I’m just gonna say it. I kinda hate this time of year. Somehow November always sneaks up on me and I’m thrown into a swirl of chaos that lasts about six weeks until the calm, grey boredom of January delivers me some relief. Holidays in recovery come with more baggage than Santa’s damn sleigh. I’m forced to see family members I’d rather avoid and I have to be nice because I’m a fucking grown-up and I’ve worked steps, so bratty behavior just makes me feel like shit. There’s never enough time or money for the trip I want to take or the presents I want to buy. Then I have to face the fact that another year has flown by and that makes me feel old because they seem to be going faster and faster. And I don’t even get to have a drink! Not fair.
Don’t forget the guilt. Holidays accentuate every shortcoming for some reason. Before recovery, the holidays made me feel even more secretly awful about my addiction than usual. After I got clean, I felt weird for being single and not drinking at holiday parties and family events. After I got married, I just had twice as many drunk asshole family members to deal with and now they were all asking me when I would have a kid. Now that I have a kid, I have to worry about being judged as a parent and monitoring a tiny, volatile human being’s behavior around a group of tipsy morons. As far as I can tell, it’s really a no-win.
Even though I’m in recovery, I’m still estranged from certain family members and haunted by the memories of the old days. In fact, the holidays bring those old blurry images in my brain into sharp focus again. Then there are the days when I just feel just worn down by all the drinking—the constant drinking. I have faced 15 sober holiday seasons. Some of them were really rough, some were okay but they all had one thing in common: I didn’t pick up a drink or a drug. Here are some tips for making it through the holidays with your recovery (and sanity) intact.
1) Plan alternative events that will actually be fun.
You may have obligations like drunken office parties and awkward family dinners that you can’t get out of during the holidays, but that doesn’t mean it all has to be torture. I used to plan like crazy for Black Friday shopping as a way of distracting myself from Thanksgiving. It wasn’t really about the awesome $7 boot warmer or three sweatshirts for the price of one, it was about having something to look forward to. After I moved to a strange city by myself, I was off the hook for regular family dinners but I still had to find positive things to fill that holiday void. I would use the long weekend to visit friends I don’t see enough or sign up for a volunteer gig. Doing something nice for others staves off self-pity and old ghosts. Now that I have a kid, I can do fun holiday things with him that don’t involve booze (at least not for me—I can’t speak for the mall Santa).
2) Take someone safe with you.
I don’t know about your family, but mine is nicer to strangers than me. Bringing a friend from the rooms to family dinners really helped me early in recovery. Not only does that give you somebody to talk to that doesn’t have wine breath, it can also help buffer toxic energy from family members. It’s important to pick a companion who can hang in social situations (for example, my boyfriend from 2004 who was fresh out of prison was not a good choice) because you don’t want to end up babysitting your companion.
3) Don’t get caught up in drama.
Several times a year I have to spend time with a person who gets off on intentionally pushing my buttons. I have no choice. The consequences for avoiding her indefinitely would be worse than the occasional bother of her company. I used to get myself so worked up before seeing her that I would already be defensive and almost physically ill before I even left my house. I would have entire arguments in my head before crossing the threshold. It was self-defeating and ridiculous. I finally had to surrender to the fact that she is a fucking nuisance and there is nothing I could do about it. I’m not going to “win” with her, so I choose not to play anymore. I am as pleasant as possible without offering any personal information that can be used as ammunition for an attack. I bite my tongue while she quotes Fox News, say the Serenity Prayer in my head and count the minutes until it’s over. Since I made an effort to alter my perspective and reactions, I have had several holiday dinners with this person that are actually pleasant. It’s amazing what can happen if you get out of your own way.
4) Have a hard out (I’m big on exit strategies).
I may have to go, but I don’t have to stay. In my early recovery, I used meetings as an excuse to escape to a safe place after picking through the emotional land mines of every holiday dinner. As I got better at setting boundaries, I just left when everybody started getting buzzed enough to make me uncomfortable. Now I have a kid, who is the world’s best excuse. He really does have a bedtime and he will explode if he’s past his limit of socializing. I like to get on the same page with my companions about an exit strategy before we enter a potentially drunken/annoying/uncomfortable situation. Sometimes this means we take separate cars, so I can feel free to bail out if needed. I don’t like to be trapped in a potentially unsafe situation. You’ll never see me on a booze cruise for this exact reason.
5) Don’t be afraid to skip it altogether.
If you really aren’t up to it and it’s a serious threat to your sanity or recovery, don’t go. There’s always next year. Trust me, it’ll be here before you know it.
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