Holiday Blues and What to Do
Meals to cook, presents to wrap, kids with the sniffles (or worse), reaching end of year work deadlines, preparing for travel or preparing for guests to arrive– there are a litany of added stresses that permeate what should conventionally be a season of relaxing with friends and family. Compound that with interfamilial conflicts, historical holiday traumas, and spending uncomfortable amounts of time with in-laws and you have a perfect recipe for anxiety, depression, and the colloquially named “Holiday Blues.”
What the Research Shows
According to the American Psychological Association, 44% of women and 33% of men report heightened stress levels during the holiday season. There is also a direct link between stress and illness (which is also heightened during the winter seasons). The National Alliance on Mental Illness found that 64% of people living with a mental illness report that their conditions worsened around the holidays. There are countless variables that contribute to our worsening mental health this time of year.
How to Manage the Holiday Blues
First and foremost– give yourself permission to be stressed, depressed, anxious, etc. It does not serve you to shame yourself into “not feeling” your emotions just because family is in town. Validate yourself and what you’ve experienced. Validate your emotions. You feel the way you do for a reason.
Second, double down on the stress management techniques that work best for you. Want to take a bath but feel silly cause you took one yesterday? Take one anyway. Need some alone time to read, breathe, watch a show, or play a video game? Let your loved ones know what you need and then make sure you give yourself space and time. It’s common for family to not understand. What I’ve found is helpful is to explain that when you take time for yourself, you are able to show up in a greater way for them. Prioritize you.
Let’s be real. Most of us mortals can’t meditate our way into a zen state that no one in our family can trigger an emotional reaction from us. Third is to employ in-the-field coping mechanisms. In the mental health world we refer to these coping strategies informally as mental band-aids. These are activities that are not designed to treat or heal, but they do temporarily cover up the symptoms. This topic could use its own entire blog post, but essentially you give yourself permission to grab your proverbial teddy bear/pacifier to make it through the hard moments. This could be giving yourself permission to eat whatever treats you like, pour an extra glass of eggnog, pull out your phone and watch a couple of cute puppy videos– you get the idea. We don’t want to rely only on mental band-aids on the daily, but for those extra stressful holiday events– give yourself permission to do so.
Fourth, find someone to connect with. Research shows that connecting with a friend or safe family member reduces stress levels on a neurological level. Cortisol, the stress hormone, is shown to decline in persons connecting with someone. Connection lowers heart rate, blood pressure, muscle tension, and breathing rate. If you can find someone to laugh with– the benefits are exponential.
Conclusion
The holidays are stressful! Whether you have a mental health condition or not– the added pressure, familial obligations, travel, sickness, etc., does stack up! Make sure you take care of yourself this holiday season. Define and defend your boundaries. Prioritize you. Once the holidays are over, I almost always feel like I need a therapy session to just vent out everything that happened. I couldn’t recommend a better post-holiday mental health treatment.
As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts, questions, and stories in the comments!
Good luck.