Saying no to another family Christmas was a landmark life decision, says Alison Stevens

You’ve only recently found the courage to tell your parents that actually the last time you wanted a cuddly toy for Christmas you were still in junior school. Now you have to hit them with the cruellest revelation of all – this year you won’t be spending Christmas en-famille at all. . .

My mum’s ‘feed the five thousand’ turkey probably thawed out quicker than she did when two years ago, at the tender age of 26, I finally made a stand and said I wouldn’t be home for Christmas. Even amidst the wailing and gnashing of teeth I knew this was an important moment in my life. A rite of passage somewhere on a par with ordering your first lager and black.

And when you do it, you have to keep nerves of steel. The emotional blackmail is intense. You’re seen as a fifth columnist. There to destroy the family structure. In fact, it seems like the whole of society’s social fabric will break down with this one act of betrayal.

One way to keep your nerve is to do what I did – reciting a mantra beforehand, listing my least favourite things of spending Christmas holed up with my (soon to be ex, as threatened) family. Number one, my dad’s insistence that none of us could open our presents until after lunch, and even then only in order of age and with the proviso that the wrapping paper be disposed of with military precision afterwards.

Which was followed very closely by my number two hate: Mum’s hit or miss approach to the Yuletide feast, best demonstrated by the year she melted the plastic dish around the Christmas pudding and still made us eat it.

Then there was the way my gran overindulged the Christmas spirit indulgence (and, come to think of it, the Advocaat) by inviting someone less fortunate than ourselves to share our meal. Usually this meant a tramp from the local park – though whether he thought himself less fortunate than us after seeing what was on our Christmas table is debatable.

Or my brother’s requirement that we watch, for possibly the hundredth time, James Stewart in It’s a Wonderful Life. Whoever said this film was feelgood must have been on suicide watch. If we were going to have to see it why couldn’t he have timed it so it drowned out the Queen? Because, as soon as Her Majesty hit the screen I felt the need to run up the red flag while my dad turned into Alf Garnet. Still, at least the screaming arguments (Dad – Anne Widdicombe is a perfectly reasonable human being. Me – Dennis Skinner should be Prime Minister) drowned her out. Need I go on?

I believe this one small step for me but one giant leap for grown-up children everywhere has saved me years of therapy. So what did I do instead? The first year of rebellion I’m ashamed to admit I spent the day with my boyfriend’s parents and – oh, just read the above again with in-laws as a prefix.

But last year I did it my way. And although there were moments when I was tempted to play Judy Garland’s ‘Please Stay with Me Till After the Holidays’ more than twice, it was the best Christmas Day I’ve had since getting a real Barbie instead of a snide one.

Up at eleven and no need to disguise the raging hangover, although Gran’s eggnog did used to be the best hair of the dog. Open presents immediately (all two of them, a diary from my bank manager and free makeover vouchers from the gym. My family childishly refused to give me mine beforehand) and throw the paper around with abandonment. Then lunch. Those microwave turkey dinners for one are a wonder of modern science. Then television. A choice of Sound of Music – I can see my mum holding her tissues at the ready or . . . It’s a Wonderful Life. Oh, what the hell. What’s one more time round the block with Jimmy Stewart and the Andrex extra-strength?

That said, I will never regret saying no to a family Christmas. It was the first time I’d felt grown up in front of my parents since I was allowed to choose my own wallpaper. This year is no different, although I have persuaded Mum and Dad (as they now allow me to call them again) to give me my presents on Christmas Eve. I will, however, be going out to a restaurant with friends on the big day as the microwave dinner was perhaps too reminiscent of my mum’s plastic pudding.