free will and families

In the aftermath of the holidays and the abundance of major family events that are part of my typical, adult holiday experience, this seems to be shaping up as a more personal post.
So. Did anyone else have the experience of snapping at a loved one in irritation and anger during the past few days? Here's my confession. As we sat together by the Christmas tree to open gifts on Christmas Eve, the light soft, the appetizers tasty, the children happy and excited, something happened. An energy began to build in the room. A momentum and an impatience, I would say. These were the first gifts of the season. The children had been waiting all through advent, the Elf on the Shelf, the television commercials and the catalogs that arrive in the mail. We began to pass gifts around - my oldest child old enough to read name cards and help. We try to keep it equal - everyone goes around and opens one gift, then a second round of gifts is distributed, and so on. After Round One, my daughter, who is nearly five begins asking, 'where is my next gift, I can't find another one with my name? Can you help me?' Simultaneously, my sister and mother begin directing me to find another specific package under the tree. I can't find the one for my daughter nor the one my sister and mother are requesting. My daughter, sister and mother begin offering more directions and making louder requests all simultaneously. This seems to go on for a minute, but feels like longer. It feels like everyone is talking at once and none of them seem to think I have the sense God gave me. I snap: "I'M DOING THE BEST I CAN! CAN YOU ALL JUST HOLD ON!"
Silence. My family is not a family of yellers. This is highly against protocol. I am a jerk. There are a few awkward moments. I apologize for snapping. The night goes on normally.
When it comes to the vast majority of life, particularly how we treat other people, I believe that we have many choices. Free will. With family in particular, I think we are not always aware of what choices are available to us because we are locked into ways of being that we grew up with, old scripts for behavior that we rarely question.
In my life, when I question my words or behavior, whether past, present or future, I find it helpful to try to ask myself and answer as objectively as possible: What are ALL my choices here?
With the above situation what were my other choices? I could have patiently continued to look for the gifts my family members were asking for and ignored their escalating voices (and stuffed my frustration). I could have told them all to go to hell and find their own gifts and stormed out of the room. I could have made the whole thing into a joke to lessen the tension for them and for me. I could have said a clear version of my truth, "I'm sorry, but I'm having a hard time finding these gifts. Maybe someone could come over here and help me or try to be patient while I do one thing at a time." I'm sure there are other possibilities that I'm not thinking of. For me, I think the last two choices ring more true to who I want and strive to be as a person.
So next Christmas, my family better watch out - I intend to be so patient, kind and in touch with my feelings, it will be nearly intolerable. I hope it will be the same for you.
Speaking of choices and family, and on a somewhat other note...this article appeared in the NYT on Dec. 26 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/26/us/politics/26death.html?emc=tnt&tntemail1=y regarding the new Medicare guidelines for doctors to advise their patients regarding choices in end of life care including advance directives. In case you don't know, advance directives are documents that allow a person who is healthy and his or her right mind to consider in advance what life sustaining treatments should be administered or withheld should that person not be able to make those decisions on her own and also appointing a health care proxy like a spouse or adult child. We should all be having these conversations with our families and making sure we have these documents, whether this is initiated by our doctors or not. Obviously, my time working in hospice exposed me to these issues, but by the time a person is in need of hospice care, the trajectory of their illness or treatment is typically one without much choice. I most certainly saw families where the existence of an advance directive would have brought lots of peace of mind to the family trying to make decisions for a loved one in a coma or with dementia.
The point is there are lots more choices available to us in all aspects of our life than we typically stay aware of. Here's to being aware of our choices and making ones we feel good about in 2011.