Your "I'm Alone on the Holidays" Thread (divorced, grandmother, husband)
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Exactly. I am curious for all those who were unhappy with their Thanksgiving this year, are you doing anything now to make sure it doesn't happen again?
I think there have been some great suggestions here that have been brushed aside because "no one who wasn't completely alone on Thursday gets it." What is there to get?
There is a good chance I will spend a holiday alone here and there as life goes on. My daughter is grown, I live alone, my family of origin is 1,200 miles away (and I never visit on holidays). But it won't catch me by surprise. I'll make sure I plan a great day, and posting an "us vs. them" thread about it won't be part of that day.
Seriously, why do you insist on badgering people? Most have posted the whys and wherefores of their holiday decisions. If you don't like it, make different decisions for yourself. I don't know why this is so hard for you.
Some years ago, I invited my neighbor, who was a widower, over for pie Thanksgiving afternoon. We chatted, ate some pumpkin pie, and he left.
This could be a good model for those without other Thanksgiving plans. It doesn't give guests the awkward feeling of being an outsider at a gathering of intimates--it's just dessert. It's normal for casual friends and acquaintances to have a little food and drink together. It's something to look forward to for people who don't want to spend the whole day alone.
It should probably be hosted by someone who is *not* having a big dinner (i.e., beyond immediate family). For one thing, most hosts look forward to everyone going home after a big dinner. For another, the dessert guests might wonder why they didn't merit an invitation to the dinner, even if they didn't want to go. It should probably be hosted in the evening so that it feels like dessert and not dinner. There could be board games or a movie for entertainment.
Some years ago, I invited my neighbor, who was a widower, over for pie Thanksgiving afternoon. We chatted, ate some pumpkin pie, and he left.
This could be a good model for those without other Thanksgiving plans. It doesn't give guests the awkward feeling of being an outsider at a gathering of intimates--it's just dessert. It's normal for casual friends and acquaintances to have a little food and drink together. It's something to look forward to for people who don't want to spend the whole day alone.
It should probably be hosted by someone who is *not* having a big dinner (i.e., beyond immediate family). For one thing, most hosts look forward to everyone going home after a big dinner. For another, the dessert guests might wonder why they didn't merit an invitation to the dinner, even if they didn't want to go. It should probably be hosted in the evening so that it feels like dessert and not dinner. There could be board games or a movie for entertainment.
Not only me...everyone I know would wonder about this. I have had friends who were estranged from their kids for periods of time. But not ALL their kids. I am a curious person. Family dynamics are interesting to me...so help me understand.
This post made me LOL. Literally.
Lay off, lady. Seriously.
The OP could not have made the thread title any clearer. No has to help you understand anything.
I, as a vet, have spent many a holiday alone. Now personally, I like it. But I can totally get why some do not.
The OP could not have made the thread title any clearer. No has to help you understand anything.
I, as a vet, have spent many a holiday alone. Now personally, I like it. But I can totally get why some do not.
"Family dynamics" are not always the cause.
Understand now?
Please read the actual post I was responding to. It was not the OP. It was from a poster 2 pages in. She stated that she was unhappy being alone but hadn't spent a holiday with any of her three children in decades. I was curious how that would happen when you were unhappy about not having anyone to spend particular time with.
But it doesn't really matter does it? I was curious, as a lot of people would be.
The OP has stated they prefer being alone at the holidays so obviously I wasn't addressing them.
I think there have been some great suggestions here that have been brushed aside because "no one who wasn't completely alone on Thursday gets it." What is there to get?
Thanksgiving dinners are for families and their closest friends, not random acquaintances, and people tend to miss those connections when they aren't there. Circumstances aren't always under our control, and even when they are, there are other considerations besides how we spend holidays.
The "great suggestions" I've read on this thread are of the "Why don't you just..." type, by people who've never spent a major holiday alone and haven't stopped to think that the advice they're repeating (Just talk to your neighbors! Just volunteer! Just invite random acquaintances over!) has already been endlessly repeated and tried with mixed results.
When someone (at work) asks, "How was your Thanksgiving?" I say ruefully, "This is a tough time of year for me. But I do think we should have food and gratitude all year long." For Xmas, it's "I think we should have food and lights all year long."
Works for me.
I still don't understand what information or stories you are hoping to elicit though. Joyful tales of loneliness? Did you really expect no one to ***** and complain about the people and situations in their lives that left them abandoned or marginalized on this day? You are doing it too.
As humans we want to help when someone is hurting. So we dig into causes and look for solutions.
I am not abandoned or marginalized. I CHOOSE to be alone on the holidays, after years of hectic travel on the holidays, combined with a high stress job.
In years past I could have asked a couple of friends or acquaintances to come over, but I CHOSE not to. I didn't want to entertain. I wanted to enjoy the day in a relaxed way of my own choosing. But in the future, after I meet new people in my new city, I might ask a couple over, if they don't have plans, and see how that goes. We could play cards or a board game, fry a turkey outside...whatever.
I do my holidays up right. I cook a holiday meal for me and my dogs. I cook what I want, how I like it. I do any number of other things that I enjoy. If I'm hitting the holiday sales, I research that and get my plan ready to go, or I order online.
It can be a time of reflection, when I reflect should I have remarried? Should I have had kids? But then I realize that I CHOSE not to remarry because I was so unhappy being married. I CHOSE not to have kids. And then I look at what I do have: no old geezer bossing me around or expecting me to be his caretaker, no kids with problems, able to retire a little early, good health, a few friends with the hope of making new ones in my new city when I find a house, a good brother (but awful sisters), two mischievous rescue dogs...and on and on.
I much prefer these holidays I have to the ones with my large family, when there would be an argument sooner or later, and all the hectic travel. Or a smug relative says something snarky to someone. The money wasted on gifts that people complained about. I don't do any of that any more. I just decide to have a nice time on the holidays, and I do.
So don't assume that people alone on the holidays are all lonely, because you would be. People are different.
So don't assume that people alone on the holidays are all lonely, because you would be. People are different.
Of course not. I think you may be confusing me with another poster. I was the one who suggested, for those unhappy about being alone, issuing invitations instead of waiting for them, and inviting people not necessarily for dinner, but for breakfast, after dinner cocktails, football or another time limited, low-key get-together. As I stated before, many people like to make the rounds. One young woman who was at my table on Thursday had three houses to go to that day, seeing two sets of parents and her BF's family. They came back later for games.
Do people not do this in other places? Do most people spend all day at one house?
so turkey day i hid in the house with the window shut and shade drawn, yet I rather been out in the yard or in the shop working on something, maybe take the dumb dog for a walk, but no I hid, I was afraid, you see I live in a housing subdivisions, where everybody talks over the fence. it would of been 12 invite and twenty plates if they knew i was home, I is the charity case. so it was the couch the dog , popcorn and bad tv reruns. I did see 14 shows of blue blood, during the Thursday marathon.
so now we got xmas coming
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