first christmas after a loss of a parent

*, all the family complications.

you say, "do you think i am silly wanting it to pass me by with no celebration apart from visiting the children,i really don't see in joy in anything at the moment so why should i just pretend i am okay,hubby is happy to go along with whatever i want,"

No you are not silly, have a quiet thoughtful withdrawn time and remember your Dad and talk about him - its absolutely fine, there are no "cookie cutter" oughts , you are grieving..

So much grief here.
Each of us have to find our own way of "getting through".
Each day you survive the grief is a bonus.
You must do what suits you and your family.
No-one is judging you Dawn - most of us have had someone close to us die. We understand it's horrible and just so wrong.

Thinking of you Dawn, and all of you who have been left without someone very important. I'm hoping you all find a way through to something less traumatic in time.

And to those of you that never had the privilege of this pain and loss (because maybe you had "not so great" family circumstances), I'm thinking of you too and hoping that you are getting on OK now - and are at peace with life.
💐

Christmas is difficult for so many. Sometimes for what we have lost, sometimes for what we have never had.

... just read this back - apologies if it sounds a bit preachy. It's not meant that way. Just felt the need to also acknowledge those who have not been as fortunate as I have been.

Paddyann, that’s so sad.

Dawn62, when I lost my husband (it was in November) the idea of attempting a 'normal' Christmas seemed utterly ridiculous. We were all still reeling with shock and grief. My friend suggested that I joined in with her Christmas day (along with my four children) and, although it was very strange and really sad, it saved us from the awful prospect of spending the day with my family - all too close - and making them feel really awkward too.

When my Mum died, leaving just me and my Dad we immediately changed our routine. Usually I did Christmas at my house for the three of us. Instead we booked a lovely restaurant for Christmas lunch and continued to do this for the next nine years.

My Dad died four years ago leaving me footloose and fancy free. I booked a hotel for Christmas in one of my favourite places that I’d always wanted to try and a dear friend, whose husband died around the same time, decided to come with me.

It was a first Christmas for both of us being alone and it was a huge success, so much so that we’ve continued the tradition and thoroughly look forward to it every year.

It worked for us as we had no other family that we needed to consider but I found not trying to replicate the Christmas we had when our loved ones were with us, instead doing something completely different was a huge help.

How tragic, ChloeJo, I’m so sorry. 💐x

Hi
My dad and mum both died on Christmas Eve a year apart. I had a daughter and granddaughter age 6 I was heartbroken but for my family I cooked the dinner played games with granddaughter. At night when they went home I had wine and cried my heart out. I’m sad every Christmas but I make the effort for my daughter and granddaughter. I light the candles and remember the happy times like they wanted me to I’m 66 I’m lucky to have such lovely parents. Think of all the good times u had with them have nice food and enjoy like I do

You’re not being a pain at all, Dawn62 - you have a huge emotional load to cope with, besides grief for your dad. It’s good to offload here if it helps at all. 💐x

Hello.thank you all for the messages.My head is just completely messed up,dad went into hospital for what we thought were stents but turned out he needed a triple bypass from which he got a bleed and never came around so for a week mum my hubby and i sat by his bed,so it was a shock and i feel so sad,from deciding he needed a bypass he wasn't allowed home so that week he rang endlessly sent messages he was so sad missed mum so much he was worried about her,i had lots of messages say i loved you down from the minute you were born,you were our xmas gift bday xmas for me,and one of the lest messages said remember Dawn i have had a good life,why would he say that makes me think he knew something he was very active until the last year he was 83 and still running his own business.Anyway back to xmas strange i can talk about what happened because i feel it is someone elses life not mine can't think of him as gone,my sister lived with them shes late 50's single doesn't work and her and i hate really hate each other apart from twice in the last 6 weeks we have not spoken for 40 years,i don't think she liked dad he always favoured me and they had a hard relationship because she lived with them but would go months even years without speaking to them,since dad has died she fell out with mum for 2 weeks when she needed us the most,we buried dad etc and she has asked nothing about dad,she is speaking to mum again not me i will never speak to her again and after dads things are sorted mum will make 2 will so we never has to face each other.Anyway she wants to put a tree up i think it is just to upset mum but would tells me she's not bothered either way she just wants to get through xmas so i have decided to say nothing about it don't want to stress mum out shes nearly 80,but apart from going to visit our son and his family taking mum she loves the 2 and 4 year old as did dad,i wont do anything just be a normal day maybe next year we can go away for xmas,i would now but i can't leave mum and she wants to be home,she hasn't accepted dad has gone either she tells me she still feels like he's home.I just worry i am maybe a drama queen for being so selfish and saying no to all the xmas bits,i don't want to force fun if that makes sense.Thank you all and sorry for being a pain.

