Family gathering causes anxiety

Depression/anxiety may have touched your family, your friends, yourself; what helps you to deal with it? Sharing is caring!

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Diss1984
Posts: 1
Joined: Fri Jan 10, 2025 3:09 am

Family gathering causes anxiety

Postby Diss1984 » Fri Jan 10, 2025 3:11 am

We have a family dinner at our place once a week. It’s usually my family of fourgeometry dash lite; myself, my husband and two children (four and two) and I invite my mother, grandmother and my MIL. Sometimes there’s more or less people but it’s basically our Sunday afternoon tradition to get together at my place. Tonight was a typical scenario for me, so I’ll lay it out; I am in the kitchen roasting potatoes and sautéing squash, two things that could easily burn. Both of my kids are asking me for things like water and snacks. I’ll get them water but snacks are out, this close to dinner. I remind them they can always have fruit but nothing else and there is a lot of whining. That’s okay, I can focus on 4 things at once if I take deep breaths. My mother comes in and immediately asks me 4 questions back to back “ where should I put dessert?”, “ do you have a starch or should I make carrots?”. Then my grandmother is right behind her with similar questions. It’s just too much. I tell the kids to go talk to daddy (but they won’t because I am the primary) and tell my mother to figure it out. Now I am being a bitch. When I finally get dinner to a stopping point, I walk outside to take a breath. My anxiety is already too high and I just need a minute. My MIL shows up with steak ready to cook but needs me to do things like set the oven and find her utensils/oil/seasoning. I am ready to go back in the trench. I go back and now my mother and MIL are asking me questions. I ask my husband to work on loading the dishes that we have already dirtied, while my two year old wants to be held and my four year old whines about snacks. We get to a stopping point where we’re waiting on two timers, the first one being 10 minutes. I sit down with everyone and my two year old is acting like a Tarzan gymnast in my lap. Then, somehow, everyone starts talking at once. I have a working phone but for some reason, that’s the time everyone needs to tell me every mundane thing. I can’t even hear what anyone is saying, it’s become too loud and deafening. Why doesn’t anyone else ever help with my kids? Did I mention that I recently brought the kids inside and I can feel the dry sweat on my skin? My ears are ringing and my mother is showing me photos of her lawn and my husband is playing a handheld and, oh no, we didn’t make waters for everyone yet. One kid pushed the other and I definitely needed to sooth the baby. Finally, I just quit. I get up to go take a shower. I need a time out. Everyone is like “Why are you leaving, dinner is soon!?”. I compose myself in a 10 minute shower. When I get out, still in my towel, I remind my husband that waters need to be made and the table needs to be set. Someone should put the beans in the microwave. I take another 10 minutes to dry my hair and listen to wind.

This is a common Sunday night for me. My MIL made jokes at dinner about my “mental health” and my mom thinks I just don’t care about her or her issues. The parents don’t usually watch our kids and I feel like if we didn’t have Sunday dinners, we might not see them. I like being able to talk to my family but why is every detail on me!? I talked to my husband tonight and it felt less than helpful. “If your personality flaw is so triggering, then don’t invite them”. I want to see my family, I do, I just don’t want to be responsible for every detail. I told him that maybe he could do things without me asking. His response was that our kids would mess up a made table and he doesn’t know when I am done making dishes dirty. He isn’t wrong. But is he right; is this just my problem? Am I “dramatic”. How do I not get so stimulated!? How did our parents host people and children without acting “bipolar”. Wtf can I do better?

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