Christmasis meant to be a time of festive cheer—when people feel joyful, happy, and at peace. But unfortunately, that’s not always the case. It can triggerbad memories, so not everyone enjoys this time of year. For some, the season sparks feelings of loneliness. Others might be dealing with grief, anxiety, or depression. Then there are those suffering at the hands of poverty, watching sadly from the sidelines as those around them go all out with spending and splurging during the holiday season.When someone recentlyasked,“What Is The Worst Thing That Happened To You On Christmas?”there was no shortage of answers. From the mildly funny to highly frustrating and absolutely heartbreaking, people poured out their hearts about the Christmas they wish they could forget.Bored Pandahas compiled a list of the most touching answers. Some of the stories might leave you feeling very grateful for your own blessed experiences this year, while others could have you reaching into your pockets to help a stranger in need.This post may includeaffiliate links.
Christmasis meant to be a time of festive cheer—when people feel joyful, happy, and at peace. But unfortunately, that’s not always the case. It can triggerbad memories, so not everyone enjoys this time of year. For some, the season sparks feelings of loneliness. Others might be dealing with grief, anxiety, or depression. Then there are those suffering at the hands of poverty, watching sadly from the sidelines as those around them go all out with spending and splurging during the holiday season.
When someone recentlyasked,“What Is The Worst Thing That Happened To You On Christmas?”there was no shortage of answers. From the mildly funny to highly frustrating and absolutely heartbreaking, people poured out their hearts about the Christmas they wish they could forget.Bored Pandahas compiled a list of the most touching answers. Some of the stories might leave you feeling very grateful for your own blessed experiences this year, while others could have you reaching into your pockets to help a stranger in need.
This post may includeaffiliate links.
My favourite bad Christmas story of all time was when my ex had been on an oil painting course so I’d bought her all the gear for Christmas; Easel, oil paints, fine art brushes, the lot… and that st ain’t cheap either. I’d bought it over several months and got her the best of everything. Brilliant present… or so I thought.Cut too, Christmas day and the big present opening, she opens all this stuff, bursts into tears, runs out of our flat gets in the car and drives off nearly crashing said car into the neighbours wall. It took me 8 hours to track her down and find out what the fk just happened?Turns out she hadn’t been on an oil painting course at all, she’d been fking some married bloke every Wednesday in a hotel down the road.Merry fking Christmas me.
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2008: I came down with swine flu and had to wear a surgical mask. My deadbeat dad went to jail. And on Christmas morning I found my beloved pet parakeet dead on the bottom of his cage. My neighbors looked out their back window that day to see a sobbing 17-year-old in a pink bathrobe and SARS mask saying a funeral for a dead bird in the middle of a blizzard.F**k that year.
The worst Christmas for me was 9 years ago. That December my house came down with the Noro virus. We were all either sitting on the toilet or bending over a bucket. After a few days everyone else in the house started to improve it my health continued to decline, I didn’t even have the energy to keep my eyes open. On Christmas Day the ambulance was called and I was in hospital for a few hours. My father, who was an inpatient at the same hospital came down to stay with me and to make plans for a makeup dinner, since obviously Christmas dinner was postponed (thanks to me). That was the last time I spoke to him, he passed away December 28. RIP dad
The Holiday Blues are a very real and “unmerry” thing. One 2023 surveyfoundthat almost 90% of American adults feel stressed during the holiday season. 41% said they have higher stress levels during this period compared to other times of the year. There are a range of reasons but some include a lack of time, financial pressure, stress about gift-giving, andanxietyoverfamily gatherings.“It’s important to understand that triggers for holiday angst come from many sources. Memories, stressful patterns that seem to occur every holiday, or potential new crises are common triggers,”saidDr Elsa Ronningstam, a psychologist at McLean Hospital. The expert advises that understanding your own triggers can help to reduce holiday stress.
The Holiday Blues are a very real and “unmerry” thing. One 2023 surveyfoundthat almost 90% of American adults feel stressed during the holiday season. 41% said they have higher stress levels during this period compared to other times of the year. There are a range of reasons but some include a lack of time, financial pressure, stress about gift-giving, andanxietyoverfamily gatherings.
