Christmas and Pacing Yourself

[VaBreeze]

As the holiday approaches quickly, what measures are you taking to pace yourself?  Pacing is one way we can make it through the season without enabling ourselves to become over-exerted or without setting ourselves into a flare.  With fibro and cfs, we must make certain accommodations to our lifestyles because we don't have the energy we once did; fibro-fog invades us at the worst time making it take longer to recall what we need to do and leaves us frustrated.

I began decorating early this year.  I also cut back on how much decorating needs to be done.  I order from online companies and gift shops so that I can avoid the crowded malls...this also saves me my energy.  I do love to gift wrap, but i've found that pre-decorated boxes and gift bags make people just as happy.

Do you have a method that you use to save yourself some time and energy?  I would love to hear about it, no matter how small it may seem.  I'm trying to make my holiday season as simple and as pain-free as I possibly can.

[VaBreeze]

I agree Robin...a roast is far easier to handle and less mess.  Pop it all into a crock pot and dinner is done by itself.

Kitty - that is a great way to take the whole burden off of yourself, by having others bring special dishes.  I love the paper and plastic too.  No fuss...just toss it away.

Thanks so much for the great ideas.

[Kitty76]

Well We don't celebrate Christmas so I get out of it pretty easy :OP But when it comes to organising family get togethers both my mother and I generally work together, lately because we've both been etra exhausted and sore we've been asking one family member to bring a dessert, another the drinks and the rest something extra to put on the table to save us the extra work. Then hubby goes out buys the meat and we just have a BBQ with paper or plastic ware so that we can just toss it all out at the end of the day that way all that needs to be done after is a quick run around with the mop and vacuum cleaner and all the benches wiped and thats when hubby steps in to help :OP

[RobinHood70]

I'm not sure if my comments will be particularly helpful, but I just let my partner do all the decorating.  And this started way before the CFS developed. :)  If he left it up to me, I'd pull out a pre-decorated 18" tree, plug it in and be done with my decorating for the year.

But seriously, like you, I order strictly online, which all my relatives know at this point.  I generally have the energy to wrap, though in truth, I lack anything resembling skill!

Apart from that, if we do something special for dinner, we start cooking as early as I feel up to it, then just let it slow cook all day until it's done.  And if it takes too long, we just snack on other things or reverse the order of dinner and dessert.  Another tip is to cook a roast rather than a turkey.  I'm not exactly a professional chef, but at least for me, I find a roast to be far less work.