When you start working, you get the opportunity to meet people you would have never normally crossed paths with in your day-to-day life.

In my teens, I remember befriending a lovely older lady at one of my first jobs. Seeing how lost and confused I was as I tried to navigate workplace politics, she took me under her wing and took care of me. Kind and generous to a fault, we had many teas and biscuits together.

It took her months to open up but I remember a particular moment around Christmas when she broke down and told me how much she dreaded the holidays. She confessed to me that she had fallen out with her mother years before and the fact that she was unmarried and childless meant that she would spend “the most wonderful time of the year” alone.

She said that what made it so much worse for her was that she had to force herself to act cheerful even though she didn’t want to because that’s what the season requires.

With around 20 Christmases to reflect on since we spoke about this and everything that has happened to me in between, I can’t help but dwell on her latter sentiment.

While Christmas does have a beautiful way of bringing people together, it can also act to make people feel even more isolated and alienated when they don’t have all the things those shiny, glittery adverts are telling them they should or when they’re going through a grief that feels even heavier to carry on such occasions.

Of course, I’m by no means implying that we should all be miserable just because a number of people are going through more challenging times than us or that we shouldn’t celebrate ourselves but what I notice more and more is the lack of empathy and compassion that seems to be growing as the years pass.

A lack of empathy and compassion seems to be growing as the years pass- Anna Marie Galea

Thanks perhaps partly to technology and the constant focus on the self, more and more people have moved away from thinking about their communities and the role we all have to play to make the world a little bit brighter.

This has made those on the fringes feel more alone than ever. In a world that constantly tells you how to look and what a perfect festive season looks like, it is getting ever harder to reconcile your experience with what you’re being fed.

By the time you see this piece, it will be Christmas Day and my hope is that you will be warm, well-fed and surrounded by those you love. However, for those who read this under very different circumstances and whose Christmas doesn’t look like a Hallmark film, I want you to know that you are not alone. You are seen and, however hard things feel today, they will get better.

I want to thank everyone for sticking with me for another year; we have come a long way from me telling you not to get your significant other socks for Christmas.

Here’s hoping that 2023 will be a year full of hope and redemption for us as well as for the country we call home.