Christmas blues.....? Am I the only one?

Oh Rowantree - first of all
Next - you have clearly got issues regarding anxiety and depression but there is absolutely no reason to add guilt into that package. Depression is a bit of an alleycat - it isn't fussy who it lands on so just because you have no material worries to speak of does not mean you are in any way at fault because you feel the way you do.
I can hear how fragile you are feeling and how the late cancellation of this weekend's plans has made you feel worse. Trust me everybody else is not out socialising and despite the media, Christmas is not a period of non-stop glittery dresses and Fererro Rocher choccies with the ambassador. (Well if it is, it ain't for me)
Being with other people can help lift you out of depressive thoughts and you are recognising this when you say you dread being alone with your thoughts.
Could you go to a film? (Not Philomena - that will have you sobbing all the way home) but something light perhaps? Maybe a meal out? You say your DD lives too far away for you to offer to babysit - or does she? Perhaps you could stay over, or offer to take the other DD out for a girly lunch?
I am great at giving other people suggestions but not so good at following them myself and I find weekends hardest when we do nothing and I feel everybody else is out having fun. But trust me - they are usually NOT. So feel free to tell me I have got it all wrong, but just wanted to send a {{hug}} and my very best wishes that this cloud will soon lift for you.

Have a look at some of the threads on here, Rowantree! You are not alone, I promise. It is hard when you're struggling with depression anyway, never mind when things go wrong, because the one person you blame is yourself. Try not to.

I send ((hugs)) too.

Rowantree and ((hugs)) from me also and I so agree with the suggestion of taking yourself out somewhere on speck,they are usually the best outing when they have been arranged quickly and without any thought to them.
I now do tend to be totally the opposite as I relish my time at home after a busy working life and active social life,I find my socialising now is taken up with my business a couple of nights a week and that is enough for me now.
Can you go and stay with your single daugher and maybe have a week-end together my DD and I do this every so often & visit a local spa or similar for the day when they have offers on,hoping you feel brighter soon.

I know that feeling - totally unreasonable yet very real. "Toxic thoughts" I call them. I usually try to find something practical to do that engages my mind elsewhere- luckily I have plenty of hobbies - but sometimes it is hard to get motivated. You may find that having written it down make you feel better. I have no magic solution but you're not alone.

Rowantree, definately you're not alone, I could have written that myself. Then I feel guilty when I realise how lucky I am compared to lots of people. Agree with Rockgran, I try to keep busy, busy as that definately helps. I have learnt over the years to tell myself "this will pass" and yes, it does but waiting for it to pass is awful. Hugs to you ((((()))))))

As Rockgran says toxic thoughts can be destroying. I don't have them by day but at night.......... they all arrive with their suitcases for a prolonged stay!I was told to imagine putting all these thoughts into a black plastic binbag and then dumping them in a wheelie bin and crashing down the lid. Curiously , sometimes it works, but not others.So my sympathies to you Rowantree [lovely name] everything does seem worse near Christmas , when all the ads show sparkly people having festive fun, when you are not.Knowing that you aren't in a bad position all round doesn't really help with depression sadly.I don't feel terribly sparkly I must admit, so know a bit what you mean.I don't have low self-esteem or depression though, so if you add those into the mix, I can see you are having a hard time.Christmas will soon be over, and a New Year emerging for you. Good luck and hope you feel better soon.

Oh wow - I really appreciate and value all the replies, thoughts and suggestions everyone's made here, so thank you all very much! I'd LOVE to stay with my single daughter, but she's busy with work she has to catch up on before she comes down to us, and our daughter with the baby we visited last Wednesday to help out (which was really lovely and I enjoyed and relished the time we had with her and the baby) but she and her partner want time together as a little family, before Christmas, as they will be visiting family much of the time (and I can totally understand that). I will definitely think about visiting my single daughter by myself sometime, though usually I do that together with my OH. I know she'd love to visit a spa though and she really deserves some TLC, so I'd love to treat her to that sometime (if there is one accessible by train!) Excellent idea.
Yes, my feelings are 'totally unreasonable yet very real', rockgran - but often, as you note, it's very hard to feel motivated when depression hits. I have often had to push VERY hard through that barrier and just DO something anyway and often the motivation returns when I do - but not always. I think I am very frightened of ending up in that horrible black hole that engulfs me and that I've been trying to struggle out of for a long while now, despite various therapies (been there, chewed up the T-shirt)

I am feeling a bit better after cleaning out a cupboard or two and baking some flapjacks and a cake and giving myself a talking-to. Actually, venting on here was a huge, huge help, and though I felt so bad for feeling the way I do in the first place, it is reassuring and comforting that I am understood and not judged. That means more than I can say. So bless you all! Long live Gransnet and the lovely people on it

I think Gransnet is great for helping you get things in proportion. A great way of unloading those toxic thoughts. Feel better.