I'm not looking forward to Christmas this year either. It will be the first without my daughter who died 6 mths ago and my brother in law, my sisters husband, died two weeks ago. We still have his funeral to get through. However, I have four grandchildren and my son and his wife have invited me, my son in law, my daughters children, his wife's parents for Christmas. Hopefully all the childrens' excitement will make the time pass quickly.

There isn’t a one size fits all for this - we all have to do what we feel is right for us at the time. When my dad died, we had mum with us for lunch just like we’d always done with both of them in previous years. It was a more subdued affair, but we still had Christmas, together. When mum died, my DH and I were invited to my brothers house for Christmas lunch which was very thoughtful of him and we reminisced together. Subsequent Christmases we’ve gone back to staying at home on Christmas Day and see family in between Christmas and New Year or the run up to Christmas.
It’s all still so very raw for you Dawn and I imagine that you are really only going through the motions right now. Perhaps closer to the day, you might feel that you want to be with your family for some of the day or still feel that you can’t. Either way is understandable, there’s no right or wrong way, no one size as I said at the start. Whatever you decide, look after yourself. Condolences to you 💐.

My much loved MIL died last December ,sadly we had 3 more deaths BEFORE the actual day with funerals on the horizon.I managed because I cooked dinner on the day for my Son and his family,his wee one was jst 2 and his oldest 12 and they kept me busy .
This year ,I'm in bits .I'd happily forget about it all and suface sometime in January .I've spent the past few days in tears because I came across the still wrapped presents for the folk we lost last year .I'll need to open them so I can pass them to charity but I cant face seeing the things I bought with such love for them that they didn't get to see

Do what you feel comfortable with.
I lost both my parents in the last months leading up to Christmas and my mum 5 weeks before my daughter was married. DH's father died on DH's birthday just days after Christmas. Not all in the same year.
We decided as the family was still at home we would carry on, as usual.
At DDs wedding I put on a smile and got on with it, the only time I nearly broke was when ex-SIL said how sorry she was and was I coping . I just said I hope it looks so.
I tell myself they would have wanted me to, especially my father he always said he wanted to be made into fertilizer for tomato plants.
What ever you decide will be right and you can always do it differently next year.

So sorry for your loss.

Whatever you do this Christmas you will feel sad and miss your father. This is only natural.

As you and your husband will be alone and he is willing to fall in with your plan, go ahead with it.

Next year, you will be better able to cope with a little Christmas cheer, although things will never be as they were before.

I lost my mother in 2002, my father in 2009 and my sister in 2016 and there are still Christmas hymns I only can get through without crying if I shut the dear ones who are no longer here out of my mind.. But apart from that, I can enjoy Christmas again now, though the first time without a person is hard.

My dad died 2 weeks before Christmas, a few years ago. He absolutely loved Christmas Day. All the family went to my parents usually, so for that year, my mum didn’t have a tree, but we did have a scaled down family lunch with lots of laughs about previous Christmases and tales of my dad etc.

We’ve now taken on the Christmas day festivities at our house,
and we all still tell tales and enjoy the day, whilst thinking a lot about my dad.

Just do what feels right for you.

