Redeeming the Holidays

I will not go into all of the gory details, but my wife grew up in a home which oozed tension and strife.   To me, it seemed like the goal of one person was to stress out the others as much as he could.  Personally, I laughed at the childish behavior.  My wife was not so fortunate.  For her, the holidays have always meant stress, fear and anxiety.  For her, it was more like on "Everybody Loves Raymond" when Robert Barone was trying to lick Pepto Bismol out of the bottle while his parents were going at each other.  It was stress times 10.  This continued into her adult years, and we were the gluttons for driving south over the holidays to partake in the insanity.  Over the years, I witnessed this tension and what it did to my wife.  Because the relationships were unhealthy, manipulative and destructive, we have distanced ourselves from that insanity and have purposed to make the holidays a positive experience for us and our children.

Hunter gets overwhelmed when he receives too many gifts and his senses get overstimulated.  When this happens, he shuts down and it's a stressful situation for everyone.  We have learned to minimize the sensory overload so that he can enjoy the holiday, as well.  We push him but we also know what his limits are.

Merriman-Webster defines redeem as the following:

1. To buy back
2. To free from what distresses or harms.
3. To change for the better.
4. To offset the bad effect of, to make worthwhile.

Many of these definitions apply to our practice of redeeming the holidays.  My wife and our children are no longer being subjected to that insanity, so we have freed them from what distresses and/or harms them.   We have also decided that, as much as we are able to control, our holidays will be different than what she experienced.  Gradually, her holidays are becoming something which she looks forward to, so they are now worthwhile.

Our goal is to give our children good memories of the holidays.  It does not mean that we buy our children everything that they want, but it does mean that there is joy, thankfulness and love displayed in the home.

For my wife's sake and for the sake of our children, we have chosen to redeem the holidays.