I do think the homely things help. There is another thread about thisbut a crochet hook and a ball of thread and a pattern makes you concentrate on something outside yourself. Knitting is more complicated. So is patchwork but they all produce something creative and take you away from dark thoughts. It is a difficult talent to be happy with your own company. And we all can suffer from the sound of laughter in the next room.

I am still worrying about my daughter though....all her friends seem to be in relationships, married and/or have children. She's such a lovely person (I know all mothers say that about their children, but she truly is - gentle, caring, generous, understanding, thoughtful and supportive....) and I really want her to find someone who is as lovely to share her life with. Yet I can't make it happen for her - and I have to accept that it might not. I know she'd love a family (it was the main reason she and her partner broke up last Christmas - he was younger and didn't want children so they decided to call it a day)... it must be very hard for her to be the auntie/babysitter all the time and not be a mum herself. Secretly (and I feel ashamed to admit this) I felt a profound sense of relief that the daughter of a friend of mine was also single (and she's a bit older than my daughter) but my friend's daughter has stunning good looks and seems to have met someone in the last day or so - and here I am, wishing like hell that she hadn't, as if it affects my own daughter's relationship status! Ridiculous, I know.....but I know it will make my daughter feel even more alone when she knows. Life is never fair, and no-one ever said it would be....but now I feel worse about that and have to find ways of dealing with those uncomfortable feelings. I would add that I'd never communicate my anxiety about DD's single status to her, because that wouldn't help at all - it's just something I struggle with. I wish I was a nicer person and could feel happy for the happiness of others more, instead of wishing it away resentfully.

Rowantree; that's how Ifelt when my son was on his own for a while. And, please don't worry about how you felt about your friends daughter; I would have been exactly the same . Early thirties is still quite young when it comes to settling down and having a family; we tend to think of how things were when we were that age. I agree though that, being women we always have a clock ticking in our head with regards to having a family.

Yes, true - I do worry about that clock and I had a fairly early menopause so I'm concerned it might make things harder for her if she inherits that tendency. Not thoughts I would communicate to her though: she doesn't need to know her mum is worrying about her relationship status! Good to know my feelings about my friend's daughter aren't too abnormal - I feel really nasty and bitchy for secretly wishing her new relationship doesn't work out! Sometimes I think that when genes were dished out I got the lion's share of the Nasty Twister Old Cow ones.....:/

Not at all; if you were REALLY nasty you wouldn't worry about the fact that you think you are; proper nasty people a] don't even realise they're nasty and b] wouldn't worry about it if they did!!

Rowantree, please be kind to yourself, I struggle with similar feelings, my younger daughter has been longing for a baby for twenty years , come the new year she is going to try IVF for the fourteenth time , aged forty three she now accepts this will be their last attempt , well this is what she says now.

We are a large extended family so I have had to tell her many times of the birth of a child to one of her cousins , three this year and I have just had the good news of another birth in the spring. Every time she is thrilled with the news but I do detect that tremor in her voice and I ache for her. I have lost count of how many Godchildren she has. And now her eldest cousin who has four daughters is to be a grandfather

It is natural to want joy for our children

Christmas definitely brings its own kind of anxiety.

For the last few weeks I have been waking up with "butterflies", not only in my stomach, but right down to my toes! I have realised, however, that as soon as I get out of bed and get on with stuff, like wrapping and Xmas cooking, the anxiety immediately goes, and my usual love for the run up to Xmas returns. I think that's the good thing about this time of the year. It keeps you busy and occupied.

I too have some worries about one of my children, and I know that black pit is always there, ready to suck me in. Thank God for the old fluoxetine.

Hope you feel better soon. x

"the good old fluox..." should have said.

I wish I could take fluoxetine - it's an SSRI and it interacts with my migraine meds so I have been put on Mirtazapine. Jinglebellrocks, I know that black pit well! One of mine (the one with the baby) suffered terribly with depression and anxiety - was diagnosed with BPD years ago. After many suicide attempts, self harm and more, she was given specialist therapy and hasn't looked back (well, as far as I know). Has a lovely man who adores her despite her disability (something physical she was born with), she's worked to carve herself a career niche and now has a baby girl - probably her only child as she risks passing on her condition and their little girl is free of it, thank goodness. I still worry that she might relapse - and our elder daughter, though fine physically and emotionally, I worry about because she's single and trying hard to build her career path and I know she would love to have her own family. Anniebach, I feel for you - and recognise that ache so well that you feel for your daughter. For years after our younger D was born with a rare syndrome I hated hearing of the birth of my brothers' babies - trouble-free and no health worries, while we struggled to cope with a syndrome which didn't even have a name then (though it does now). It was hell, though we loved her dearly from day one and determined that she would have as normal a life as possible. I honestly don't know how we got through it all, the surgery, amputation, leg lengthening, mental health probs and all the rest, but we did and I am so proud of her for being herself.
Oh dear, I've wandered off topic rather, but just giving a bit of background. Being a parent isn't easy, is it, whatever our respective stories!