I would just celebrate the love you had for so many years and carry on as usual enjoying what you know your dad would have enjoyed.
I have no such memories of happy Christmas’s or even lots of love with my parents and you are very blessed that you have, so just celebrate the happy times you had.

Barmyoldbat ❤

My MiL and DF died within 6 months of each other - MiL in the summer. The following 10th December is forever etched on my brain, because that was the day my mother phoned in tears to say she’d just been told that my father was dying. He died exactly a month later, so that was a very sad and subdued Christmas, but with young dds I did of course make an effort anyway.

The following year we went away for Christmas, taking both my mother and my FiL with us. It seemed the best solution and worked very well. I know we were fortunate to be able to do that, though.

My father in particular was a very jolly type - he’d have hated to think of his death casting a shadow over subsequent Christmases, so I always tried to let that thought guide me.

My gc lost their mum 2 weeks before last Christmas, the spent the day together, cooking the meal she would have done and are intending to do the same this year. For myself this will be my first Christmas without my daughter `and we will just hold her in our thoughts and memories

Do what you feel comfortable with

Is the best advice. You wont like any option, but the one that suits you better is the one to choose.
My Father died nr his birthday nr Christmas nearly 10 years ago, and although Christmas decs ect. have always been put up, I still haven't been able to put his photo around the house.
I took them all down when he died.
I do keep him alive in my heart by talking to or about him, and toast him silently at family occasions.
My condolences

We have always been a Christmas obsessed family.

My Mums last Christmas, she was terminally ill and living with us. I had all the AC, GC and my sister and husband here it was busy and noisy, Mum laughed and enjoyed it, we made memories for us all.

The following Christmas DH, myself our DD and GS spent Christmas Day and Boxing Day at my sisters. It was quieter, there were tears along with much reminiscing and laughter. It worked for us.

You have to do what you feel comfortable with, it will be different, make it special for you and your family.

My father also loved Christmas and I carefully did the opposite to you.

Both my parents died within a few weeks of each other and I inherited all their old decorations. I used all their cherished baubles and (weeping) made a wreath for the door as dad used to.
I went overboard with decorations mingling their old baubles with mine and I suppose I took comfort in the love this somehow demonstrated. I still weep when I take some of these out of the boxes each year but surely this is a good thing and demonstrates how very lucky I have been to have great parents that I still miss.

I had had so much love over the years. Yes, the decorations spoke to me in terms of what I had lost but also in terms of the blessings I had had and would carry forward with me.
We bought lebkuchen to remember Mum and Bronnley soaps (which she loved) as small gifts for her friends and though we are vegetarian we had a big Christmas lunch and toasted them both. Dad loved to cook and would have been busy at the Aga from the night before.

I made myself make dad's Christmas cake and made a very boozy Christmas trifle.

We all find the ways to cope that suits us best. I won't pretend it was easy but the idea of doing nothing when he loved it so much was out of the question!
to you.

I’m sorry for the mistakes. I did try to read it through first.

I am so sorry for your loss💐

Everyone grieves in their own way Dawn, so what I am going to say coms from my own experience only. Please disregard it totally if it is wrong for you.

The first time you celebrate Christmas without that special person that you live is terrible, because it is all wrong that they are not there where they should be. But unless you are never going to celebrate Christmas again, there will always be that “first time” without them, whether you do it now or in ten years time. I have lost my mother, my father, my sister, my husband and there is no getting past it, it has to be endured. So my decision was to just do it.

Secondly, I want to say you have so many people that you love still in your life. Don’t waste this time you have with them. Christmas is not trees or decorations or even presents, it’s being with people you love and doing what makes them happy. You have your husband, your son, your lovely grandchildren, who are at the best age to enjoy Christmas.
Please don’t let this Christmas with them slip away.

Dawn62 I do understand where you are coming from but I wonder if it wouldn't be more of a comfort to all be together if that is possible, small GC really help in this situation and I remember sitting and watching ours carry on as "normal". It is hard, you don't have to be all singing all dancing just a quiet day together.