Mental Illness in the Family Support Group

I remember a few Christmases that really stick out in my mind. Well, like I've said before on here, we were very poor when I was a little kid. So some Christmases were pretty lean, but we never cared.

We would put the tree up just a few days before Christmas and decorate it together while playing Christmas carols and drinking hot cocoa.

I remember laying in bed on Christmas Eve all snuggled up with my sister and my brother, listening to Christmas carols on the radio, anticipating the arrival of Santa and whatever gifts he left. We always got at least one toy and usually some useful items like pajamas, socks, hairbrushes/ribbons, etc. The most fun to me was the stocking. We got apples, oranges, bananas, sometimes we even got a pomegranate (when mama could afford it). She also would give us a little Christmas candy. We didn't have store bought stockings so we would hang up any sock we had. I use to like my knee high socks......lol

On Christmas morning we would wake to the wonderful aroma of food being prepared in the kitchen. Mama and Granny had already been up for a few hours cooking and preparing the meal. My great granny was a Ramone, straight from Italy. (I'm also Swiss German and English) Anyway, it is traditional in our family to make homemade ravioli as a side dish to whatever else like turkey, ham, or prime rib, etc. So they were busy getting all that together. I love those memories.

Also, my mama always made sure we knew the Christmas story about Jesus being born in Bethlehem in the stable. She would sometimes read that to us from the Bible and also The Night Before Christmas.

My favorite memories of particular gifts throughout my life are a Toodles doll, a Thumbelina, a giant stuffed purple poodle, a Tricky Tommy Turtle, a suede purse with fringe on it, bicycle, and a Christmas pillowcase, and a shawl from Ireland.

I'm 52 years old, so there have been alot of Christmases for me over the years. The best were with my own children. They are grown now. But I love reflecting back over the years when I was young, too.

Lolly, maybe I just speak for me, but you set too high a bar for us with your beautiful memories--I think that's why folks haven't replied yet. I didn't have a miserable childhood, but here is the truth of Christmas in my youth: my mom worked fulltime as a teacher (so did my dad, but my mom had responsibility for food, clothes, and kids--three of us), so she would finish up her school stuff and then would be a MegaBitch and a ManicMom in trying to get her shopping and cleaning and cooking and decorating done! In fact, she kind of made us kids miserable until Christmas morn.

Christmas morn, we opened presents (though I LOVE THE TRADITION she started in our family of everyone opening one gift on Christmas Eve). Now, my Mawmaw was a Saint (family lore), who did Christmas so perfect that all of her kids (especially her four daughters) were made to feel inadequate from birth!

I had a reasonably happy childhood, but I don't have any memory of a specific Christmas. I think the fact that my mom was so stressed right till Christmas was something I picked up on. (And since I teach too, I emulate this. Very bad, isn't it?)

Here are some things I loved about Christmas as a kid: My mom would every year, after we kids had opened presents, look around at our haul and realize that she had forgotten to wrap some present she had hidden away somewhere. I loved going into the "men's room" when the extended families (both sides) got together and debating politics with them while they were trying to watch sports and pretend they liked each other. My dad would always take us around to look at the Christmas lights. Did our family put out Christmas lights? No. But we enjoyed looking at the lights other people put out. Dad would always find out the most tasteful and most tacky lights in our small town. So we would go see them both, but we loved the tacky ones the best! Jesus Mary and Joseph would be under one tree, but Santa and Rudolph or the Charlie Brown guys would be under another, so the sacred and secular would be all confused!

Thanks for getting me to look beyond my memories of my mom's stress to the happiness!

We didn't have much money when I was growing up, either, but it didn't matter. What mattered was being together as a family. On Christmas Eve we looked at lights on houses, then came home to hot chocolate and listened to Christmas carols. The evening always ended with my dad reading "The Night Before Christmas," and the Christmas story in Luke 2. A number of years we spent with my grandparents and extended family; they were fun, too, and had a feeling of warmth and security, plus my grandma's good cooking. My mother was a sweetheart, but not a great cook. I miss them at this time of year.

My favorite Christmas, though, happened when I was 15. We were extra poor that year because my dad was starting a new business and it was not going well. He was leasing some land for it, so we took a winter picnic there with hot chocolate and homemade chili, and cut down an evergreen bush (a juniper) for our tree.

My 2 sisters and I talked about the gift situation, and decided to pool our money to get something for our parents. We didn't have much, mostly some babysitting money, but we bought some photo album supplies and a couple of other small items. We went through the box of family pictures and put together a family scrapbook for them; we had so much fun putting it together, laughing and talking about family memories. I think we only had 1 small gift a piece that year, but the best one was watching my parents reaction when they opened their present. It was priceless.

I haven't ignored this post, I just needed time to write everything. I have alot of special memories, with as chaotic and dysfunctional as my childhood was, my parents seemed to always pull it together for Christmas.