“It’s important to understand that triggers for holiday angst come from many sources. Memories, stressful patterns that seem to occur every holiday, or potential new crises are common triggers,”saidDr Elsa Ronningstam, a psychologist at McLean Hospital. The expert advises that understanding your own triggers can help to reduce holiday stress.
One year, back in the 70’s, my Mom did not get much of anything from my Dad. All he bought her was a lighted slide sorter (for pictures), which would be fine - if she took pictures. After all the presents were opened, she went to her room and cried, while my Dad set up the slide sorter and organized HIS slides.
We got a call on Dec. 23th that my father-in-law was dying. He’d had a hard year and seemed to be doing better. He had diabetes since before I joined the family and pretty much was doing okay. Then he got an infection in his big toe and it was amputated. Later he had his leg amputated. He was really over the worst, or so we thought. They had even flown to visit my husband’s sister for Christmas. On the 23rd he’d been doing a crossword puzzle and asked my mother-in-law for help with a word. When she turned to answer him he had stopped breathing. If I remember right they did CPR until paramedics came. When we got the call the doctor had said he would not live much longer. My husband got a flight to go down to see his dad before he died. He didn’t make it in time. My father-in-law died Christmas morningHe flew back to us and we drove to the funeral. My father-in-law was a special man and we all miss him This happened over 30 years ago but I still remember how hard it was on all of us. That was tragedy number one. Many years later I was divorce. My brother’s wife had suffered with asthma her whole life. As she got older the damage to her lungs had progressed to the point where she was on oxygen all the time. A few years ago she kept having to go to the hospital. She was tired of struggling to breath and Christmas week was in the hospital again. She decided she this struggle was over. The doctors were going to turn the oxygen off. She did not want it to happen on Christmas so my brother, her daughters and grandkids would not have her death associated with Christmas. At a few minutes past midnight she asked for the oxygen to be removed. She was the sweetest lady. We miss her and my father-in-law more than words can say.
Regardless of your triggers, if you find yourself feeling down this December, experts say there are a few things you can do. One is to limit the amount ofalcoholyou drink. Alcohol can worsen negative emotions because its a depressant. Exercise, on the other hand, helps to reduce symptoms of depression. So get up and get moving to feel a bit better.
My mom was almost 80 years old and had multiple scoliosis and heart disease and blood clots and struggled with health issues for over 10 years, I took care of her for the past 18 years and we spent every day together, she also had dementia and I knew she was getting older so I made sure to tell her that I loved her 10xs a day and I tucked her into bed every night. when covid hit i was scared to death and she didn’t leave the house for over a year and I sanitized everything and was super extra careful, but like the plague it eventually found its way into my house and my whole family got it! After 2 days My mom stopped getting up to go to the bathroom and she stopped talking, i was terrified, then she stopped eating the next day, i immediately called 911 and sent her to the best hospital where they ran soo many tests, they told me that she was dieing, I said no, you don’t know her, she always gets through illnesses and she is a tough cookie, the next day i went up to see her and they told me that she had a blood clots in her brain and had a stroke and now brain damage, her kidneys were failing and she wasn’t peeing, her heart was failing and barely pumping blood and her extremities all were dead and dieing and it was traveling up her arms and legs and she was in terrible pain and they couldn’t give her pain meds because they slow the heart even more, also her lungs were falling and she was on life support, i went home devastated and cried all night, I couldn’t stand knowing that she was suffering like that and that she was really leaving! I agreed to put her on hospice and wrote her a long letter, i thanked her, told her I was sorry for things, and I told her just how much she meant to me and all that she taught me, 2 days later God came for her and i was right there holding her hand and playing Elvis music just like i always promised her when she told me she was afraid of dying alone, I promised to be right there and this year has been very hard for me, I miss her laugh and how her smile would just light up the room and you couldn’t help but smile back and I am not celebrating Christmas this year and I just want my momma back! :(
You should also avoid isolating yourself during this time. “Social isolation can be a major risk factor fordepression—and depression typically makes social interaction difficult. Particularly if you’re on your own, reaching out and finding social support can be all the more difficult,“notesVeryWell Mind. “Look for ways to enjoy social connections, even if you can’t go home for the holidays.”
