Gonna find out if your worthy or not, Santa Claus is coming to town...

I have been mulling this over in my head lately.
You see, in so many ways my kids ARE healing...for REALZ.

It is very SA-LOW....if I didn't look at last year and compare it to this year, I wouldn't see it at all.

This time of year is rough on my kids for a number of reasons. In the summertime we tend to see the most healing, less engagement, more of the real them.

I think it is for a number of reasons, it is warm, we are out side 80% of the time. We are active, we play in water almost every day, there are no birthdays or major holidays that bring gifts...in one word to me Summertime means HEAVEN. Winter time? Not.so.much.

Once fall hits we have a whirl wind of birthdays, then cold hits, next snow, and being stuck inside...and to open the wound entirely this very over stimulating, over gifting, over commercialized holiday that leaves grown adults asking my children:

 “if they have been good this year”, and “What is Santa going to bring them”....
One certified emotional crap-storm coming up in a jiffy.

In their heads they are thinking, “Of course I have not been good, I am never good enough, thanks for pointing it out Jack Wagon, Santa shouldn't bring me anything and if he does he is a bigger idiot than YOU.”....I know this because my kids have actually vocalized these feelings.

In our home, believe it or not, we still do Santa. Not in a “lie to your kids about a mythical man that is indeed stalking your every-move and has creepy little elves making sure you are minding your P's and Q's”...
But in a magical, spirit of giving. Magic for my children that have been robbed of much of childhoods is in short supply. They KNOW he is pretend, but what is the HARM in pretending when it feels loving and good. Santa is the “Fake it till you make it” nice guy that loves everyone and gives them gifts...We all should want to be more like Santa.
We want that kind of magic in our home....
We treat Santa like we treat parental and Religious figures in our home, an out pouring of love and acceptance, NO.MATTER.WHAT.

When it comes to gifts my kids are on HIGH ALERT. They know they CAN NOT LOSE CHRISTMAS....most the time I like to blame that little ditty on Christine. But the truth is, they would never lose it any way. Yet REALLY, that is NOT what they are afraid of. In fact I think they would feel almost relived if they did lose it.

Chatterbox told me just yesterday.
“Mom you know how I lose it the day after stuff”.
“Yup”
“I am going to try to not do that after Christmas day, but maybe I shouldn't get what I want to get for Christmas, so I won't feel like I want to lose it.” (my heck she is ALREADY worrying abut this)

“Sweetheart, why do you feel if you don't get what you want it will be easier not to freak out?”

“Because I know I didn't earn it, and then I will feel bad for having something that shouldn't be mine.”

and there you have it.

I SO Sooooo get this for her.
ME, Lindsay who LOVES to give, send and surprise people with random gifts, and somewhere in my head likes to be given things... well sorta...still struggles with feeling worthy of them. I do. I have this AMAZING friend whom has tried to teach me to knit. I SUCK at knitting, which makes me more in awe of the things she knits. This friend sent me beautiful wash cloths on a really crappy day.

I still look at those beautiful washcloths and feel a little unworthy of them. Same goes with the scarf she knitted me and gave me for my birthday. I never know how to appropriately respond to gifts...because if I acted out what I was feeling when I am given them...it would look a little like this:
 

Or I try to play it too cool and don't even act like I care. “Yo, cool, thanks and everything.”
“Weirdo” Right?...but it is OH so true.
When people do things for me, I feel weird, even though I do nice things for them all for the time, I am comfortable giving and doing things...but if a friend offers to do my hair (C you know who you are), or friends that pay for my meal, give ME a gift...WEIRD OUT CITY...
SO I can 'get' this for my kids....

Which is why we started our version of “Secret Elves”....no $ is ever used. Instead my kids draw names the day after Thanksgiving. Everyday afterward they are required to do a small kindness.
This could be vacuuming a bedroom, not engaging in a fight, writing a poem or a drawing...it is good anonymous giving and receiving, it is safe and it is great practice for the anxiety of giving and receiving yet to come. They “return and report”, and for the reporting, they receive a “Sweet for the Sweet, a little treat for their being willing to serve and tell me about it. It really has been a beautiful process in seeing what my children come up with for each other.

Just a couple thoughts jotted down before we start our day....we are all worthy of love, goodness, acceptance and even GIFTS...even if it makes us feel all freaky beauty queen inside.
 

Fly that Freak flag baby, fly if for your kids, fly it for you....The Holidays are a coming...

 Don't you run, don't you hide, I don't give a friggn'-freak-a-do if you have been naughty or nice...

I know you are worthy, because we all deep down are, especially our sometimes very Angry elves.

Merry Christmas y’all.