I can clearly remember the most difficult holiday season that I ever had. It happened 5 years ago, two months after my son was born. I was still getting used with caring for a newborn and the sleepless nights made me feel more exhausted than ever. But I still insisted on preparing for the holiday season the way I used to do it before becoming a mom.

Soon I ended up with a lot of things added on my to-do list: meals to prep, gifts to buy, decorations to choose, cards to write. I tried to keep up with everything, but I only got more tired and overwhelmed. It kept getting worse as Christmas was approaching. Instead of enjoying the holiday season I was feeling more and more frustrated.

One evening I decided to dress my baby in some lovely Christmas pajamas that had cute reindeers on them. He even had a very nice elf hat that looked great on him. I turned off the lights and sat next to his crib to wait for him to fall asleep. I just sat there looking at his cute little face lid up by the Christmas lights on the balcony. He looked so wonderful! I slipped my hand inside the crib, and he grabbed my finger with his tiny hand and fell asleep holding me.

That night I realized that in the middle of the holiday rush I forgot to slow down and enjoy the things that mattered the most. It was my son’s first Christmas, and I wanted to enjoy every minute of it. So the next day I decided to let go of all the things that were just adding stress to our holidays. It wasn’t an easy thing to do because I am a recovering perfectionist, but I felt that it was the right thing for us. And I was right!

We spent the Christmas days at home, just the three of us. So we didn’t stress out about the meals, the decorations, the holiday visits. We had a wonderful Christmas tree, a few gifts under the tree, but most of all, we had plenty of time to enjoy each other.

That was the last year that I let holiday stress overwhelm me. I promised myself that I wouldn’t let it happen again and I started to find ways to prevent it.