Post-Christmas thoughts

Hey 😃
Hope everyone had a great Christmas and/or practised self-care and kept safe.

As I previously said, I love Christmas; but this year it brought up a lot of anguish for me that I thought I had overcome years ago.

Christmas is a time for family, and sometimes family is more complicated than sitting around the table smiling and passing the roast potatoes. 
Sometimes there are people missing for whatever reason, sometimes families don't get along, and sometimes gatherings can bring back memories of things that you've either forgotten or repressed which leads to anxiety or flashbacks.

For me it was a mixture of missing people, conflict, and flashbacks.
I had a conflicting childhood of extreme pain and suffering but also very happy and privileged times, and all my memories are a haze. This means I'm still unlocking parts of my past; it also means I can't fully trust what I do remember. When you get flashes of a past you don't recognise it can be extremely traumatic, because it's like watching a mashup of a bunch of films you haven't seen with the same actors and trying to decipher which scene came from which movie.

I'm not saying I had a bad time this Christmas, because I didn't, but I did have to take myself away and remind myself that my health comes first. I had a relaxing soak in the bath and watched a lighthearted movie and went to bed. It might not have been the Christmas I envisioned; but it was the Christmas I could manage and that's what matters most.