Don't Believe the Pristine Holiday Photos
Just out of shot, a child is definitely screaming.
If you follow me on Instagram and have viewed my stories over the past few weeks, you might assume that I have been living the perfect life. I’ve shared photos of beaches, sunsets, ice cream, parties, cake, dogs, and guacamole (my favorite food).
Readers, the past few weeks were not actually perfect. They were, overall, quite lovely — I know December can be a struggle for so many families, and my family has had very little to complain about in the scheme of things. But several things happened that you didn’t see reflected on Instagram.
I don’t try to curate my feed to look perfect; I’m often sharing photos of my messy-as-hell kitchen, among other things. Still, sometimes I don’t want to share all the challenging bits of my life and have to navigate the many questions and comments I may receive. Sometimes I have privacy concerns, too. There are excellent reasons to hold back on social media sharing, and I’m never going to argue that people are obligated to share more than they’re comfortable with.
At the same time, I know that my decision to only share only the shiny parts of my life over the past few weeks was, potentially, misleading and unfair. It could have made people feel alienated — thinking that I, and everyone else, was having a grand old time when they weren’t.
So today I want to say to those of you who had a rough holiday season that, in fact, you weren’t alone. A bunch of you shared your not-so-pristine holiday anecdotes in in my discussion thread yesterday, so I know for a fact that December was tough for many of you, for many reasons: Deaths. Viruses. In-laws. Job losses. My favorite quote from yesterday’s thread was this: “Honestly, I want to crawl in a sensory deprivation chamber for about a week.” Amen.
Here’s what happened to our family that I didn’t share on socials.