Where Are You Christmas?

Being a Broke Single Dad on Christmas

I Felt Like the Biggest Failure to My Six-Year-Old Daughter

As the holiday season of 2011 approached, I was feeling so much pressure. I hadn’t worked a regular job since 2003. I’d been self-employed for 8 years and sadly it wasn’t going well. I wasn’t looking forward to Christmas this year.

I was a newly single father of the most wonderful, caring, adorable 6-year-old daughter. I wanted to give her the world but had trouble affording a globe. I had no idea what Christmas was going to look like for her that year. And it broke my heart.

When you’re self-employed, things can be rough at times. I used to get so stressed out worrying about where the next real estate client was coming from. I worked my tail off as a Realtor, but the Great Recession of 2007 to 2009 had badly affected our local real estate market. I couldn’t rely on that source of income anymore.

I had just started a small carpet cleaning business in 2011. But building a business takes time. Though I put tons of effort into marketing, it was difficult to find clients. Especially around the holiday season.

When it became apparent that real estate and carpet cleaning were not likely to earn me enough money for a decent Christmas, I knew I had to do something. And it sure wasn’t something I was looking forward to. I had to give up being self-employed and humble myself, for the sake of my daughter.

I took a call center job. I started at the end of November. At 6 am in the morning.

Man, that was rough. Having to wake up at 5 am and drive across town was no picnic. Especially for a guy who is admittedly not a morning person. Not having to wake up early daily was my favorite thing about being self-employed.

Well, suck it up, Buttercup. Your daughter means more to you than your sleep. Go to bed earlier and get this done. She’s worth it, you know. And I did.

Working at a call center when you’re 37 years old wasn’t ideal, in my mind. Most of the people I trained with those first two weeks were kids. Many of them only looked about a dozen years older than my daughter Avery.

I felt out of place. It certainly didn’t help the feeling I had of being a loser. My self-esteem suffered during my time working at Teleperformance. But I handled it the best I could. She was worth all of this.

I made a friend the first day, a nice fella who wasn’t quite a fetus at least. He was closer to my age. At least we had stuff in common, and a sense of humor about working a tech-support job.

We laughed about some of the questions people asked during training. A handful acted like this was the most important thing ever as if we’d been handed codes to the nuclear arsenal of the United States of America. A few were grade-A genuine ass-kissers.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, you had others who were clearly high off their asses during training. Teleperformance didn’t drug test the people they hired and it showed. Anyone willing to work from 6 am to 2 pm was paid $10.50 an hour to give tech support on Apple products.

That was another issue that made things difficult for me. I’d never owned an iPhone, an iMac, or an iPad. Yet I was going to tell the owners of these devices how to troubleshoot and fix their products. Talk about Imposter Syndrome.

Relax, Jason. Breathe. She’s worth it. Christmas is coming.

I did what I had to do. One thing about being reasonably smart is that you catch on quickly. I did well with the training and received my first paycheck on December 9th. That afforded me food to eat and gas for my car for the next two weeks. My bank account was no longer in double digits, but I had to live on what I had left until the next payday.

So there was no Christmas shopping being done yet. I targeted December 23rd to be able to shop for Avery’s Christmas. I also volunteered to stay longer, as much as I hated being at that place. I wanted her Christmas to be decent, at the minimum.

I started dating my Bride on December 9th, right in the middle of this. I was open and honest about my financial situation, telling her that I was a licensed real estate agent and owned a small carpet cleaning business. And how I was a call-center phone employee from 6 am to 2 pm weekdays, to ensure I’d be able to afford Christmas.

Somehow, she found that endearing, instead of running in the opposite direction. She’s always had a heart of gold and wasn’t looking for the best offer she could find financially. We didn’t have much between us that holiday season, but we had laughter and love. I realized how important that was, far more than material things under a Christmas tree.

Though we’d only been dating for a couple of weeks, when I had that paycheck in my hot little hands, I wanted to get a gift for her and her two small children on Christmas. Suddenly, I had four people to shop for on December 23rd instead of only my daughter.

I put a lot of pressure on myself that day and on Christmas Eve. I bought a Nerf dart gun set for her son and a little art kit for her daughter. I tried to be thoughtful about them. I found a cheap little necklace with earrings set with blue gems (not sapphires, sadly) and hoped she’d appreciate the thought and gesture.

I remember picking out a few video games at the pawnshop for Avery. She loved the movie Chicken Little and they had the PlayStation 2 version of it. I also found a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game that looked fun, and a game for her Nintendo 3DS her mother was getting her for Christmas.

That hurt my pride. She got a brand new handheld Nintendo system, and I got to give her a pawnshop game for it. Ouch.

I shook it off and put on a smiling face for everyone on Christmas Eve. The five of us spent time together, had a good dinner I cooked, and laughed constantly. Our 1st, 2nd, and 3rd grade kids had a wonderful time that evening and the next morning when we opened presents.

Between Dad’s pawnshop video games and her little other gifts from Mai, Avery was a happy camper. Kazden and Kiera enjoyed the gifts I gave them, and Mai appreciated the jewelry set I gave her. She knew what a sacrifice it was for me to include them in my Christmas shopping and she was so appreciative.

My young daughter and I played the hell out of Chicken Little for months. I doubt she’ll ever know how badly I felt that Christmas initially, not being able to do more for her. But that’s the lesson I needed to learn.

Christmas isn’t about expensive gifts. It’s about doing whatever you can to make your family smile and feel loved. Giving them your time and putting on a happy face goes a long way, even when your budget doesn’t go quite as far. &:^)

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