Mom Faces Backlash After Taking Down Christmas Tree Because 'My Kids Don't Have Anything to Open'

Mar. 15, 2025

Stock image of a single mom and child with Santa hats on.Photo:Getty

Getty

A single mom shared the reason she took down her Christmas tree, starting a conversation online.

“Take my Christmas tree down with me because there’s no point my kids don’t have anything to open under my tree for Christmas morning,” theTikTokvideo begins, showing the mom disassembling the tree.

Erica, on TikTok @electricerica, explains that her video isn’t because she’s looking for “sympathy.” Rather, she aims to “try to normalize what single moms go through.” It has since received over 3 million views.

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Stock image of gloved hand holding Christmas tree.Getty

“I’m forced to now get a part-time job on top of my full-time job,” she says, asking that people “watch and engage” so that they can “help someone who is doing everything to help herself and still failing.”

In follow-up videos, Erica explains it’s important to her to put her energy into being a “happy, present mother,” and says that’s a more significant thing she can give them than material items.

Stock image of a Christmas tree being packed away.Getty

“You had money to drive hours and stay in a hotel to visit a man in jail, why didn’t you use that money for gifts for your kids?” a user commented on her video of the visit.

“Where there is a will there is a way,” another commenter wrote on a video of her defending her Christmas tree takedown. “They have toy banks for people they have help for your kids you could look into it maybe, but this is worse on your kids and you’re being selfish taking this tree.”

Erica clarified in a follow-up video that she and her young children will be spending Christmas Eve and Christmas at her oldest daughter’s house, spending the holiday “opening gifts over there — the gifts that she has bought for my children.”

source: people.com