cimorene

The substitute airbnb worked out for the last two nights.

The food was tasty! But I did not enjoy the feast day. Or the entire week so far really.

It was bad enough that I walked into the living room - full of talking relatives (10 guests) - and stood by Wax's chair, trying to make myself just pick a place to sit and make myself take part, but I was frozen like a statue, unable to do anything (there was nowhere left to sit but the floor or on top of Wax and that was the last straw, combined with what felt like a wall of sound). Wax noticed me standing like a statue and touched my wrist to check in and said "Okay?" and I automatically said "No." I then spent most of the free unstructured talking/socializing time hiding in the dining room with Sipuli, feeling simultaneously overstimulated - buffeted by too much noise from the next room and unable to go look for earplugs - and left out. (Littlest niece was also overwhelmed and she was also hiding alone, but in the kitchen, watching something on a tablet. Later I came in there and asked her if it all got to be too much and she nodded shyly and we both petted the cat. Then I left again lol.)

I didn't get to the point of meltdown, but I was already feeling extremely overstimulated by the end of the 23rd and I was still overstimulated and consequently irritable when I woke up yesterday. (I did not have enough spoons left to deal with being talked to before breakfast two days in a row!)

There were a couple of hours in which everyone but me and littlest niece sat in the living room talking and eating cookies and nobody wanted to start preparing the food yet. This made me extremely anxious because the amount of food prep tasks for the day that had to happen before we eat seemed huge, and I can't relax before starting a time-limited to do list. I was so anxious that I broke down almost crying in the kitchen and complained to Wax that everyone was doing everything illogically and disorganizedly and she hugged me and laughed and said it didn't matter and I didn't have to worry about it and could go take a nap if I wanted. I didn't, though. I also felt too bad about leaving Sipuli alone with the party in the next room so I ended up lying down alone in the room with her until people started wanting to set the table and prepare food. I had to be on hand through that entire process to answer Where is X?-questions because Wax doesn't remember where anything goes and usually doesn't hear the first time you ask her something.

Dinner went okay, and I had some bits of fun and enjoyed eating. The family present opening also went okay. The way it works in Wax's family is that every nuclear family brings all the presents they got from anyone and they all get opened while everyone else is supposed to watch. That means that it takes forever and we all watch everyone open stuff from people we don't know and also the distribution of recipients is extremely lopsided. I've disliked this event ever since there were multiple children to open presents (so... like 16 years, or eight family feasts), because that's what pushed it over into taking forever. Yeah, sure, cultural differences and different doesn't mean better about MOST things, but I still think my family's way where each nuclear family opens their personal presents first and the extended family only exchange presents among themselves at the communal Christmas is objectively better.

The fact that there weren't really enough upholstered seats in the living room for everyone was on us as hosts and we honestly forgot to think about it at all... but on the other hand there was a time when I would happily sit on the floor, and yesterday I was just like, Nope, I'm too old and I'm too tired, I'm not gonna sit on the floor or a little wooden stool in my own living room while a dog and an empty space occupy half of my sofa. (I made Wax share the armchair with me for the present opening but that was not super comfortable because it's not big enough.) Another part of me was like, these people are your family and you can just sit down beside them or shove the dog over! But another part of me was like AAAAAAAAAAA. And as soon as the presents were done I went back in the dining room with Sipuli.

Maybe going upstairs would have been better in the long run - because I had to retreat anyway and I couldn't do any good lying with my head under the cat. They would have had trouble finding things for sure and probably never known where any serving dishes were, but they would have still eaten, I presume.

But I didn't feel able to go upstairs and nap, partly because I'd looked forward to the day, maybe? Probably partly because of a sense of duty, though. By my big Midwestern extended family's standards I am a pretty bad host already, and knowing what my mom and aunts and grandma would do is enough to provide a mental background of shame, but actually LEAVING might be enough to put me in the category of like, Bad In-laws that are Terrible Hosts who become gossip and then family legend. I was raised with horror stories about the bad host behavior of my dad's family from a young age, and as a child I also experienced feeling confused, unwelcome, and uncomfortable in some of their homes, so I have a lingering fear of becoming THAT as the endpoint of the slippery slope of failing to host as well as my mom and aunts. I'm realizing as I write this that that doesn't logically follow and I should probably revisit these ideas and calm down about them.

I guess family Christmas was actually a success because I think most of the guests liked it fine, although the airbnb nightmare must have taken some years off SIL's life. However, from my point of view... I have to give it one star.

ETA: forgot to add that Tristana has been refusing to sleep in the bed with me since the Strange Cats slept on it even though I changed the sheets, when I have been used to her cuddling with me all night recently.

ETA2: I would have liked to medicate, but my benzos are still not working after taking them too often during the recent nervous breakdowns 🙃 I thought about just taking a quadruple dose in order to get the effect; I've been told it's not like, poisonous. But I wasn't having any severe anxiety symptoms, so I was reluctant to perhaps make the tolerance worse when I'm trying to give it time to fade.

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stranger

I have to confess that I'd skip most family holidays, given the chance. They were often performative for me, even when I was somewhat comfortable (I was never in a place where I had to host anything). On the other hand, "performative" meant mostly being quiet and doing set things to be polite, but not being that stressed about it, because most disapproval just sailed over my oblivious head.

I had a lovely Thanksgiving one year in college, when I had to write a paper that weekend and completely stayed home (and in the library) to do that instead. I even got a plate of traditional dinner from a kind neighbor who thought it was terrible I had to miss the holiday. Sadly, this excuse doesn't work after one graduates.

The whole AirBNB fiasco sounds like a major nightmare, though, and there really isn't any way you could have made it better.

1empress

I hope you get some time to unwind now it's almost over. It's an overstimulating season, and there's so much work to be done if you're hosting and cooking.
I'm sure your pusscat will be back sleeping with you once she's made her point clear enough.