I used to hate holidays!

When my ex and I first broke up, holidays were the worst! I’m telling you I would hate those 24hrs and the minutes right before and after them. My children were small, I didn’t have a life of my own and people were tired of my sob story so I truly had no one. The few people I considered friends had some sort of relationship or their children were older or they had a life. Me, nope, nothing! I had gave my life up for marriage and family. The sad part was, it was his family that I spent most of my time with. For some reason, they really felt like my family too, until he and I broke up! I didn’t realize that those were his people and my children’s people but me, not so much lol. I can laugh about it now and I no longer wish to kill any of them! So needless to say, I had really just fell into the whole thing not knowing there would be a time that I would need someone other than him or them. After the break up, holidays like Valentine’s Day, Mother’s/Father’s Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas proved to be those times. The people I had recently spent my holidays with were no longer available, unless I just wanted to be apart of an awkward situation. The people I kinda just left hanging to start my new life had basically found things to do that didn’t include me. I mean, I didn’t want to sit around people I didn’t know and definitely didn’t want to be a pitiful third wheel! So I spent those days in the house with or without my kids, crying, hurt, thinking of all the memories that I allowed to replay in my head because my break up was fresh. Ugh! I mean I made myself sick, I lost weight, my hair was falling out, I started drinking like a fish. All around a holiday!

This lasted a couple of years. It was a fixed pity party. In my mind, it became the time for me to rehash all the stuff that had happened, figure out where he’d lied, think about what I could’ve done or said. Just a bad way to spend a holiday. Especially if my children weren’t home because OMG, all I had was them. The people who would check up on me didn’t make it better. They filled a void of me being alone, but nobody told me anything other than it would be okay! Thats the last thing you really want to hear while you’re drunk and crying so hard that you can’t be understood. It really would be ok and I get it, because you don’t know what else to say to someone in that situation. What did help, was them getting me out of the house, with or without my children. I had to start finding things to do as a party of 3 instead of 4. I even had to find things to do when my children were away.

I would get invites from people who knew what I was going through because I told them or it just showed. I stopped turning people down and started building my life from scratch. It was really a chance to find out who I was and for some, this can be the chance to reinvent yourself. I started “dating” my ex at 16 so I didn’t know who I was outside of him. I was bruised and scared mentally and emotionally. But it was either sit here while these kids grow up and do what you’re grooming them to do, which is be self sufficient and live a purposeful life on their own or go get your life and find out what you like and your purpose so you won’t be a cat lady in the future!

The big picture is the future and no matter where you are in life now it’s gonna change. Change is inevitable! Life will happen to you if you don’t happen to it. So I started having my own holiday parties and making sure I was surrounded by people who loved me and would make me laugh and who wanted to be in my life. I actually started liking the holidays because I looked at life different. It didn’t happen overnight but I found a life lol. I started having people to see and things to do. It didn’t just fall in my lap all the time tho, I had to make a lot of it happen. It started to be “ok,” just like they said!

As Valentine’s Day approaches let me encourage you. Don’t dread it. You don’t even have to celebrate it if you don’t want to but you don’t have to hate it! It is not the end of the road and hopefully not the last Valentine’s Day you will live through. Think about you in the future! Not your children, not your spouse, YOU! If you don’t figure out how to get through them days now, and there’s a time in the future when you need to get through them again, you’re gonna be messed up! Things happen, not just break ups. People pass on, go off to college, get married, etc. You can start a tradition and do it annually until your situation changes. Find a single buddy and make plans, go to a comedy show or dinner or a road trip, something! Don’t be found drowning in your tears wasting your life away about the shoulda, woulda, couldas! Somethings we just have to do for ourselves and you just might like it. I did, probably a little too much! Lol!!! I decorate my house and my office for holidays now. I only wish I started doing things for me sooner.

This doesn’t take anything away from what has happened to you or in your life but trust me, you don’t get time back! Cry it out for a min and then shake it off. The quicker you get over your feelings in a situation, the quicker you stop hurting! So this Valentine’s Day make plans to enjoy life. Don’t trip about being single, just have fun. Holidays can actually be fun again. It’s up to you! Happy Valentine’s Day!❤