to my generally happy baseline.

I am so glad that I did and that I embraced the living of life as best I could. Because who knows what the future had in store if I had continued with my old life? We really don't know what tomorrow can bring.

So as we have "times of echos", I try to shed a few tears to loss and then remember happy things about them too.

After losing a parent to dementia, I realize the preciousness and humanness of memories. We aren't really present without them. And I also realize that life is for the living. If we dwell in longing for the echos then we rob ourselves of the future. Why do that?

[Biscuit]

Great post Reinventing.

[MadLuv]

And I also realize that life is for the living. If we dwell in longing for the echos then we rob ourselves of the future. Why do that?

I wanted to reply on your thread so I didn’t hijack Treasures thread , but this is such an important thing to discuss. It just came up in my therapy a while back. I said, I lost both my parents and my daughter and I have been able to move forward and put it behind me. Not that I don’t miss them, but it is almost like coming to a realization that this is just how it is. I can’t change it and we all have our lives mapped out and the time we are to be here. I said, so does it make me cold that I am able to move on? And then why did I struggle so much with my XH being gone and am able to move forward without my own child. She said, are you numb? No. Did your parents or daughter have a choice leaving?, no. She said, so what is different? He left and had a choice? They left and didn’t. She said, so why are you here? To figure out how to move on. She said and you are because you are doing the work.

[Treasur]

It’s a mild Christmas Eve morning here and I just wanted to take the opportunity to wish every single one of you, those that post and those who just read this forum, the most happy and peaceful Christmas that you can reach this year. For those early on, it might be a tiny moment of breathing out or a small bit of something that brings comfort amidst the chaos. For those of us further on, it may be different than we enjoyed before with a few old echoes, but still worth pausing to give thanks for what we have repaired, rebuilt and recreated regardless of the storm. Every single bit, big or small, is not nothing and I hope you can give yourselves a pat on the back at Christmas for your own resilience no matter how imperfect.

Whether you are a person of faith or not, the core messages of Christmas always seem to me to be about hope, kindness and our capacity for joy. And these can be gifts to ourselves as well as gifts received from other humans. Every one is worth a small hurrah imho. I’ve always thought there is something very simply human about a festive season, at least in the Northern hemisphere, that is grafted on to the Solstice....about light and warmth in the middle of dark and cold with the promise of Spring to come. For those of you who post to support and validate others, thank you. For me, and for others here you may never meet, this forum can be like a lit Christmas tree, a warm blanket or a mug of hot chocolate on a day when we run out of steam. That matters so much when we feel so little, doesn’t it? So, thank you from me to each and every one of you. From my house to yours. X

And a special virtual hug to any of our friends in the US who are caught up in the very bad weather affecting some areas. Hunker down, stay safe, take care of those you love and who love you.

As is often the case in the last few years,  my own half-plans tumbled like dominoes. Our own bad weather, a lot of strikes hitting everything from post to trains to hospitals and some reappearance of Covid. My plans were modest lol....but fell over anyway. But hey, we LBS get really good at adapting, don’t we? And finding the small good stuff. I am happy, and a bit surprised, to report that Gracie’s Christmas tree is still standing and the twinkling lights are lovely. For Christmas Day itself, when my plans with others fell over, I used that marvellous Rule of 3 to think what I wanted most for Christmas....and it was simply to see my Mum. So I will drive up there very early on Christmas morning and pop by to see my Uncle, who has not been well, afterwards. As those of you who have experience of advanced dementia know, it will likely not be the Mum I miss so much and visits are inherently unpredictable....but I want whatever bit of my Mum is still here. That’s enough. I will take small gifts and get to see her face and read to her from Heidi, one of her favourite books. I can love her without getting anything back. And the hidden gift for me in that is to see that I am not in the fragile place I used to be and that I can carry things that might sadden me in a smaller suitcase than I did. And how could I forget....Gracie has not had one seizure since August so the medication is obviously working....that was a surprise for both me and the young vet....what a blessing right there! (Which I remind myself of every time she is her normal rather mischievous diva self  )

Today I will make mince pies and sausage rolls while listening to Kings College Choir sing carols. I will go to Midnight Mass with old friends where I used to live and give them some of my baking as well as taking some along to my Uncle tomorrow. Gracie and me will have smoked salmon and a glass of fizz when I get back (well, no fizz for Gracie although she finds the bubbles interesting lol), and I will shift my Christmas Day to Boxing Day to unwrap the gifts from kind friends under my tree, go for a nice long walk with a chum, glug some good wine and cook myself (and Gracie) a Christmas lunch. Lots of blessings to count and I will count every single one. Oh, and I might watch Babe again as a bit of inspiration!

I wish you all the best Christmas you can create and the hope that 2023 will be a good year for you. Xxx

[Biscuit]

Merry Christmas Treasur.

Your words have meant a lot to me in 2022. Thank you, hope you  and Gracie have a lovely Crimbo.

[FaithWalker]

Belated Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year Treasur