Christmas

Seriously, I think Christmas was marked with a giant black 'X' for me...

Hubby and I had a wonderfully relaxing few days in California with my in-laws and arrived home around 10ish on Christmas Eve.

Yesterday morning started off well. Everything was super quiet though and I had spoken to hubby about how much I missed the kids being young at Christmas. When your youngest is 17, there really just isn't the same excitement over the festive period. Plus, Christmas here in the US is so very different from back home in England. Here Christmas was yesterday and today is Monday, in England, Christmas was yesterday,  today is Boxing Day, and tomorrow will be a bank holiday because Christmas was on a Sunday and Boxing Day was on a Monday, and then people will still hold onto their Christmas Spirit right through until the New Year! Here, so many people will take down their trees today and it will be like the whole event never happened - I don't like that!

I figured a quiet day was probably not really a bad thing. The boys were all doing their own thing and seemed happy enough. I looked at some photography stuff and felt a little 'meh' but that was ok. We had decided on a really low-key dinner of smoked Prime Rib and Leg of Lamb, so early in the afternoon my hubby lit up the smoker and threw the meat in. One thing I really love is the smell of meat smoking. I rustled up some quick veggies to accompany the meat and we had a dinner all of us were happy and content with.

It wasn't until we started to play Scrabble that things turned nasty! Oldest son didn't really want to play and so decided to make snide remarks to his brother all the way through the game. Hubby and I were continually telling him to stop, but no, he carried on until his younger brother reached boiling point and left the table. After this, all hell broke loose. Youngest son has bi-polar disorder and refuses to take any form of medication to help with his mood swings or 'cycling'. This goading by his brother led to an outbreak of rage quite unlike any I have seen, and Youngest son was screaming at me and slamming doors while his older brother retreated to his bedroom. The whole situation escalated to the point where I lost my cool and forced both the boys to listen to a few home truths from Momma! Little did I know at this point that my youngest was actually in the throws of some sort of psychotic break, and he retreated inside his own head and when he returned to us, had no idea what had really gone on.

I could go into more detail but I am so emotionally and physically drained from the whole thing that right now I am not thinking 100% clearly. I know that Christmas is definitely over, despite hubby telling me that we will make today a wonderful day. I feel like crawling inside my own head and disappearing right now.

I think we will revisit this when the dust in my brain has settled and I can see and focus more clearly. One thing I know for sure is that life with my boys is NOT going to carry on like it has been for any longer. I cannot make them like each other and want to spend time together, but I will have civility and they will not carry on with this thing of winding each other up any longer. As I said to them last night - I did not protect them from the abuse of my ex, and put myself through all that pain, just so they could destroy each other anyway!

It's just not happening.

Christmas is offically over in this household.