So when you’re young you celebrate all of your holidays with the family you’re born into, and sometimes that tradition carries into your adult-hood.  In my case, I find my self celebrating my holidays more and more with my chosen family.   I wasn’t given a choice about who I was born to, how I was raised or how I was treated by my extended blood family.  Now, as an adult, I make the choices about being with people who genuinely enjoy me, who love me and who care about my well-being – even if that means they hold me when I cry.  I belive my parents love me very much, but negative emotion wasn’t welcome at my child-hood home, so I learned early to just choke back and suppress any unwanted emotion and only display what is positive even if it was a total lie.  I don’t live that way any-more. I have the right to feel how I feel with no apologies and no guilt.  I embrace all of my emotions and don’t worry about what’s politically correct or socially acceptable.  I embrace the truth of the moment and I don’t continually censor myself any-more.  Now I approach the holidays with the thought of… “What’s healthy for me?”  not  “What will make everyone around me like me or approve of me?” 

This year I have spent Christmas day with my best friend and my husband, two of the only people who truly feel like family to me,  two people who really know me and love all of me, not just the acceptable opinions and attitudes… I will also be ringing in the New Year with them and I can’t think of a more peaceful way to begin my year than to be surrounded by love and acceptance.  I am truly grateful to have been given a new definition of love and of family this year.