Unexpected Traditions and the True Meaning of Christmas

by Dec 23, 2016Holidays, Special Needs Parenting0 comments

Like Mary and Joseph, parents of kids with special needs know much about unexpected traditions and the true meaning of Christmas.

A year ago, my left hand was in a cast to recover from surgery to reconnect the thumb tendon I’d severed in a kitchen accident. A back injury had incapacitated my man-of-steel husband. As a result, we wisely decided to forego decorating the house for Christmas. “It’s only for one year,” we told each other. “We’ll do things up right next year.”

Those were, dear readers, our most Famous. Last. Words.

A month ago, we stumbled upon a house that satisfied every condition on our someday-we’d-like-to-downsize-and-live-in-a-house-with-the-following-features list, and we bought it. We’ll be moving sometime during the holidays, and our Christmas decorations are too big and too numerous for the new home. So we donated our tree and half our decorations to Good Will. And we decided not to decorate for the holidays for the second year in a row.

That, dear friends, is how unexpected holiday traditions begin at our house.

Parents of kids with special needs are all too familiar with holiday traditions of the unexpected kind. We know too much about canceling holiday plans because a medically fragile child spikes a fever, changing travel routes from Grandma’s house to the hospital for emergency Christmas surgery, or arriving late for family gatherings and leaving early to lessen the likelihood of meltdowns in kids who are sensory sensitive.

That, dear parents, is how unexpected holiday traditions begin families like ours.

Two thousand years ago, an unexpected tradition began one starry night when a young woman gave birth to the Son of God, assisted only by her husband.

To read the rest of this post, visit Key Ministry’s blog for parents of kids with special needs.

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By Jolene

Jolene Philo is the author of the Different Dream series for parents of kids with special needs. She speaks at parenting and special needs conferences around the country. She’s also the creator and host of the Different Dream website. Sharing Love Abundantly With Special Needs Families: The 5 Love Languages® for Parents Raising Children with Disabilities, which she co-authored with Dr. Gary Chapman, was released in August of 2019 and is available at local bookstores, their bookstore website, and at Amazon.

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Meet Jolene

Jolene Philo is a published author, speaker, wife, and mother of a son with special needs.

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