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GROWING UP, I always remember great Christmases. My Mum saved all year and began buying presents in the summer just so we could wake up on Christmas morning to bagfuls of presents. We lived in a small estate in a little village and everyone knew everyone. When I was nine my parents bought a pub and Christmas day was one of only two days in the entire year my siblings and I would get to spend with them, undisturbed by goings on in the bar.
When I was 19, the pub was sold and my parents split. Christmas after that was uncomfortable and fraught with ill feelings. The day itself never felt special. We would stuff ourselves till we could barely move and watch rubbish TV.
In 2009, Beth came along and was barely three months old when we celebrated her first Christmas. The day was spent with just the two of us and my mother. It’s hard to even think of that day without getting sad. I felt like a failure as a mum, not able to provide a proper traditional family for my daughter. The next day she went with her Dad for a few hours to spend time with his family.
I couldn’t see then how it was ever going to be different, but it is, thankfully. Beth is becoming more aware of the whole holiday. She has ‘written’ her Santa letter and knows he can’t bring her everything in the Smyth’s catalogue. The excitement is palpable in our house.
This year will be Beth’s fourth Christmas and every year has gotten better. For the last two years her dad and I have shared Christmas day. At 8am he arrives at the door and we enter the living room together with Beth to see what Santa has brought. We spend a couple of hours opening presents, eating breakfast and playing. At about 10am, Beth gets all wrapped up and leaves with her dad to go visit his parents’ house until dinner is ready at my house.
Last year was lonely. When they left the turkey was in the oven, the gorgeous smell filled the kitchen and I sat at the table at a total loss. There was nothing to do. My family weren’t due for another couple of hours, the place was spick and span and there I was, eating a selection box, on my own, at the kitchen table.
She was only a few weeks old when I knew she wasn’t mine to hold onto anymore. As soon as she was born she became part of her dad too, a granddaughter, great granddaughter, niece and all the rest. As much as I’d like to think of her as all mine I have to realise letting go is the best thing for her. She is very much a part of her dad’s family, the light of their family as well as mine. If I kept her with me she’d never forgive me.
However, this Christmas Eve will just be about Beth and me. I have the whole evening planned. New jammies, Polar Express, selection boxes and hot chocolate are all on the menu. It’ll be the one time over the holidays that it will just be about the two of us and I’m going to make the most of it. I think the key is good communication and letting go. I don’t tell Beth’s dad that he can’t have her on certain days. We try to make a compromise, it may not always be easy, there have been arguments, but in the end we always know what is best for her and there’s no arguing about that.
The arrangement we have now is not going to work forever. It works now because Beth and I live near his parents and that is where he spends Christmas day. In the future, new jobs, new towns, new relationships will all have a part to play in the shape of our Christmas. I just hope that we can always give Beth the Christmas she is happy with. I had magical Christmases as a child. As I got older they were hit and miss. The difference between Beth and I is having parents who aren’t together is all she has ever known. She doesn’t know what it’s like to have mammy and daddy around the same table, at Christmas time or not. Maybe that’s a good thing.
There are many non-traditional families out there. It may be a bit messier but it doesn’t mean that Christmas can’t still be fantastic for the kids. For the adults it can dredge up feelings of loneliness and inadequate parenting, like you are depriving your kids of a ‘proper’ family Christmas. But the reality is that, whether you are a single mum or dad doing it alone, or your kids are spending the day with an array of step mums and dads, it can still be magical and full of goodwill.
I try to embrace the uniqueness of our situation. I’ll admit, there are times when I just want a normal family Christmas – but then who’s to say what is normal? There are more blended families out there than ever before, half a million people in Ireland are living in single parent families. I’m not alone and Beth will see in the future that our situation is not uncommon.
Being a single parent means you do have to work harder to make Christmas work for your own personal circumstances, but it doesn’t mean it can’t be any less special. Beth brings the spirit of Christmas to life for me, whether her dad and I are together or not.
Nessa Toale is a single mother and a writer. Her book is called The Secret Beneath Bleeker Avenue. She also writes a blog: Life, love and the pursuit of a crawling baby. More information can be found on her Facebook Page here. To read more articles by Nessa click here.
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Any chance of luring all Taliban into one place and nuking them.
They’re defending there country would you liked to have put all the IRA men fighting in the troubles in the 70s in one place and nuke them.
@shane. If by ‘defending their country’ you in fact mean ‘ want to set up a neo caliphate and believe its their right to kill non believers’ then youre right. Otherwise no. ( wonder what they’ll do to beliebers?)
I know what you mean,but you can’t say that they don’t have a right to defend there land,alot of times is a farmer shooting at them because he’s pissed off at them for attracting attention of the taliban by trampling through his fields.not all muslims are extremist
@ Shane. Wow what an amazing like for like analogy!! Last time I checked, northern Irish paramilitaries were not burning down schools, refusing to allow women to be educated after the age of eight, forcing child marriage, or banning women from general hospitals.
Catholics were burnt out of there homes they could not get jobs and were basically excluded from politics.is that the reason the UN is there then,why arnt they in all the other Muslim countrys that this happens in.If say for instance Scotland invaded Ireland in the morning through no fault of your own would you just try and make the most of you and your family’s life or would you try do something about it.
The Taliban are not representative of the Pashtun people or the other diverse peoples of Afghanistan. Read up on your Afghan history.
So you think that there glad to have the UN there after all they can grow opium again after the taliban had banned it.Does anybody want foreign soldiers in there country I doubt it somehow
Yes actually I would Shane, they’re all scvm
Also learn the difference between there, their and they’re. What age are you? You clearly haven’t a clue about what’s going on. It’s NATO who are in charge of operations in Afghanistan, not the UN
I was replying to your nuke them all question
Shane – defending their country my hole. A bunch of nuts hiding behind a ‘religion of peace’ the majority of whom Re not even from Afghanistan. A bunch of thugs who terrorised a local populace.
The UN are there at the request of the Government of Afghanistan to assist it and the people of Afghanistan in laying the foundations for sustainable peace and development. As for your opium comment, Between 1996 and 1999 Mullah Omar reversed his opinions on the drug trade, apparently as it only harmed kafirs. The Taliban controlled 96% of Afghanistan’s poppy fields and made opium its largest source of taxation. Taxes on opium exports became one of the mainstays of Taliban income and their war economy.
Any more ‘facts’ Shane, or will you admit that your analogy is based on assumptions and poor research?
No mate I come here for questions and answers I can admit when I’m wrong.I thought the Americans went in after bin laden that they weren’t invited wasn’t the taliban in government they were fighting the northern alliance.
Germany rules large tracts of western European the early 40′s yet, would you agree that they were the rightful rulers?
Read what they (Taliban) did in Mazar-i-Sharif. Is this behaviour that is acceptable when assuming power?
I’m not saying I support the taliban any group that wants sharia law should not be aloud near politics at all.my point is that you can’t blame people who want to defend there land from invaders the farmers hate when troops come into there area becauae it attracts the taliban in for a fight,they just want to be left alone from both sides
Where are the bleeding hearts now…… Guess we have a good idea what the outcome of this will be…….
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