holiday ho hum

Sometimes I think that I completely understand why people profess to hate the holidays.
I am sick of hearing Christmas music already.
I am tired of feeling torn between different factions of my family as to where and with whom I will spend the actual day of Christmas.

Many years ago the local paper used to print a crime map of the previous weeks criminal activity in my city.
It was remarkable how the number of domestic violence calls increasingly escalated between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

I do believe that the holidays increase stress, and eating and a plethora of other issues.
It is OK to make the choice to participate to the amount that is tolerable emotionally. What is hard is people who push and nag for me to attend holiday events when I'm just not feeling like I can tolerate the festivities.

This will be my first Christmas since my brother commited suicide. When I was in college and took psychology classes it was usually considered "normal" to have grief over the death of a family member for one year. The thinking behind the one year is that by then survivors have made it through all of the holidays without the family member.

My Dad's wife sent me an email Sunday that read that my Dad is going down hill fast and the Hospice nurse does not expect him to live through the holidays.
Either way when my Dad passes the clock on that year of living with grief will tick back to zero and I feel just incredulous about this event.