I was 40, had recently been ejected from my home in an ambush divorce, broke, missing my kids every single waking moment. I needed money so I was driving a taxi cab, which was paying my child support and barely keeping me from homelessness. I worked a twelve hour shift on Christmas day, and if I had the constitution for [taking my own life] I probably would have just called it a day.
Parents sat us down, me, my brother and sister to tell us that they were getting a divorce BEFORE we got to open presents. My two younger siblings were so young that they don’t remember it. I was the lucky one to fully comprehend what that meant. So yea, kinda sucked. Not really a fan of Christmas Day.
When my son was 6 months old, his dad had a really bad motorcycle accident. His accident happened on October 1st. He didn’t get released from the hospital until October 31st. Before he could be released, we had to have medical equipment set up in our home. He had broken his pelvis in 4 pieces, punctured his bladder, and had a slew of other injuries. He was bedridden unless a physical therapist was there to help him get in a wheelchair and start doing therapy. I worked from home, and with our son being so little, my ex being bedridden, and me just trying to take care of both of them, I didn’t leave the house much. One of my ex’s friends came over on Christmas Eve to visit. He said he smelled gas in the house. I called our local utility company to come out and check things out. There was a gas leak. A really bad leak. The guy told us we needed to leave until it could get fixed.My heart and stomach both just sank. I had no way of moving my ex from his hospital bed, let alone get him in a car. The poor guy looked at me and said he was going to turn the furnace off and to use electric heaters. I opened what windows I could to get some fresh air throughout the house. I blocked off the rest of the house from the room my ex was in, and the 3 of us camped in there until the furnace could be fixed the day after Christmas. I felt more sorry for the guy who came out than I did ourselves.He really struggled with what he should do, and I’m sure me being 22 at the time with an 8 month old and my ex obviously bedridden I had a thousand yard stare going. I’m pretty sure I laughed a little at it all because it was just so much, and I didn’t know what else to do. That was 18 years ago and it is and hopefully will always be one of the worst Christmases of my life.
My brother died unexpectedly on December 22nd, 2001. Christmas is always at least half sad because he isn’t there. But that first Christmas was the very worst. Plus we had a massive snowstorm around Christmas which isolated family from joining each other and giving each other comfort. We even lost power. It was just plain miserable.
This year was one of the worst. We have a pretty close knit extended family of about 15. After spending a great day cooking for Eve dinner and wrapping presents, the rest of the family starts arriving. We’re a Hindu family, some of us agnostic/atheist but it’s cool. One of the cousins brings over his girlfriend. Cool. She’s Muslim. Not cool with the older people in the family. The yelling and rage still hasn’t stopped.
Today….today is definitely being s**t. A few weeks ago, my wife told me that she felt like we were losing the passion in our relationship. Today I saw in our phone bill that she texted some dude she works with over 4000 msgs in the month of november (around the time she started to become distant). Here’s the catch…I proposed to her exactly one year ago today….she is my second wife. The first one cheated on me while i was in Iraq.
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Stillbirth in the week between Christmas and new year, nan passing away 2 weeks after- 2001/2002.Mum passing new years day 2005Christmas and new year is a s**tty time for me.But 4 years ago a delightful amazing little boy came to me on new years day.my youngest
The worst I can remember is when I was ten, when I wrote a letter to Santa asking him to help my mom quit smoking (I believe it was around then that D.A.R.E. started). My mom, of course, read the letter, and she took me aside and told me never to bring that up with her again. And that’s how I found out there was no Santa.
- My dad had a massive stroke 4 days prior, so it was spent watching him struggle to even speak while my mother was down the hall in ICU fighting sepsis.
It was day six of my prison sentence. I was still in administrative segregation before being taken to gen-pop a day or two later, so I spent Christmas that year in a tiny cell with no one to talk to and nothing to do. I cried for a lot of it.Honestly, I’ve never really celebrated Christmas since.
