In the early morning hours of December 8, 2016, I cried on the phone with my family as they called me so we could be “together” as our father took his last breaths.  The holiday trip to my parents house that year was for a funeral, not for a nostalgic “I’ll Be Home For Christmas” moment.  That morning, l began a holiday season in the deepest grief of my life, and since then I’ve had to learn how to survive the holidays when the grief keeps coming.  

Gorgeous lights and cheery decorations are hanging everywhere, the carols of the season play happily, businesses close and parties are planned, but death, divorce, financial ruin, job loss, disillusionment and abandonment don’t take breaks for the holidays.  In fact, grief seems to intensify as celebrations go on, oblivious to the shattered world of a grieving person.  I remember finding it so strange, leaving the hospital the morning we walked my nephew’s body as far as we could to the doors of the operating room where his organs would be donated,  hearing the landing helicopter and knowing the reason for it’s noise, feeling like the world had, and should, come to an end, yet people went on as if everything was fine.  

How can Christmas be held when that wonderful young man is no longer here to see it?  How can a celebration go on when I sit alone, my children with their other parent?  How can a holiday of any kind take place when sorrow is drowning me?  The answer is, it can.  And it will.  And the reason why is the most beautiful truth:  Because the joy in the world will not ever be totally killed by sorrow.  THAT, my friend, is something to celebrate.

Most conventional wisdom on grief gives us the impression that we will enter a time of grief, that time will pass, and we will be over it.  The little known truth is that it’s completely normal to experience deep sadness, and shining joy at the same time.  Of course, at times one is more intense than the other, which is also normal. The expectation that grief stops in times of joy is unrealistic, as is the expectation that joy must stop altogether in times of grief.  

In this truth, I’ve found the key to not only surviving, but enjoying the holidays.  I sit with my grief.  I welcome it without a fight.  But I also welcome the joy.  And as I do so, more and more they visit me together.  Moments of tears as I miss those faces no longer around my table are mixed in beautifully with the laughter of my children and the traditional family recipes.  The loneliness of a New Year’s Eve with no one to kiss sits in compliment to the bubbles in my champagne for one, and the anticipation of a fresh new start.  

My darling, if you are grieving this holiday, let me gently say that it’s perfectly fine to let yourself have joy right alongside the sadness.  Just for a moment, look up at a twinkling light.  Slide your eyes closed and savor the sweetness of a Christmas cookie.  Snuggle down into your covers and delight in the warmth and comfort, even if it’s just you.  No need to stop the tears, either.  When the absence of someone you love feels overwhelming, let it come.  It IS overwhelming to be bereft and there is no need or reason to pretend to be fine.  

The pain that leaves you breathless and the happy moments that bring an effervescence to your world can coexist.  Both are there because of love.  Let the ache of whatever you are grieving in these days of celebration be both intensified and eased by it all.  To live a life of no grief is to live a life of no love.  The two are inextricably bound, and if we let them, they will both make our lives, and our holidays, worth celebrating.