Does it seem a little early to be thinking about the holidays? I would have thought so, too, a few years ago. Since fibromyalgia (FMS) became part of my life, however, I find I need to start early if I want to get through and still feel like celebrating.
That means I start now, thinking about several autumn birthdays, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Here's my ideal 10-step timeline, which has me doing everything early so I can adjust for times when I'm not functional:
- Early September: start shopping for autumn birthdays and Halloween costumes.
- Late September: finish up those tasks, start asking family who's hosting Thanksgiving this year.
- Early October: decorate for Halloween
- Late October: take a break to enjoy a few birthdays and Halloween.
- Early November: solidify who's making what for Thanksgiving, shop for what I need. Make occassional quick trips to stores to get Christmas gift ideas.
- Week Before Thanksgiving: start preparing food. (I usually volunteer for things that keep well or that I can freeze.)
- Late November: compile list of what I'm buying everyone for Christmas. Start shopping online.
- Early December: decorate for Christmas. Do any local gift shopping I need to.
- Mid December: start wrapping presents, making sure to work in short bursts with rest periods in between. If I have the energy, I might do some baking.
- Anytime I'm going to a party or event, I do nothing else physical that day and try to keep my schedule light the day after.
This kind of timeline really helps, but it's not really enough to get me through this busy time without a crash (or two). That's why I've put together a Holiday Survival Guide based on what a very wise woman in my forum shared with us all last January. I hope you'll follow it so your holidays can be happy instead of hurty!
If you have tips for getting throught the holidays, please share them here or in About.com's Fibromyalgia & Chronic Fatigue Syndrome forum so we can all learn from them!
I would love to read this, but it seems that the link isn’t working.
Thanks Adrienne.
Aloha!
Great survival guide!
BTW, I’d found some helpful holiday resources at
http://www.flylady.net/pages/holidaycruising1.asp
especially the Holiday Control Journal, the Cruising Through the Holidays missions, etc.
They were designed for the general public, but they gave me a fill-in-the blanks format to prioritize, break things down into babysteps, & really enjoy the meaning of the holidays.
The idea is to start with little steps on only the most important things way in advance & to finish most or all of them by Dec 1 so that we have a built-in buffer.
FYI, I’m not connected to this website except as someone who has benefitted from its great resources.
Hope this helps!
–RWhite
Best thing I get out of Holidays now, is we have the dinners at My Son’s house and he does most of the cooking!
I usually cook two dishes and my two girls bring stuff too!
This way no one does it all!
I use to do all the cooking and my oldest daughter made the dessert and she was the only one that stayed long enough to help clean up after we ate!
But not no more!