Christmas Eve: Holding the Quiet, Honoring What This Season Really Is

Christmas Eve has always carried a certain weight for me.

Not the loud kind. Not the sparkly, performative kind. But the quieter weight—the kind that settles in your chest when the house finally stills, the lights are low, and you’re left alone with memory, grief, gratitude, and everything in between.

This night asks for reflection whether we’re ready or not.

As a parent, as a doula, as someone who has lived through a pregnancy that didn’t follow the script and a postpartum season that cracked me open, Christmas Eve doesn’t feel simple. It never has. It holds tenderness and ache side by side. It holds who I was, who I thought I’d be, and who I’m still becoming.

There’s a lot of pressure this time of year to make things magical. To wrap pain in pretty paper. To smile through exhaustion. To create moments that look good instead of moments that feel true. But Christmas Eve, for me, isn’t about forcing joy. It’s about honesty.

It’s about sitting with the year that has passed and letting it be what it was.

Birth teaches us that some moments change us forever. Not because they’re perfect, but because they’re real. Christmas Eve feels similar. It’s a threshold. A pause between what has already happened and what hasn’t arrived yet. A space where we can stop striving and simply witness ourselves.

I think about the parents I’ve supported this year. The ones in postpartum fog. The ones navigating feeding challenges, NICU memories, slow bonding, hormonal storms, and invisible grief. I think about how many of them feel like they’re doing it wrong because their holidays don’t look joyful enough.

And I want to say this clearly: tenderness is enough.

If you’re in postpartum this Christmas Eve, you don’t need to create memories. You are surviving and healing and showing up. That counts. If you’re grieving a birth you didn’t get, a body that feels unfamiliar, a version of yourself you miss—there is room for that here. This night can hold it.

For me, Christmas Eve is about small rituals. Soft ones. Lighting candles not to decorate, but to ground.

Creating something with my hands because words still don’t always come easily. Sitting with my body instead of pushing it to perform comfort or cheer.

Creativity has taught me that healing doesn’t need to be loud. It doesn’t need witnesses. Sometimes it just needs space.

So tonight, I’m not asking myself to be grateful for everything. I’m not tying the year up in a bow. I’m letting it be layered. I’m letting joy exist where it does and grief exist where it needs to. I’m honoring the parts of me that are still tender and the parts that have grown stronger without asking permission.

Christmas Eve doesn’t need to be magical.It needs to be honest.

If you’re reading this in the quiet hours—maybe rocking a baby, maybe missing someone, maybe feeling out of sync with the season—I see you. You’re not behind. You’re not broken. You’re exactly where you are.

Tonight is not about fixing. It’s about holding.

And sometimes, that’s the most meaningful thing we can do.