Carrie Bickmore: why I find Christmas so difficult

WE ARE told how Christmas should make us feel, but for many that’s not the case, writes Carrie Bickmore. And it doesn’t help that the supermarket is already selling mince pies.

Christmas is an emotional time for many, including Carrie Bickmore, so it doesn’t help when retailers start pushing festive reminders before it’s even November.

A few weeks ago, I saw fruit mince pies in the supermarket. I felt two things upon seeing those delicious parcels of pastry. Firstly, isn’t it only September? And secondly, a pang in the pit of my tummy. It’s the same pang I feel every year. It’s not that I dislike Christmas. It has just always made me emotional.

As a kid, I had many textbook-happy Christmases. In fact, I had only happy Christmases. Some years we’d have a big lunch at our house; other years we’d visit family interstate. Fishing in Port Lincoln, going to midnight mass, giggling as Mum belted out O Come, All Ye Faithful, eating pav and custard till I’d burst.

There was always swimming. Oh, and randoms. Mum always invited people from church or the neighbourhood who had nowhere else to go. As kids it was equally as amusing as it was confusing that we had to pull a bonbon with people we didn’t really know.

Whatever we did for the festive season, it was filled with lots of people and we created wonderful memories.

So why then did I always feel teary around Christmas? Lonely even. That sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it, given the experiences I just described?

Maybe it was because our family was scattered across different states. My parents were divorced and lived on opposite sides of the country, so I could never be with both of them. Who knows what it was?

Bickmore, pictured here winning the Gold Logie last year, founded Carrie’s Beanies for Brain Cancer after she lost her husband to the disease in December 2010.

As an adult, I know exactly why I find Christmas hard. It’s the time of year I lost someone I loved dearly; it’s a time I am reminded of those wonderful humans who shaped my past but no longer sit at the table with us. I miss their cinnamon-smelling hugs, their bad jokes, their funny Christmas videos. Christmas is not the same without them. Every day is not the same without them, but at Christmas it feels amplified.

Don’t get me wrong, I still make Christmas fun for the kids. We spend weeks cooking bauble-shaped biscuits, making decorations; there are always presents under the tree and cousins to share their new toys with. But when I close my eyes feeling full and tipsy at the end of the day, the overwhelming feeling is one of relief. It’s over.

I know exactly why I find Christmas hard. It’s the time of year I lost someone I loved dearly

We are told how Christmas should make us feel, but for many that’s not the case. Life gets in the way. Death, financial stress, physical and mental illness, unresolved fights, the list is endless.

So as I walked through that supermarket feeling weird/sad/annoyed that Christmas had started in spring, I wondered: “What do we do… cancel Christmas?”

I am not the Grinch. Can we ask supermarkets to at least wait till November? That’s not going to happen. Should we push advertisers to reflect the real Christmas, recognising the sadness, longing and loneliness some people must bear? Sadness doesn’t sell tinsel.

Maybe my mum had it right when she invited strangers to Christmas. It was always less about presents, decorations and indulgence, and more about inclusion, reaching out and offering the best gift possible – the chance for people not to feel lonely.

I should count myself lucky I have a family to share fruit mince pies with. But I’ll buy mine in December.

Carrie co-hosts The Project, 6.30pm weeknights, on Network Ten.

Originally published as Carrie Bickmore: why I find Christmas so difficult