Christmas Eve we would get to open one SMALL gift from under the tree. We would have egg nog, christmas cookies, fireplace on, in warm toasty pj's and open that special gift. It was a preview for Christmas morning....LOL

On Christmas morning we would have to let my parents sleep until 7am, they were divorced at age 12, so even with one parent it would be 7am. We weren't allowed to go to the living room until my mom made sure "SANTA" didn't miss anything. Then they would let us loose and we would go to the stocking. It was filled with oranges, walnuts, christmas candy, YUM...

We would spend the day playing, laughing, singing, basically doing what we wanted. My mom would make a delicious turkey with all the trimmings dinner and we would eat around 4.

Mostly it was just the four of us for Christmas, but once my mom and dad divorced it was a little more complicated. My dad was married 5 times, my mom 4, with alot of steps here and there.

Thanks Lolli for taking me down memory lane.....

Hopeful

It sounds like all of us have certain things that are fond memories, although maybe there are things we wish we could do differently in our own families. One thing I didn't tell you all was that I was a very rowdy child (imagine that!!!) and I don't think a holiday went by that my mama (a very analytical/melancholy type person) would have to pop my mouth for something smarty I had said. But you know what? Even that brings fond memories...hahahahahahaha!!!!! I think if she could catch me, today, she would still do it.....

I have a few memories of my childhood .....

1.Driving into the city at night with all of the city lights to get to my grandmothers house.

2. My best friend and I got the same "Baby Tenderlove" for Christmas when we were about 7 years old. We played with them everyday.

3. I remember the year my father split his knee open with the saw when he was trying to cut the trunk so that it would take more water.

4. At last I remember when I was a teenager walking the streets of the Quad Cities at night after a snowstorm with my Aunt. We sang Christmas carols in the snow. There was knowone else around.

I love all the positive things you guys remember. And sorry if I introduced a negative vibe into this postive thread. This is my place to be real, to not have to fake it. So some days I know I am too negative.

Anyways, I can't believe I forgot something I DO remember: Christmas Eve service at Marriedtoit's Childhood Lutheran Church in Piedmont NC. We ALWAYS went to church on Christmas Eve. When me and my two brothers got into our teenaged years, one form of rebellion would be "having" to work (we all worked for spending money--and my middle brother actually saved most of his) on Christmas Eve so we would miss the service. Because there were actually TWO services we had to go to! The early evening one included the Christmas pageant by the kids of the church. I have no memory of being in one, but my mom tells me that she NEVER had a problem hearing me. The later one was a candlelight service (only we lit the candles near the end...it was not all by candlelight). And here is the memory that hit like a Mack Truck when reading this thread tonight: we had an organist in that church. Thelma (I do not joke) was her name. She was pretty unapproachable. She was not friendly. BUT...Thelma had a daughter who was my babysitter when I was little. Thelma's daughter became a very talented opera singer in NYC. But Thelma's daughter would come back to smalltown NC for Christmas Eve and would sing in that service... and OMG. I don't like opera, but she could SING!!! The whole church shook with her high notes.

That's really cool, marriedtoit!!! I love to hear a beautiful voice and nothing is more special than attending church services on Christmas Eve! That's funny about you and your brothers trying to cut church!

I use to try to cut church, occasionally, myself. There were approx. 4000 people in our baptist church. A friend and I would sneak down the street to a donut shop and cut the service and then sneak back in right as everyone was going out the door when it was over. One day, the pastor was shaking everyone's hand as they left and I had slipped up right next to mama. He said, "Well, Laura, I didn't see you in the service, this morning..." And my mama got on to me something fierce. How did he know I wasn't there???? I worked for a pastor years later and told him this story. He laughed and said, "He probably saw you out his study window before he went in to preach that day..." lol

Post edited by: lollipop, at: 12/18/2010 05:27 AM

Shame on you all for cutting church! I loved these stories. I love that married is from Piedmont NC which is where I'm from and still live here.

I remember going for a hike thru the woods with my grandpa looking for the perfect tree. We ALWAYS found one. One Christmas (might have been when grandpa had his bypass) my mom and I went looking. The tree looked so beautiful in the woods, but when we got it into the living room and standing it looked more like a Charlie Brown Christmas.

We put bunches and bunches of decorations on it to cover the fact that it wasn't exactally full.

I remember my grandpa having the fire going so hot that the family that came over would end up hanging out on the porch or in the yard because they had to cool off. It literally felt like Christmas in July.

I remember as a kid the intense anticipation of opening presents at Grandma's house after dinner. But we always had to wait for the dishes to be done and our moms and Grandma took their time, it seems! One kid got to be "Santa" and hand out the gifts.

On Christmas morning, we were always up before the sun and ran downstairs and tore into our presents. We never waited for our parents. They were probably glad to have the 4 of us all downstairs occupied so they could sleep in!

Now that I'm not all about gifts at Christmas, I think the thing that I remember the most are the smells... of the Christmas tree, the food my Grandma made, the cinnamon, cloves, allspice of the hot punch my mom made. The sights, of course, with the tree all lit up with the gifts underneath, all the lights off, beautiful. And nothing makes Christmas more beautiful for me than a fresh blanket of snow, the candles all lit at the midnight Christmas Eve church service as we sang Silent Night.

Just a few of the many memories I have.