I was in first grade when someone told me Santa wasn’t real. I refused to believe them. For the next year, I held on to my desire for Santa – this old magical man driven by reindeer with a sleigh full of toys – to be real. He had to be. I wanted him to be more real than my imaginary friends who played with me in my backyard. Deep down inside, I knew believing was silly, but I still wanted to do it because life seemed more fun with magic in it.
Growing up, my family attended a Vietnamese church even though we are Jarai. The family is from Vietnam, but our features are darker and flatter in the nose, and the village had their own language. When I was seven, none of the boys in Sunday school were taller than the girl who played Mary so they forced me to play Joseph. My sister played a sheep. I wanted to be an angel and begged to have my role changed. At home, I expressed my anger but my parents told me I had no choice but to do it. I don’t remember much about the play itself other than my sister being a noisy sheep “baaaa”ing through her scenes. When it ended, I was eager to take off my costume and wash off the mustache and beard someone drew on my face with a black eye pencil. My mom gave me a very frilly dress to wear after the program for the church’s Christmas potluck.
The next year at church, all the girls in Sunday school were required to recite a few verses from memory about the birth of Jesus. I was to go first. There were four verses to say in front of the church into a microphone – in Vietnamese. When I heard my voice echoing against the walls of the church I froze. We never practiced with a mic so it totally caught me off guard. I completely forgot my lines. My teacher had to feed me my verses and I stumbled my way through it like a blind mouse in a maze. When I finally finished, I let out a huge sigh of relief into the microphone. The church laughed. I went home in tears that night completely mortified and embarrassed.
Each Christmas it was one thing after another that I had to do for the church Christmas program. Play piano and multiple instruments, hours of choir practice, dances, working with little kids, making costumes, and more. Each year I felt more stressed and annoyed with the amount of time and energy put into something I really didn’t want to do. When I was 18, I had an anxiety attack in the church coat closet thirty minutes prior to the church program. My dad grabbed me out of the closet and told me I had to get through it or else I’d be in trouble when we got home. I dried my tears and went up and played the piano, sang the songs, but there was no joy in my music that day. I was empty and depressed. Probably my worst Christmas memory.
Not all activities at the church during the holidays were bad. Some of the songs were beautiful. I will admit I did enjoy singing in a small groups, duets, and performing a solo here and there. When I was doing something I actually liked, I felt a lot better. However, for the few things I enjoyed, there were many things I didn’t like to do but had to participate in. My schedule was jammed packed with practice at home and at the church. In addition to all this practicing, my parents would attend other church Christmas programs, or we would perform at other programs besides our own. It was a lot of work and I dreaded the holidays. I never got any extra gifts or any praise for busting tail every Christmas. It was what we were called to do to gain favor and gifts in heaven. When holiday music and decorations at the store went up in the fall, I would start dreading the busy season awaiting the family. “This again?”
Outside of church, we didn’t really many festive activities except visit a few neighborhoods with decorated holiday lights. We didn’t grow up with many relatives around so it was just the four of us every year doing the same church thing and having Christmas dinners at a church. The time we opened gifts was contingent on what time we needed to get ready for the Christmas program we were performing in or attend as guests. There was nothing relaxing about the holidays. I hated it. I hated Christmas.
Strangely, I woke up today and realized I no longer despised Christmas. Hearing holiday songs didn’t send me into a tailspin of dread. It’s more enjoyable and less stressful these days with an emphasis of family and fun. Although I enjoy Christmas programs and appreciate all the hard work that goes into them, I realized participating in them is no longer something I wish to be a part of. Instead, I created my own traditions with the family which includes picking a tree from a u-cut farm, decorating it to the 17 minute version of “In a gadda da vida” by Iron Maiden, and celebrating some polish traditions with our sister-in-law. Maybe there’s a little bit of stress trying to figure out gifts and decorating the house (minimally), but it’s nothing compared to my past.
What I realized is that I had to rewrite my past trauma and appreciate the lessons I learned from it which was:
- Don’t create more stress than you want in your life.
- If your kids are upset, LISTEN to them. Advocate for them first. Try to come up with a fair compromise to get through tough things they don’t want to do. And acknowledge and celebrate their acts of resilience.
- Schedule relaxation time or “lazy” days. It’s totally ok to unplug and not get to your to-do list to keep you sane. The laundry can be done tomorrow.
- Be realistic with your to-do lists. Do you really need to send holiday cards or is it a year to skip it? Whatever you choose, it’s fine!
- Schedule fun activities. Go see lights around the neighborhood, make the best hot cocoas, play games, do a holiday movie night, bake cookies, etc.
- It’s ok to sprinkle in non-holiday music in your holiday spotify list just to keep it fun and fresh.
- Forgive your parents and the church if they made Christmas shitty for you. My parents did their best raising me with what they thought was the right thing to do. I don’t fault them. As for the church, I can now look back and stay neutral on my feelings towards my experience. Ask me a year ago I probably would have given you a totally different answer. That’s a personal sign of growth for me.
So yeah – that’s it. I don’t hate Christmas anymore. I don’t love it as much as other holidays, but I can appreciate and see a bit of magic in it again like I did before I found out Santa wasn’t real. And that’s something worth writing about.
It's Polyesther 