Rowantree - I don't think your feelings are unreasonable at all. I think you may be surprised how many people feel the same. Don't beat yourself up for these feelings - as anniebach says, be kind to yourself, you are a good person. Christmas does sometimes make us feel worse, with all the jollity around us we feel we should be jolly too and feel bad if we don't. MY DH and I sometimes drive out and find a nice country pub and sit and soak up the Christmassy atmosphere, even if it's just the two of us. If you are nasty for these feelings then I am nasty too!

There is a very good thread on here somewhere about how to live with the back dog - I am sure someone will know how to direct you to it, and it did seem very helpful to me.

Dwelling on sad thoughts is part of the problem and is common to may people.

One of those thoughts includes the feeling that others are having a better time than you are. We never go out on New Year's Eve and I often think we should be out doing something and everyone else is at some sort of party - even though the truth is that I am very happy by the fire with my music and books. What crazy irrational beings we are!

I know how very hard it is not to worry about our children - we just want the best for them, but we can no longer engineer happiness for them as we did when they were little when a smartie would take away the pain. You can only be there for them and fill them up with love to carry through the difficult days.

I hope that you will be feeling a bit better soon - Christmas can be a difficult time when you are feeling low, as we feel an irrational obligation to be jolly!

I don't have any mental health issues but always feel sad and emotional in the run up to Christmas. Every year I tell myself I will be positive and that I have a lot to be thankful for ( aged parents still alive, lovely D and partner plus a gorgeous GS) but I still feel terrible until it's all over. I do miss my son and family who live abroad but it's deeper than that. Partly I think it's due to the fact that I am an introvert and hate all the fuss and all the communal jollity and parting but also I think it makes me think of when I was a child at Christmas and reminds me of the passing of time.
I'm not religious at all but carols and Christmas songs make me emotional still. I think Christmas is such an emotive time for all of us, bound up in family and the past the way it is that's its little wonder that it a difficult time for those of us with a sensitive nature or prone to depression.
And yes Mishap that 'obligation to be jolly' is a killer!

I was only thinking about such things yesterday. As we get older time seems to go so fast and the secret is [supposedly] not to do the same things each year. Have a holiday in a different place at a different time etc [otherwise we get the awful 'it was only like 5 minutes ago I was here' feeling!]. But, of course, we can't move Christmas. It's compounded by the fact that Christmas past is etched in our memories more than at any other time of year. For that reason I always want it to be perfect for the grandchildren [hence not being able to sleep the other night because I thought an important present had been forgotten]. When I put the old decorations on the tree that were my mums I could be back in our living room 50 years ago and I physically hurt inside. If I was prone to depression [other than being a terrible worrier] I'm sure it would tip me over the edge. As for New Year, it's my bloomin' birthday as well, so it's like someone hitting me over the head with a wet fish shouting 'yah boo, you're getting old'. If I could I'd sleep right through it. Happiness and sadness are such strong emotions it brings them quite close together in the spectrum of emotions [the best comedy having a touch of pathos to it]. I have a few friends of a similar disposition, and we all greet each other at this time of year with cries of 'bah humbug'. On which note I'll wish you a 'Merry Christmas' [bah humbug]....and send you a hug!

Rowantree, I really can identify with the whole "Everyone else is having far more fun than me" but maybe it all gets a little exaggerated in our minds especially if you are like me the worlds greatest thinker/worrier.
I don't think I am depressed but I can't remember the last time I spent a night without lying awake for hours on end, heart pounding and worrying about things that may or hopefully may not happen. Christmas always heightens and adds to all that, I constantly worry when the whole family get together if there is going to be an argument (there invariably is!) Is everyone enjoying themselves? and if not I take it personally and so the list goes on. It seems to me that everyone else takes things in their stride without feeling on edge to the point of hysteria. Maybe I would benefit from one of those self help books that I tend to scoff at. I'm off to put it on my Christmas list.
A very merry Christmas and happy new year to all.

just love yourself for who you are.best wishes to all gransnetters.

I'm amazed at the number of people (myself included) who seem to worry about everything all the time. It makes you realise that even inside the most confident looking person there is probably a little worried mouse gnawing away at them. I'm constantly checking myself in case I've offended, forgotten, overdone or underdone something, misinterpreted, or in any way hurt a friend or member of the family - or indeed a perfect stranger. It is exhausting!
I hope I have not upset anyone!