Acceptance?

I never go home for the holidays for probably two reasons. One, my family never offers to pay to see me. It kind of makes me feel like, well, you can come home but you are not important enough for us to pay to get you here. I come from a large family, 3 brothers, an older sister and a younger half sister. I mean if they really wanted to see me, they'd pay, right?

The other reason is that I'd drink myself silly after being in one room with all of them. This is one of the reasons the holidays can be hard on me. All this love and family chit. At the moment I am single, so you have the impending new year's eve date night and you have all this family time.

Family is what you make it and I know that. I have a very good core Texas family here. People that I know and love and love me unconditionally. Most know my background, the pain, the suffering and hardship. That is why they are my family. My real family in Nebraska, I am not sure of. They were all there during that crap. Each, to their own credit, dealt with those issues in their own way. Collectively, in a room, at a time when family should be cherished, all that baggage comes out to play. It is not the ideal situation, but it is what it is.

This leads me to this thought. I have always avoided the holiday gatherings for those two reasons. However, it led me to think about my perspective on this.

Should I accept my family for what it is? Have I done this? I don't know. I wrote this years ago but it's so true. Does it apply to family too?

Learning to love yourself is about accepting yourself as who you are. Once that acceptance is gained and believed, the love comes easily.

Learning to love your family is about accepting yourself as who you are and accepting them as who they are. Once this acceptance is gained and believed, the love comes easily for your family.

It is the old adage, you can choose your friends, but you cannot chose your family. I am wondering if I can gain that acceptance of my family, that I would be able to tolerate holidays better.

I don't know if they will accept me as who I am. However, I think in the long run I need to accept them as who they are.

A lot of them seem to think that as family you have a certain set of responsibilities and obligations. I don't believe in obligations other than paying bills. If I feel obligated to go to Nebraska for the holidays, I won't go. Period. End of story. I want to go back when I'm ready to accept it for what it is. Once I have that, I can tolerate it better and be a better family member. Until then, I need to stay away. I have enough stress as it is, don't need more, yanno?