Rants with Bethenny FrankelYOU do the holidays, the holiday's don't do you! Don't let tradition and how things "should" be at the holidays ruin the holidays. You don't HAVE to do anything. Take the time now to think about how you want it all to go.
Let's talk about the holidays. Let's talk about the stress of the holidays. Let's talk about the emotion of the holidays. Let's try to lock the door before we get robbed. Okay, the holidays are here. It's a combination of the changing of the seasons. If you're in a colder climate, daylight, savings, darkness. You know, these things affect our lives as a result of this change in temperature and light.
We also eat differently, and the way that when we eat.
Differently, we can get more depressed, have more anxiety. If you're drinking more, you're going to experience more anxiety and depression. If you're eating more sugar, you're going to experience more anxiety and depression. You're going to feel more anxious. The holidays are coming. It's subconscious, it's conscious or making plans. You're already bracing yourselves for who you're going to be seeing, who you have to make plans with, who's not doing what you need them to do, who you don't want to spend time with, who you are obligated to spend time with. You have to co exist with exes, and you have to blend families with new partners or if you are in a relationship with someone who has their own kids from their own divorces.
It's kind of a shit show.
So this is the time when you have to reduce your drinking ironically because it's the season for drinking. Increase your hydration, start doing things that will calm you down, taking walks, meditating, if possible, doing yoga. I just went up in my room that's upstairs at my house and just started doing yoga, like for twenty minutes on one of these apps. I'm a little unhinged. I'm feeling it. It's coming and everyone has their own relationship to it. Some people have a relationship to it because of their divorce. I have a relationship to it because of my divorce, because I pretty much because I'm an orphan, because my daughter has a small unit, because of challenges as it pertains to a very difficult divorce and custody situation. Because the holidays triggers my childhood and what it was like, even for brief periods, and now as an adult, what it's like, and trying to make it into something I want it to be, or gaslighted or pretend it doesn't exist. I talk to Denise Richards, and I've talked on my own about fake Christmas. Meaning let's say you're going through a terrible divorce and you have to navigate custody schedules, or even if you're not going through a divorce, if you have to navigate going to someone's house that you don't want to go to your kids not being.
With you, you.
Got to lock the door before you get rob You have to make plans. You can't just wish the problem away. If your kids can't be with you on Thanksgiving, do Thanksgiving on a Wednesday or Tuesday. If your kids, or your husband or fiance or partner or friends can't be with you on Christmas, do fake Christmas. Make Christmas Eve, Christmas, make the twenty second Christmas, put the tree up on the twenties.
Whatever works for you.
Do not try to fit into the constructs of a Hallmark holiday. Market it in a different way. Make Christmas on the twenty seventh, and then get all your presents the day after for fifty percent off. Whatever you need to do. Also, get organized with the gifts. Can you please write out a list, write everyone's name down, write out a list. Get creative, look at what you already have. I don't know if you ever buy ahead. I buy ahead. I've gone to the outlets in the past and bought things on sale. I'll go online and buy things on sale. I'll think before I jump. I don't just walk into a mall blind and look for things that are perfect for people. I come up with ideas. Is it a toiletry kit or a makeup kit for women? Is it a nice fuzzy robe. Is it monogramming? Because now monogramming is something that if you do now, it makes a gift seem so much more expensive and so much more elevated. But you have to do it in a timely fashion so it arrives. Can you just sit down and get organized with this? Can you get the Christmas stuff out before you start buying more crap? Can you get it all out, go through it and really be militant and be like, this is cheesy, this is kitchy, this is for when they were kids. I don't have to hold on to every single Christmas cheesy plaque, sign or wreath that I ever bought. Lean out before you decide adding new. That's the big suggestion that I have for you. I don't think you should just pile on. Don't walk into the store. I refuse to go to TJ Max. I just will not go in there because I all come out with a bunch of stuff and it will create anxiety.
So use what you have.
Also, start baking of batches of cookies and send them, you know, right after December first, like get organized. You don't have to wait to do everything on the twenty third. Just be crazy. I'm gonna be that crazy person that's sending gifts at Thanksgiving. I don't care the thought counts. I give three hundred gifts. I don't have to wait till December twenty third to give them out.
I'm doing me. I'm doing what works for me.
