Dating during the holidays can be tricky. How long should you date before you exchange gifts? When is the appropriate time to invite a new boyfriend or girlfriend to your family’s house or as your date to the office holiday party? I’d like to hear from people who have started new relationship during or just before the holidays. How did you manage these questions? How did it go? Did you freak the other person out by inviting them to your parents too soon? Or insult them by not bringing the home, to the office party, etc.? What did you learn from the experience? Please get in touch if you have any thoughts.
Hi Sara,
My friend Jessica Mezyk shared your articles with me and I am glad you asked for singles to share what they do during the holidays. I’ve always been very confused as to why holidays are associated with football games. I like football but I thought it strange that if we were all coming together to “celebrate a sacred holday as family” why were we spending time in front of the tv watching something that occurs on a weekly basis? (ie any televised sport) It never made sense to me. I also enjoyed holidays with a large family growing up. My parents did a great job for us kids. When I started working in retail in 1997 I ended up being sick on Christmas so I stayed home. It was so nice and peaceful! Despite that positive experience, I proceeded to spend Christmases with family or friends. After both my parents died in 2007 my 2 brothers and sister, their families and I spent Christmas in the house that I grew up in and my brother currently inhabited with his family. It was the worst feeling ever. They were all exchanging gifts with each other and I had to watch. I exchanged a gift with one of the adults as that became our tradition to draw names but to see them all continue to exchange with each other and give/receive a gift that was “to my family” was pure torture. I left with the worst feeling I had ever had on a holiday. I stopped doing holidays “as usual” for a little while. Not having my parents there was just too palpable so I took a break. Then in 2010 I was diagnosed with Breast Cancer. Being single with no parents and not even a child to be concerned with was a very lonely battle. I kept trying to “do” holidays different to see what would feel good and right for me: go to friends, bring friends, date a guy just so I wouldn’t be “single” and even spent one Thanksgiving home alone reading, listening to classical music and watching movies. This year I made a commitment to experience every holiday starting with Thanksgiving and then Christmas and Easter in silence, meditation, prayer, yoga, spiritual reading, mindfulness and writing. No cell phone, no TV, no speaking (even to myself), just my ipad so I could play podcasts for meditations and yoga classes. I have always wanted to do a silence retreat and will someday but until then I thought this would be a great opportunity to just do the holidays different. I am not necessarily committing to doing holidays this way for the future but thought it would help to push a proverbial “reset” button so maybe I could make choices that would be fulfilling. The whole experience from preparing and sharing with others what I’m doing for the holidays and just stepping out of the norm was very challenging but very rewarding. I woke up on December 26th and didn’t want to come out of the silence. I had found a huge love and appreciation for my self and I didn’t want it to go away by facing the world and all the external stimulations. I’ve been stressed a few times since that day but I can get myself back to a happier, peaceful place more quickly since I exercised that “muscle”. I spent New Year’s Eve and Day with friends and it was lovely but I think next year I might just want to hunker down in my “self-love bunker” again.
What a wonderful idea! I’m sure a lot of readers will take inspiration from this. Thanks, Sara