NOT all households have fun Christmas in the identical approach and that’s definitely true for mum-of-two Lauren Demetriou.
Ever since separating from the father of her two daughters in 2019, Lauren determined to do issues in another way and instructed Mama Mia she selected not to have her daughters on Christmas Day.
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She says it is one in every of the finest issues she’s ever achieved – for each herself, her kids and her now ex-husband.
In 2003, Lauren first met her ex-husband Ben – she was 21 and he was 23. At the time they have been each finding out, socialising and falling in love with one another. They finally married in 2010, later welcoming their two daughters in 2014 and 2016 respectively.
As they aged and their life circumstances modified, so did their relationship.
“I started having second ideas about the marriage a number of years earlier than we truly separated. I proposed some {couples} counselling which he did, however in the finish I did not really feel that it was salvageable. So I instigated our separation in 2019,” Lauren mentioned to Mamamia.
“We wished various things out of life, we had completely different objectives and had simply grow to be completely different individuals. It was like we have been housemates quite than husband and spouse.”
When Lauren and Ben separated, their two daughters have been two and 5. Breaking the information to them was difficult, however one thing Lauren mentioned she’s glad to have sought out professional recommendation on.
“We sat them down per week after the cut up, and our couple’s counselling psychologist had shared with us how to translate this form of large information to a baby of a younger age. We defined to them ‘Daddy would love to dwell in a home the place he could make his personal guidelines, and Mummy would love to do the identical’.”
Neither Lauren nor Ben had a lot of a roadmap for coping with a divorce, because it wasn’t a commonality of their wider social circle or prolonged household.
In some way, they managed to make it work. In fact, it wasn’t all rosy – divorce in itself generally is a painful factor. However for this former couple, they have been decided to maintain one goal entrance of thoughts: to all the time focus on the kids and transfer ahead as a unit. And it is for this actual motive why Lauren chooses not to have her kids together with her on Christmas Day.
Prior to their cut up, Christmas was fairly the festivity in Lauren and Ben’s shared family. A lot in order that for Lauren, Christmas nearly felt like a chore quite than a time of leisure and celebration, consistently juggling completely different elements of their prolonged household and invites.
It is one thing plenty of mother and father can relate to, the psychological load hooked up to all of it.
“Christmas was by no means a vacation that is been deeply necessary to me. And I bear in mind so a few years of stress, having a number of household capabilities and not having wholesome boundaries in place. However for my ex, it is a completely different story. For him and his family members, Christmas has a variety of resonance. A few of them are fairly spiritual as effectively – so I assume it will imply extra to him to have the kids on the twenty fifth.”
Lauren describes her first Christmases post-separation as liberating. As a result of now she’s in a position to make her personal new traditions.
“He will get the kids on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and I both spend it with my mother and father and brothers at a household occasion or no matter I really feel like doing. I then have fun the wider vacation time with the ladies for per week or so from the twenty seventh onward – we love going to Victoria’s surf coast.”
And looking out again over the previous few years, Lauren mentioned their two daughters have adjusted rather well to the new association.
“I assume they’ve seen what an amicable divorce/custody association can appear to be and that makes them really feel safe. We by no means combat in entrance of the kids, and in the event that they ever have any questions we choose to reply them. Plus this manner, the festive celebrations aren’t simply on one particular day, however extra of a week-long event,” Lauren mentioned.
And for Lauren personally, the psychological load has been lifted as effectively.
“Now not do I have to handle the ‘good’ Christmas day, and negotiate with somebody about what to get the kids. I do what I need to do, and it feels nice. Positive, Ben and I might seek the advice of on presents for the ladies if it is a big-ticket merchandise, however there’s much less stress now. Plus, we now not have to get presents for each other’s households as effectively.”
“So usually once we consider divorced mother and father, we focus on the negatives. And it may be onerous for a lot of, do not get me flawed. However there may be large positives as effectively.”