And the holidays are very stressful. So find your ways to lock your door before you get robbed. Thanksgiving it's coming up. How to avoid overeating, over drinking, over emoting. It will move pretty quickly. You'll be sitting with family that will trigger you. It's been a very polarizing election year. This will be a conversation that will also trigger you. What do I suggest. I suggest hydration. I suggest not drinking at your normal clip because when you get exasperated, which I know from housewives, and reality TV. When your nervous system starts kicking in, that's when you want to drink more. It almost feels like you're hydrating your body with alcohol. Believe me, I've done it. You need to mitigate this. In addition, get your played out, take a little bit of everything, but know what you've done versus just constantly going back and shoveling piles so you feel bloated, full, self low, and like you overdid it. Also, don't starve yourself all day until the main meal. You will end up eating four times the calories for an overall day. Then if you throughout the day, it's sensible. You had a salad, you had some high volume foods, you had some soup, you had some protein, You had some things that are filling, You had some period vegetable soup, you had some green juices days before. Just to make yourself feel a little calmer, clearer, cleansed. Come up with your plan and stick to it. Don't walk in cold like, don't walk in without a plan. Also for conversation, if somebody starts talking about something that makes you feel uncomfortable, or you know you're gonna get lit and you know you just want to fire a random shot and slap somebody. Stand up, Go take a walk around the block. You just do not need the stress and the aggravation. You don't need your nervous system pumping. You just don't need to coke bears in the zoo. You got to take deep breaths because everybody that I know gets into this. And if Thanksgiving isn't going to be what you remember it as as a child, or what you wanted to be, or you get depressed, that's okay too.
Lean into that.
Go don't try to make yourself do things that you don't want to do, because you'll end up getting unhinged and exploding. I have literally spent I think two Thanksgivings on my own happily. I've done yoga, I've hidden, I haven't told everybody so people feel sorry for me. I've not been able to handle it for different reasons in my life, a terrible divorce, family situations, and I've just wanted to be alone. And that's okay. It's a hallmark holiday. It doesn't mean that the day is actually any different than any other day. You've got to realize that, so do what works for you. If it's friendsgiving if it's being with you know, my daughter does a love Thanksgiving. Here's another thing about holidays, Christmas and Thanksgiving, Hanika, Kwanza, whatever it is, communicate with your kids and your family about it because everybody has this ideal about what it needs to be and if you get realistic. I've talked to my daughter about it because this year I'm with her and we decided to go to Florida. Now it doesn't have that feeling, it doesn't have that you know, all the different colored leaves.
But I've talked to her about it.
She doesn't love the Thanksgiving food, she doesn't love the holiday that much. So we are going down to Florida, and I said, Okay, do you want to go over these people's house. They're going to have kids, a lot of different people, so it means we're going to go over, have a reason to get dressed up. There'll be interesting people there, there'll be good Thanksgiving food. We get to feel like we're at a family house, but we don't have to do it. She was like, I love that. Another year we went out to a very cozy fireplacey like you know, brick fireplace in and we loved that too, because it was the two of us and we got to talk and we bonded. And that might not seem very Thanksgiving is, but for us it became a ritual. And I've talked to you before about traditions. We do different traditions that we create. One year, we cooked at just the two of us, and I think it was the night before and we used my airfire when we made this air fried turkey breast that we still remember. It was the best turkey breast we ever had. It wasn't the whole turkey. She doesn't like all the dark meats. She likes the white turkey breast. We each made our own sides and we had the best time cooking together. That was another tradition in ritual. It was non traditional for most people, but for us it became a tradition. And this year I said, okay, so during the day, do you want to go to this amazing big buffet in Florida and like have a brunch Mommy and me brunch because at dinner we're going to go to these people's houses. The point is, we talked about it and we decided what we wanted. In addition, for Christmas, we were supposed to be down in Florida. She said, I really want to go to the Hampton's because that's where we have the Christmas tree feeling, the holiday feeling. You know, that's where she remembers her childhood memories and us buying ornaments together and doing things together. So instead of three of the days that we'd be in Florida where it's warm, and that could be depressing too. If you're not near snow, you may feel depressed. You're not feeling it. The holiday didn't happen. A thousand things can trigger you. It doesn't have to be that it traditionally has to be snowy. It doesn't have to be that you have to be with other people. It's your own thing. So she said, can we go to the Hampton's because I want to feel that feeling. Because we talked about it. I said, do you want to feel the snowy feeling if you want? She's like yes, And now there are all these things we've done since she was a kid that we just remember. So yes, we're going to go for three nights to the Hamptons just to feel the fireplaces, snowy hickory smell feeling and that will give us what we need and it works in relationships too. I believe when you're in a relationship, you talk to the person in the new relationship about how you want the holidays to go, Like, are we going to feel sad if we're not together? Is it going to come too quickly? And we haven't made our plans and we think it's going to be okay, but then on the day it's going to be depressing. How is this all going to shake down? Because theory and reality are two very different things. So I just suggest that you mentally and emotionally plan and prepare for the holidays as much as you physically plan for the holidays. Thanks, Happy holidays. Most persons went to the past, almost went to the pastor
