The Christmas Comedown

Well that’s it then, all gone and packed away till next year.

We have taken the tree and the decorations down today (it’s the 1st of Jan) because, well it was starting to look a little rough around the edges. The tree was missing most its baubles due to Cassi thinking that they were mini footballs, the tinsel not so carefully placed anymore and everything looking less magical than it did, only 3 weeks before.

As we packed away the glittering lights, the warm glow of Christmas was replaced with the dullness of winter. The house was back to its self and it was like it never happened, the memories of the “happiest time of the year” erased.

Suddenly, the decorations that seemed so necessary just looked wrong. The tree is drooping. The house that was so pretty and festive now looks dusty and tired. How’d that happen?

Kids and visitors have slowly destroyed the house, toys discarded everywhere, storage lacking and the house now needing a good gutting. If that wasn’t enough, you’re trying to make peace with the fact that your sister gave you mini soaps, you just know she got from that hotel she stayed in last month, when you gave her the perfume she wears (she has expensive taste) and the guest you spent so much time worrying about making a vegan dish for them decided not to even stop by.

It’s hard to stay in that twinkly Christmas mood when it feels so over.

It always amazes me how quickly the whole season sweeps in, we complain each year that its getting earlier and earlier and then we blink and its done, gone for another year.

After spending a wonderful time over the Christmas and New Year period, it’s easy to feel blue and find that it's difficult to function normally in our daily routines. Holiday blues, holiday depression, or post-Christmas blues, these commonly used terms depict the mental distress occurring after the winter holidays and festival season. The holiday season is both joyful and stressful at once. There is family to get along with, gifts to buy and return, people to visit, activities to throw yourself into, plenty of festive food to eat, sales to rush to, and parties to plan and attend. Topped off with the excitement of New Year's Eve, your adrenaline has probably been pumping a lot of the time during the Christmas and New Year's period. Returning to the usual routine and probably quieter workplace than normal can dampen your spirits just by the absence of exciting things to do and look forward to. Equally, if your Christmas and New Year's Eve period wasn't as enjoyable as you had hoped, you can be left feeling down about the lack of enjoyment you'd expected, and this can sour your mood.

Christmas seems to start to make an appearance around mid-October, with businesses hoping to cash in as early as possible for the commercial holidays.

We are all happy to start getting stuck into the merry making (I love that word), drinking the mulled wine and scoffing the minced pies. Then suddenly it’s all done, and we are left looking ahead to the long grey winter in front of us. It’s still bloody winter but without the magic glint of fairy lights, the excitement is no longer there.

To top it all off, we are bombarded with non-stop resolutions to lose weight, cut down, stop this and blah blah blah as it’s no longer seen OK to be sitting in your PJS, days drinking and living off cheese and celebration chocolates…la sigh!

The build up to Christmas is my favourite part as actual Christmas day can feel like a bit of a disappointment, an anti-climax to the whole season. Not only that, Christmas Day can give me that strange feeling, you know the one. The feeling you get on a Sunday night, it hits you around 5pm that in a couple of hours you are back to work, that’s what I get at Christmas, that’s its almost over and maybe I haven’t made the most of it.

Christmas is "happy." The presents, the food, the booze -- they all distract us from our everyday issues we face every day.

Then Christmas subsides, we are left with the same problems, fears and anxieties we had before. Christmas is like putting a little plaster over the a cut: It covers up the cut and makes it look better. But a plaster can easily fall off. It peels off and things are the same old shit is underneath.

We get a buzz from shopping for loved ones…and ourselves — but those aren't enough to really make us happy, they are temporary fixes. The toys break, or we get bloody sick of the noisy ones, we realise it's just cold, miserable winter. And now there's nothing left to look forward to.

It's the time of reckless spending. And now our bank accounts are in the red, and we are left with nothing but paper receipts and regrets. The thing to remember is this: We might be feeling poor, fat, tired, (insert new year resolution here), but none of that really means anything at all, does it?

Money is only an energy, it comes and goes, and a new pair of sparkly shoes might make us feel good for a minute, but it's not real happiness. The bloated feeling that's stopping us from fitting into our clothes will go once we get back to our old routines, remember we won’t be eating like this again for another year (and who says a few extra pounds are SO BAD anyway? Curves are sexy, guys).

And we will catch up on sleep, work or any other thing that’s on your mind because that’s what we do, let's get through the post-Christmas depression together. Let's remember these feeling are like anything else — temporary. This too shall past.