Managing Disappointment When You Expect To Feel Happy

When my children were five and nine, I planned a special joint 65th birthday celebration for my parents. Their birthdays are only five days apart, and I wanted to honour them with something unforgettable.

I spent months organizing. We arranged surprise guests from Ireland, the U.S., and across Canada. We rented a beautiful venue. We hired caterers. We lined up musical tributes from friends and family. I couldn’t wait to see my parents’ faces when they arrived and realized we’d orchestrated something magical just for them.

On the day of the party, I arrived early with my husband and the kids. We were setting up decorations, adjusting catering trays and checking last-minute details. The boys played in a small side room filled with toys and books, the perfect place to keep them entertained while the adults worked.

I was in the kitchen when suddenly I heard a scream. I ran into the toy room and found my youngest son lying on the floor, blood dripping from his head, screaming. He had been tipping himself backward on a chair, something I’d repeatedly warned him about, and the chair had flipped. He had cracked his head open.

Within minutes, people were offering to take him to the emergency room so I could stay for the party I’d poured my heart into. But I’m his mother.  There was no universe in which I could hand him to someone else while he clung to me, terrified and crying. Six hours and six staples later, he was okay.  The party was over. I had missed the entire thing.

Walking out of the hospital, I felt a rush of emotion rise in my throat—relief, of course, but also overwhelming disappointment. I felt sad that I had missed the celebration, sad that my son had missed it, and sad that my parents hadn’t had us there. And for a split second, I felt a flash of irritation at my son: why didn’t he listen? Why today of all days?

These are the moments parents never talk about, but we all experience. I eventually drove back to my parents’ home, where my family showed me photos and videos of the evening. They’d had an incredible night. They laughed and cried and celebrated. Everything I’d hoped for had come true, just without me.

And while that made me feel even sadder at first, eventually I found myself laughing and singing along with them as they replayed the night. Everyone listened to my son retell his story of the hospital while he proudly showed off his stapled head.

It didn’t unfold the way I wanted. It wasn’t the memory I thought I would have. But the night was still beautiful in its own way—and my son will never question my commitment to his well-being (I hope).

Why disappointment hits so hard

As adults, we build entire emotional stories around our plans:

• How things should go
• How people should behave
• How we expect to feel
• How we expect others to feel (and how we expect others to feel)

And nowhere is this more obvious than during the holidays.

December carries with it an entire catalogue of expectations: perfect gatherings, matching pyjamas, peaceful baking sessions, magical mornings, smiling family photos and children who somehow remain calm and grateful through it all.

So when the plan derails—a child gets sick, travel is cancelled, a relative melts down, the cookies burn, the tree falls over or someone ends up in the emergency room—the disappointment hits even harder. We’re not just reacting to what happened. We’re grieving the holiday we imagined.

Disappointment is a normal human response. Frustration is a normal response. Even that fleeting spark of anger at a child or loved one is normal. But many parents don’t allow themselves to feel these emotions because they think:

• I shouldn’t be upset,  it’s Christmas.
• Feeling disappointed makes me ungrateful.
• This isn’t a big deal; I should just be happy.

These “should thoughts” pile guilt and shame on top of an already heavy feeling.

The psychology of the unexpected

When things don’t go as planned, our nervous system perceives it as a kind of emotional whiplash. We go from anticipation or excitement into stress, worry, sadness or even anger.

This is called emotional incongruence—the distance between what we expected to feel and what we actually feel. The bigger the emotional build-up, the bigger the emotional crash when things unravel. And we all know that the holidays are full of these moments in sizes small, medium, large and XXL.

This time of year amplifies emotion. The joyful moments feel brighter. And the disappointments feel heavier. In these moments, our adult emotions, especially disappointment, frustration, and grief, need acknowledgment, not suppression.

Accepting the unexpected without blaming ourselves (or our kids)

Parents often tell me about moments like these with a twinge of guilt. They say things like:

• “I know I shouldn’t have been upset, but…”
• “I felt bad for feeling bad…”
• “I know it wasn’t their fault, but…”

Here’s the truth:

Two things can be true at the same time. Your child needed you, and you were there. And something you cared about was lost, and that hurts. The goal is not to eliminate disappointment but to respond to it with compassion. Here’s what emotional acceptance looks like:

1. Name the feeling “I feel disappointed. Today didn’t go the way I hoped.”
2. Normalize the feeling “Anyone in my position might feel this way.”
3. Avoid turning the feeling into a story “This was one moment, not a pattern or a punishment.”
4. Focus on what matters most “I showed up where I was needed. That’s the memory that counts.”

The unexpected moments that define holiday memories

The truth is, family life—and especially holiday family life—is one long series of unexpected events.

• Plans change.
• Kids get overwhelmed.
• Emotions flare.
• Travel plans unravel.
• Gingerbread houses collapse.
• Something spills on the outfit everyone was supposed to wear for the photo.
• Someone cries at the Christmas concert, and it’s not the child.

But it is often in these unplanned moments that we discover:

• Our resilience

• Our priorities

• Our ability to adapt

• Our capacity to love through frustration

• Our sense of humour (eventually!)

When we can let go of “the plan” and meet reality as it is, we teach our children emotional flexibility. We show them that holidays—and life —can veer off course and still be deeply meaningful and fun.

My take, as a therapist

When I think back to that night, I no longer feel the sting of missing the celebration. What I remember is holding my little boy tightly, reading with him to calm him as we waited, and laughing with my family afterward as they shared the joy of the night with me.

The unexpected didn’t ruin the moment; it changed the story. And in the end, that story is still one of family, love, and showing up where it mattered.

The same is true for the holidays:  The meaning is rarely in the plan.  It’s in how we show up when the plan falls apart.

The Takeaway

You should expect the unexpected because it will happen, especially during the holidays. But even more importantly, you can try to accept the unexpected.  That acceptance turns disappointment into resilience, frustration into perspective, and unwanted detours into family stories that bind us together. Because holidays, like life, rarely go as planned.