Christmas Eve was also my husband’s grandma’s birthday. Starting with Thanksgiving, we are on nonstop holiday gatherings and birthday celebrations. There are 10 birthdays of just family members, including mine, in December. I know birthdays are great celebrations but I was not really feeling like it this year. Not to mention tensions were high from a built up since Thanksgiving.

I’m a very introverted person who grew up with basically no family and spent half my life celebrating holidays on my own or having the ability to pick and choose what I wanted to do. However, Isaac has a large family and they all want to be together. Which is great … for him and my daughter… but I was having a little too much get togetherness for awhile. Plus I’ve been on high stress alert with Christmas gifts looming in our bedroom with sheets over them to somewhat hide them. I really needed help wrapping them. They were mostly for our daughter and nephew. I used a lot of my savings and my STD money to pay for the gifts. Our daughter, bless her heart, wrapped all of the gifts I bought for my husband and I was not going to have her wrap her own gifts. My husband said he would wrap them (a week ago). Now being that it was the day before Christmas and they were still not wrapped, I was having a nervous breakdown at home all by myself waiting for my husband to get home.

Of course the moment he walks in, I patiently (not really) ask him how it went. He said it was fine but one of his aunts didn’t bring the rice and beans and the other aunt had to make the tortilla soup when she got there. So basically, it was just another typical family event 🙂 needless to say, he had not eaten so he stopped to get food and was ready to eat. He sat at the kitchen table as I patiently (really trying) waited for him to finish eating. About 30 minutes past and he came to sit down on the couch. I proceeded to ask about the wrapping. He said, “ok babe give me a minute. I said I would do it but I just got home. I just want to sit down for a second and relax.”

Warning explicit words ahead

Tears start to well up in my eyes and I’m upset. This is why I hate relying on others. “Never mind. I’ll figure it out!”, I cried. I got up and stormed into the bedroom. I could hear my husband get up and ask where the wrapping paper was. He says, “I told you I would do it. I just wanted to rest for a minute.” I proceeded to tell him I’ve been waiting weeks for it to get done and it’s now the day before Christmas. “I fucking, fucking hate having to rely on you. You think I like to fucking ask for help?! I just wish I died so I didn’t have to deal with Christmas and all this!”, I exclaimed. I was losing it and my words were jumbled. He said, “I don’t understand what you’re saying.” That made me even more upset and I just said, “Don’t fucking do anything. I don’t need shit from you.”

I was totally losing it and now crying uncontrollably. Thinking back it was pretty comical but at that time emotions were high. I knew at that time I was on thin ice emotionally. He apologized even though it was not his fault. I apologized for just overreacting. It was going to be Christmas and it was important for me our family make it through Christmas because who knows, so I felt it could be my last.