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Opinion: Christmas expectations feel off the scale this year but what’s driving it?

Some of my favourite films - those I can watch again and again - are Christmas movies.

You know the ones - where despite all the hiccups and hilarity there’s a feel-good outcome in the end.

Are you feeling overwhelmed with everything left to do? Image: iStock.
Are you feeling overwhelmed with everything left to do? Image: iStock.

Seldom in real life of course is everyone’s festive season as easy as those films are to sit and watch.

And as we get closer to the big day the pressure to have the perfect occasion inevitably tends to mount.

Except I don’t know about you but I’m sure every year at the moment, the expectations are getting higher and higher and all the things we must do - or feel an expectation to do - risk dampening the fun for me.

When I was a kid I used to marvel at the palatial McCallister house in Home Alone (the very best Christmas film) with their red, gold and green decor that perfectly matched their decorations and more outside lights than I could have ever dreamt of.

Whether I simply came to the conclusion, aged eight, that this was something only for the movies I cant quite remember but either way once you switched off the TV any hit of envy disappeared with the credits.

In the age of social media however, carefully-curated Christmases are a thumb-swipe away.

Where pictures of matching pyjamas, Christmas bedding, Christmas Eve boxes, burrr baskets (I’ll leave you to look those up) decadent advent calendars, homemade gifts and food, Christmas market visits and outings to wintery wonderlands (either the real deal or the one in London!) risk giving us the impression it’s the only way to do Christmas ‘right’.

Elf on the Shelf is a relatively new tradition. Image: istock/smilesb.
Elf on the Shelf is a relatively new tradition. Image: istock/smilesb.

Our Christmas tree is up - the star however remains on the arm of the sofa where it’s lived for almost two weeks as it needs a stepladder no one has bothered to go to the garage and retrieve.

I did remember to book a supermarket delivery - but rather than ingredients for homemade mince pies or cookies - so far just six bottles of plonk sit in the basket which enabled me to reserve the slot, checkout and worry about it later. It’ll be an ‘interesting’ Christmas Day if I forget to go back before the deadline.

I’m banking on last year’s festive jumpers being squeezed into for one more year and the concept of ‘clean pyjamas’ is about as matching as it’ll get over here.

Because things have gone crazy and I can’t keep up.

Perhaps the post-pandemic rush, in which we all felt a need to make up for lost time after a tough few years, has got us here?

Social media probably also has a role in this particular Christmas play too.

I’m also curious to know whether households without children living at home succumb to the same feelings of overwhelm? Or - and this is controversial - is it mostly mothers with the mental load?

Was Christmas prep more straightforward before the age of the internet? Image: istock.
Was Christmas prep more straightforward before the age of the internet? Image: istock.

It’s not like Christmas before the world wide web involved only an exchange of satsumas. But perhaps once you’d circled the Argos catalogue and closed the book any FOMO (fear of missing out) was forgotten?

Of course it goes without saying - but I’m making it crystal clear anyway - that I’m hugely privileged to be able to sit here and write about stress levels attached to needing to remember things, buy things, make things or attend things.

But have we turned the most magical time of year into the most stressful where, rather than enjoy the build-up, we all feel like we’re nose diving towards December 25 without a parachute?

For now though, back to that supermarket shop…

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