My dad passed on Christmas Eve and I was snowed in and couldnt get to my family until a couple days later. It wasn’t a terrible Christmas, but it’s affected every Christmas since with his memory. Joyful memories about how he loved Christmas and our time together. I miss him immensely at this time of year.
The Christmas I was 13 and my mom confirmed what I already knew, that Santa wasn’t real. Something about her saying the words, and following it up with “I don’t have a lot of money so think of a few budget friendly ideas and don’t tell your siblings.” Even though I knew it was all make believe, her confirmation felt like it sucked all the joy and magic out of that Christmas.
Christmas 1965 when I was 13. I was asked to go bring our elderly neighbor over to our house. There was no answer at the door, I let myself in and he looked dead on the kitchen floor. I went to check him and his normally very friendly dog attacked me. Lost a neighbor, got my face stitched up and my family adopted his dog who never liked me.
I had a labrador who peed on the Christmas tree a few years ago. We tried to stop him, we chased him, then the Christmas tree fell on the puddle of pee.
Not to me but to my mum, and not on Christmas but on Boxing Day (December 26th for those in North America). I think it was 2009 I just remember hearing a loud noise and then the sound of repeated thudding in the middle of the night. My dad came into my bedroom shortly after and woke me up saying “wake up! Mum’s had an accident, she fell down the stairs!”. Mum was lying on the floor at the bottom of the stairs with a bad concussion. My dad had already phoned for an ambulance and they arrived within about 20 min. She was taken to our local hospital and treated there. Thankfully she was OK and was discharged the next day but it was a worrying few hours for us I can tell you! My mum was only 53 at the time and she says the last thing she remembers before falling was getting up out of bed to be sick, so what had happened was she had drank a bit too much on Christmas Day and was still slightly drunk, which is what caused her to fall. It’s not something we like to forget about in our family and my brother and I always like to tease her about it every year. The worst thing that has happened to me was last year when I tested positive for Covid 8 days before Christmas and had to spend Christmas Eve, Day and Boxing Day isolating in my house with only my cats and my lodger (who was out most of the day celebrating round a friend’s house) for company. I know it could have been much, much worse however!
Neighbor’s house caught on fire, so we had to evacuate onto the icy cold streets with over a foot of snow in the middle of the night.Siding on our house melted and there were char marks, had to file insurance claims. Everything inside our house smelled burnt.
Me, my partner and our daughter all came down with norovirus Christmas Day. I was first, in the morning in between opening gifts and the extended family arriving for their Christmas dinner, my partner went down about 2 hours later and our daughter later that day. I was sitting having a morning mince pie and Irish cream and suddenly had to run off to projectile vomit. The extended family arrived and then went home without any dinner and we spent most of the day lying around groaning running back and forth to the loo. My birthday is the day after Christmas, so I had to cancel my birthday party too. It took me 3 years to eat a mince pie again and I now have a fear of illness ruining Christmas Day every year!
The oven died and I woke up to my mom screaming at my dad about how my Christmas was ruined.A little backstory:I was in my last year of university, I was home for the holidays. The last several years had been brutal, my dad donated our life savings to the church and we lost any money we had. He also racked up thousands of dollars in debt and we were forced to declare bankruptcy.We also had an oven that had been there since we moved in over 20 years ago.I come down and my mom is screaming and swearing at my dad. He’s not even saying anything, and she finally storms off. I asked what the hell that was about and he started laughing.I utterly lose it at this point and actually throw something at him. (a five dollar radio he got me, he was a cheap to anyone who wasn’t himself), and scream at him about how he thinks this is funny that our lives are s**t because of him.It comes to a head when (The Golden Compass just came out and dad hated it of course because of God being killed), I scream I hope God dies.My mom drags me out of the room at that point.It was a helluva morning, That’s for sure.
My entire family woke up in the middle of the night with either food poisoning or stomach flu and we we all violently ill for the whole day and a few days after as well.
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