Seeking out articles about the Holiday season that don't tell us to "connect"

[treesgrowslowly]

So I've looked online for articles written about the Holiday season, for the rest of us. Those of us who do not have 3-4 weeks of plans and events with various "F and F" (family and friends) leading up to December 25th.

I tried to find even one article, that takes a different perspective, rather than the tiresome status quo narrative of "if you are lonely....spend time with F and F!"

If people have F and F to connect with, that's great. 

I call BS on these articles. Are any of them written by people who have been through NC and the isolation that comes up at this time of the year? I get the sense that many of these articles, just make things worse for those of us who are going to look out, and try to reach for something beyond  - what is beyond the world of "F and F" in December each year? What is possible for us?

Here's an example of the type of article I'm talking about: https://narcissistabusesupport.com/10-tips-to-survive-the-holidays-with-a-toxic-family/

Solid (familiar to us) advice about basic stuff regarding FOO events. And then at the bottom of the article, the F and F advice, yet again.

Sure, if you've got kind-hearted folks to spend time with this coming season, please do so. I don't know that the average adult needs an online article to point them in that direction.

Some of us dread December, and F and F advice, has nothing to do with where things are at for us. We've had to walk away from so much. We have had to manage an entire year of, well....everything we've managed. We dealt with ups and downs and stress, without F and F support.

The F and F articles (which were 100% of articles I saw in the first 3 pages of search results)...not a great corner of the Internet, if you ask me. If anyone finds articles that actually helped you to make sense of the December time of year, as a survivor of PD abuse, please post for us here!

Trees

[Hazy111]

Trees, good luck with that one!

Its all just cliched platitude stuff designed to make us feel sentimental and nostalgic and guilty ,, to make sure you visit and also remember to "buy stuff , and spend on presents, flights, journeys food drink etc etc. " (Ohh look its Black Friday , when did that become a thing in the UK??? Buy more stuff. Its your patriotic duty)

If youre not attending FOO events you'll less likely to be buying stuff and therefore cant be marketed at.   Just my cynical take on things.

Btw Xmas wasnt that supposed to be about celebrating the birth of ....no no... its about FOO and eating/drinking too much with people you really wouldnt have chosen as friends. 

[Hattie]

I don't have a specific article to recommend, but i guess we don't need to connect just to other people. We can also use the holidays to connect to ourselves, our spirituality, nature, pets etc.

I tend to think loneliness is more a state of mind rather than a literal reality. I have a busy social life but often feel lonely, probably because of my traumatic experiences of loneliness in childhood. Whereas I have a friend who is a Buddhist practitioner, and can spend a lot of time by herself and not feel lonely, because she has such a strong sense of spiritual connection to the world.

So I am always slightly dubious about articles that put forward socialising as the answer to loneliness. I'm not averse to it myself, but it isn't the whole story.

[Boat Babe]

I don't have a specific article to recommend, but i guess we don't need to connect just to other people. We can also use the holidays to connect to ourselves, our spirituality, nature, pets etc.

I tend to think loneliness is more a state of mind rather than a literal reality. I have a busy social life but often feel lonely, probably because of my traumatic experiences of loneliness in childhood. Whereas I have a friend who is a Buddhist practitioner, and can spend a lot of time by herself and not feel lonely, because she has such a strong sense of spiritual connection to the world.

So I am always slightly dubious about articles that put forward socialising as the answer to loneliness. I'm not averse to it myself, but it isn't the whole story.

[treesgrowslowly]

Hazy111, Yes! I agree. I think that people will parrot this idiotic advice about finding Family and Friends, and not realize they are doing this because of consumer culture.

Before the current crop of manipulators, and their social media toys, there was Edward Bernays. We are all living in his world, are we not?

Hattie, this really nails it for me in the sense that I think that we have to work on that...the connections to loving FOO are never going to happen for me. That ship done sailed. Connecting to other things puts us on a different path. This time of year, the status quo is really against us.

This video would tick off a lot of people around this time of year, where consuming seems to ramp up so much. In this video Marion Woodman talks about the addiction to consumerism, based on her Jungian views:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3h4n-_NEgU

I think I was born to people who were addicted to all sorts of things. Including drama, including their own egos, and they inflicted a lot of pain and did a lot of damage to others. I stepped away from it, and I myself, am never going into their world again.

Boat Babe thanks for being here too. It's nice to know there are others who are thinking about these things too.

We are ones who know that the answers we seek, don't lie in doing the same things that we already know don't work. Socializing doesn't lead to anything sometimes.

I think it's their fear, in those articles about how we all have to just go out and drink and buy gifts for each other. They fear their own loneliness, and they write without admitting to it.

Thoughts?

Trees

[Coyote23]

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/tech-support/202111/unloved-daughters-5-ways-defang-holiday-sadness?amp

[Coyote23]

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/tech-support/201711/unloved-daughters-and-holiday-triggers-seven-ways-cope?amp

[doglady]

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/nov/24/toxic-families-thanksgiving-pandemic

I liked this article. It definitely validated the decision not to connect.

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/nov/25/holiday-season-family-more-tense-than-ever

And this one was also helpful. It validated the decision not to attend

[guitarman]

I won't be connecting with my uBPD/NPD sister this Christmas. I won't be sending her a card or getting a Christmas present. I've not been in contact with her for two years. I care but can't cope with her abusive behaviour.

Every Christmas used to be traumatic as we never knew how she was going to behave.

I'm full of guilt for going NC but know I have to look after myself.

Holidays can be stressful and traumatic for many people.

Advice I now follow...

If these people were not related to you would you have anything to do with them? If the answer is "No" then act accordingly.

Keep calm. Keep strong. Stay safe.

X

[treesgrowslowly]

Thanks for these replies everyone.

Coyote23 I read through the articles you posted. I think they are helpful. Thanks for posting them.

Doglady, I have not read through those articles you posted yet, but they look like helpful ones to those of us getting Out of the FOG.

Guitarman, I was given that same advice as well, about thinking about what we would do if they were not relatives. It has been helpful advice to reflect on.

It can help us to see that actually, they are the ones who dropped the ball first. When there is abuse from them, then they are the ones who have ruined things.

Sometimes in our FOO we are told that WE 'started' the drama. No, the abuse is what started the drama...we would not have to make these decisions if something had not happened first.

I think there is a lot of 'sweeping it under the rug' that happens around this time of year too, and some of us just can't do it - it goes against our values.

Good for you for not participating in things that are abusive.

Trees