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12 Wins of Christmas with ADHD

With a brand new outlook, I am going to jingle all the way towards the holiday. Here’s to the Christmas chronicles of a late realised and mentally hilarious ADHD woman in her 40s 🤶🎅🎄🥂.

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In a valiant attempt to banish my inner Grinch and embrace the spirit of Christmas, I decided to dig deep and reflect on my December wins.

In years gone by, the lead up to the big day was the nightmare before Christmas and I just wanted to be left home alone to wallow in my own misery. 2023 has seen me start to evict my shame and guilt gremlins and address those negative die-hard habits that stopped me from seeing that love actually is all around.

Here is a look through my ADHD lens at my December wins …

🤶The first win of Christmas … My boy opened door number one of his advent calendar on the 1st December. This is not to be taken for granted in our mentally hilarious household. There have been years where, due to the elves being exceptionally busy preparing the advent calendars, they have (very naughtily) sent my son’s calendar late and it hasn’t arrived until the 3rd of 4th of December. So, the fact that he did have it on the 1st is to be celebrated. We can ignore the fact that it was only just before bedtime on the first when a lovely Amazon-elf turned up with it. Someone forgot about the calendar (again) and someone only ordered it the night before on a special one-day delivery slot that the elves reserve for ‘special mummies’ like me.

🤶 The second win of Christmas … My son made it in to school wearing a Christmas jumper. I knew it was coming for several weeks beforehand. I knew that we had a jumper I bought last year that was far too big and should now fit him perfectly. I knew that we should try on the jumper, just in case. Although, maybe we should have tried it on earlier than the night before Christmas jumper day. “That looks amazing” I said to my son through gritted teeth as a wave of mummy-guilt hit. I had not anticipated him growing quite so much in this last year. Having little choice at that point, I shrugged my shoulders and thought we might just get away with it. The next day, as he got ready for school and tugged the wooly Rudolph over his body, there was a wail, “I don’t like the feel, it’s too itchy”. Action stations! Go go go. A quick detour to Tesco on the way to school, arriving at the gates with a minute to spare, my son very happily trotted in wearing his beautiful new Minecraft Christmas jumper.

🤶 The third win of Christmas … I made it to not one but all three of the school Christmas events: music concert; Christmas fair; church concert. I was there. I was present for my son. I was only late to one of them. I even managed to hide (for the most part) my chuckles at the out of tune singing and poorly played brass instruments.

🤶 The fourth win of Christmas … I have about 95% of presents bought and wrapped already, a new record for me. There are still six more days until the big day. This is normally the time that I start my Christmas shopping but I am almost finished. A couple of months ago, I thought I would give Temu a try and buy a couple of things to see if it was any good. I started with some toys for the cats. I then found a bag and gloves and a scarf and a nail kit … I just kept adding and adding to my basket. I had almost forgotten about the order until a couple of weeks later when two huge boxes arrived. The boxes sat for a couple of weeks unopened, daring me to venture inside. When I finally did, I was quite shocked to find I had managed to get some decent stuff (although there were quite a few things bought though that I could not, in good conscience, give to anybody I love or care about). I was even more shocked when I sat down and spent an entire day hyper focussed on wrapping the bloody things.

🤶 The fifth win of Christmas … I managed to get through an entire weekend without a mid-day nap. This is quite a win for me to not lose three or four hours of the weekend to my cosy, warm bed. More often than not, I limp into the weekend, exhausted and burnt out needing to just disappear into oblivion and recharge. However, I have actually spent time wrapping presents, decorating the house and doing some festive shopping. There may have been about an hour in which I sat on the sofa and ‘rested my eyes’ for a bit, but I am not counting that.

🤶 The sixth win of Christmas … I cooked a full Sunday dinner. While this was a regular occurrence many years ago, I much prefer to pay someone else to do this now and we can, more often than not, be found tucking into a roast dinner at the local carvery. Something strange and unfamiliar overtook me this Sunday … I actually wanted to cook for my family. The cauliflower cheese may have been Tesco’s finest and Aunt Bessie may have given a helping hand with the Yorkshire puddings, but the rest of the dinner was authentic me. Of course, I am now shuddering at the thought of doing it all over again in six days’ time, but I can get away with a helping hand from the Prosecco fairy then.

🤶 The seventh win of Christmas … I managed to get presents bought for the four birthdays I have to contend with between 1st and 14th December. I didn’t forget any of them and even managed to have presents for two of the birthdays bought before the day! On the run up to December I am always painfully aware of what is to come. Let’s be honest, the dates don’t change. The flurry of birthdays followed quickly by the advent of Christmas never comes as a surprise, but I sit for two or three months before thinking that I should get cracking, preferring instead to procrastinate and allow the stress to build up instead of just hitting the Buy Now button on Amazon.

🤶 The eighth win of Christmas … I managed to make the house look like Christmas threw up all over it. I normally attempt a half-hearted nod towards the festive season (a bit of tinsel round the pictures and the dreaded Christmas tree in the corner). This year, I went all out. Brand new tree and decorations, gaudy illuminations in the window, lights around the house (OK, I have to give credit to my other half for that one). Anyone would mistake us for a family that actually likes Christmas … I am almost believing it myself by this point!

🤶 The ninth win of Christmas … Ahead of putting up the outdoor Christmas lights that would draw attention to the withering mess that is my front garden, I actually went out and hacked away the dying remnants of my beautiful summer blooms. I have been threatening to do this for months, apparently preferring to heap layers and layers of shame and guilt on myself for never actually doing it. It is done now (if you don’t look too closely).

🤶 The tenth win of Christmas … Whoever decided to bring that first damn Elf on the Shelf into the consciousness of Brits has a lot to answer for. Yes, he is back this year despite not actually turning up on the 1st of December (Santa had a special secret mission that he is not allowed to talk about), he has managed to make his mischief every night from the 2nd onwards. Every night without fail as I decide to drag my carcass off to bed, I utter ‘Oh shit!’ as I realise the bloody elf does not have sufficient capability to wrap the toilet roll around the Christmas tree without some help.

🤶 The eleventh win of Christmas… I didn’t lose my shit when my other half, yet again, insisted on me telling him exactly what to buy me for Christmas. You would think that, after twenty one years together, he may have some idea of what I like?! You would also think that, given he only has to buy for me and I buy for EVERYONE ELSE, that he could muster up enough creative thinking to buy a few things for the woman he loves. OK, so maybe the fact that I have no hobbies, am a control freak and have everything I need may make it somewhat difficult but still … just get me some bloody pyjamas, fluffy socks and slippers like every other year!

🤶 The twelfth win of Christmas … I made it through another year with my mentally hilarious family intact. Me and T may be a few pounds heavier and have a few more grey hairs, but we are still in love. We have not managed to break our boy again this year — he still has all fingers, toes and limbs intact despite his best efforts to bounce off anything solid.

It’s a wonderful life now I can look on these events as successes and not focus only on the bits that went wrong.

I wish you a wonderful Christmas and New Year. Here’s to 2024!

Adhd
Christmas
Neurodiversity
Women
Change
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