A roller coaster…..100% the ride I am on. My peaks are lifting me up and carrying me through this season while my valleys are taking it all out of me.

This Christmas season has me feeling verrrrrry “multiple-personality-ish”, and yes that’s a real world, look it up.

I go through moments where I am so excited to do Christmas, so much so thatI found myself buying two more trees this year, so my oldest son could have a Nutcracker tree and so we could have a Santa themed tree. When we put those two trees together, I was happy, excited, smiling. Then I went through all of my ornaments to pull out any Santa or nutcracker I could find, and then came the sadness, because all of these specials ornaments I have, belonged to my mother, and my moms ornaments are now a part of my Christmas goody bag. But as much as I love them, I don’t want them, because I’d do anything to have them hanging on her tree, in her house, that she decorated, because she was still here.

One of my biggest take-aways from therapy has been simultaneous feelings. My therapist tells me at almost every session that “it is okay to feel two very different feelings at the same time”. It is so easy to feel taken over with grief or sadness, but is important to feel all of those happy feelings at the same time, the two feelings can co-exist. The problem is, you get emotional whiplash, it is a very unsettling feeling to go from doom and depressed to laughing and joy, especially when you feel all those feelings within a 5 minute window.

It is my goal to be patient with myself and embrace the different feelings I have throughout this holiday season, take time to process what I am feeling and not feel rushed to get through the sadness to make others comfortable.

I thought I’d share a happy holiday moment…… a before and after if you will, year 2 of non-matching Christmas jammies!