Xmas Woes

Can I just whine for a minute?

So, last night, with daylight savings time, my shift went from 8 hours to 9 hours. Ok, that sucks, but it's an extra hour of pay, so whatever. I only got two hours of sleep yesterday afternoon because pregnancy heartburn has set in and it's kicking my ass. Luckily, it was a pretty quiet night, no extra work for me, so other than extreme tiredness, it was pretty good.

Until my manager showed up. Not that I have anything against her, but I'd asked her for Christmas eve off (not Christmas, just the one day) because my schedule has me working Xmas eve, Xmas, New Years Eve and New Years. So, I thought, hell, maybe she'll see that it's insane and wildly unfair for me to have to work every single important holiday (oh yeah, Thanksgiving, too) in the fall/winter, and I offered to work any other shift that week, or the next week, or whenever the guy who would be taking over for me wanted, if I could just have Xmas eve off. No dice. Apparently it wouldn't be fair because he has to work New Year's Eve, because everyone in my department has to work that day, because we're supposedly insanely busy. So... it's fair for me to work NYE and Xmas eve and Xmas and NYD, but not for him.

She said I can talk to him and if he's happy to switch with me, then she doesn't mind. This guy (the only other person trained in my role) is the biggest asshole. I fully intend to ask him, to be as sweet as pie, to keep my original offer to work literally any other night he wants me to. I'll bake him cookies, I'll bring him dinner, whatever he wants - but I fully expect him to say no. He has no family in town and I'm pretty sure he never leaves his house except for work (we live in a very small town and I have literally never seen him outside of work, ever). Other colleagues have told me he hates Christmas and thinks it's stupid, but he just seems like the type of person to get a kick out of making people's lives miserable. He's rude to our customers, to our coworkers, to everyone. When he trained me, I would ask questions and he would go on 25 minute tirades designed to make me feel stupid (none of which ever answered what I'd asked). Management seems to see him as a loveable grump. If he was my employee, he'd have been fired long ago.

And this is who I have to hope has a little compassion so that I can actually enjoy Christmas with my kid. I don't think I should get special treatment because of the monster, but I'd like to think that if I had a business and one of my employee's regular schedule had them working on every single winter holiday, that I'd move things around so that everyone at least had the chance to celebrate.

Mr. Wolfman and I combine our cultures' Christmases, so we celebrate his way on the 24th (traditional meal, one gift each) and my way on the 25th (stockings, one more small gift, turkey dinner).
Except this year, it will look like:

I go to bed when Mr. Wolfman gets home from work on the 24th (3:30pm). Mr. Wolfman cooks the entire meal alone while watching DS because I need to sleep. 7-8pm, I wake up and we have dinner and one present, then I go to work. Come home at 7:30am. Maybe DS can squeeze his stocking in there, because Mr. Wolfman starts work at 8. Then Mr. Wolfman gets home at 3:30 and I go to bed. No turkey dinner because I have to sleep and I'm not going to ask Mr. Wolfman to cook a way more complicated meal that I won't even have time to eat. And then I work all night and come home on boxing day... which I guess is when we get our Xmas day presents.

FUCK.

I am well aware that this falls squarely in the realm of a first world problem. I know it's just a date. I know that there are people who are starving, people who can't even spend one day of the holidays with their families, people who would balk at 6 presents and a stocking (and an advent calendar) for a family of 3, who would never waste money on two big, elaborate meals in as many days. But it still sucks. And I still ugly cried the entire 15 minute walk home this morning. And yeah, I'm crying right now.

I'm really afraid this will ruin the whole season for me, that I'll lose it every time I look at Christmas lights or someone asks me about my holiday plans. This is the first year that the monster is going to be interested in anything going on around Christmas and his last year as an only child. I wanted it to be really special for him. And part of me knows it still can be, if I stop being a weepy mess, but at the moment, that seems impossible.

FUCK.