Extra Safe Space #54: Holiday Smiling Issues
Extra Safe Space is a place for things you’ve never told anyone before. These will always be kept completely anonymous. To tell your secret, fill out this form (it doesn’t ask for or record any identifying info). That is the only criterion. Or read other people’s here as they come in.
Holidays make me anxious and depressed. All holidays. The worst are New Years Eve and Halloween because they are supposed to be full of unbridled fun and revelry and therefore remind me that I don’t seem to have the capacity to feel those things. On Halloween this year, I could tell by the way my friends looked at me that they saw through my fake smile at their party. I’m not even acting well. Where do I start? And do I do that thing of smiling so I produce feelings of happiness or do I just show my true feelings? Do I drink to numb it or try not to?
To add to all of this, back in September I started sleeping with someone who has another partner that they are committed to. I smile through that too.
I want to help with the range of issues you're dealing with here. I also asked if other people in the Substack community could share any wisdom they have also. I will say that the idea of smiling to make yourself feel happier has not worked for me, but that's probably because I (and it sounds like maybe you) have a hard time producing a genuine smile when I am not feeling it. I went through a really tough time years back where for months I thought that everyone around me, including strangers, was really deeply depressed and then I realized that it was because they were mirroring the expression on my face - when I thought I was smiling and appearing fine. It helps me more to be open and honest about -and to let my expressions be in sync with - what I'm feeling. And I'm glad you started by sharing it here. Thank you and I'm sending you love.
I have so many thoughts on this! I have the diagnosis formerly referred to as Asperger’s syndrome (ASD I) and smiling is a nightmare for me. There’s a really sweet but in a way also sad story in one of Tony Attwood’s books about a boy with ASD I who sees his sister fall off a swing and quickly turns to his mom and asks “Mommy, what face do I make?” Sad because so many people, even renowned researchers, accuse these kids of having no empathy. The truth is just that we don’t intuit how to communicate with our bodies and this includes smiling.
Re: drinking to cope, that’s what my dad did and and as the daughter of someone who went that route I would say please don’t, it has ripple effects on others, and doesn’t get to the root of your discomfort, whatever that is in your case, it just compounds the misery.
My advice would be to figure out with a good therapist or great Buddhist mediation teacher how to just let yourself be. There’s a lot of pressure to be a certain way, I know, but that’s all it is. I don’t have much constructive advice because my coping is avoidance and that’s its own poison.
Finally, I just want to share that we’re staying in this lovely family hotel right now but there are injunctions all over the place here, on posters, even inscribed into the wooden bread bowl (“FUN-tastisch!”) to always be celebrating and having constant fun. It’s pissing me off so when I saw your post I thought I’d share that you aren’t the only one who sees it for what it is: unfair social pressure to not be what/who you are at any given time.