5 Tips to Manage Holiday Stress

Tis’ the season for gathering, singing, shopping and…holiday stress! The holidays can be cheery, but for many it brings a sense of dread, as the expectations, memories, and to-do lists overwhelm their senses.

As a former holiday Grinch, I know first-hand how it feels to hate the holiday season and everything that comes with it! However, the holidays will keep coming, EVERY YEAR, so what can you do make them a little less miserable? This blog post is ALL ABOUT ways to manage holiday stress.

What creates holiday stress?

The first step to managing stress is understanding what causes it for YOU. Every person has different things that activate their system based on their history, their beliefs, and their expectations. Ask yourself, what’s the problem?

Family and the Holidays

As a therapist, the biggest problem I hear about in my office around the holidays is FAMILY. Even the healthiest family systems can experience conflict during the holidays. For people with unhealthy family systems, the holidays can be a nightmare.

Imagine, you’ve been working hard to shift out of old patterns, regulate your emotions, heal from childhood wounds. You walk up to your family’s holiday dinner, proud of how far you’ve come, then BAM, your mom (or sister or cousin) says a comment that brings you right back, and you find yourself acting like your teenage self all over again. Sound familiar? This experience is common, because, for many, you are back in the environment where these patterns were developed and your survival skills (while, maybe not the healthiest) are activated to keep you safe. These same survival skills, or younger parts of you, are likely gearing up as the holiday events draw near, causing tension and stress in your body.

Unrealistic Expectations

Another big problem that I hear about around the holidays is EXPECTATIONS. Expectations can take a perfectly good reality and make it not good enough. Some common expectations are:

This dinner needs to go perfectly
There can’t be any conflict
I need to find the best present
I’m supposed to go to Instagram-worthy holiday parties
I need to maintain my diet
I’m supposed to feel happy

The list goes on and on. Unrealistic expectations cause holiday stress because you are constantly trying to live up to something that is unattainable.

Holiday Grief

A big stressor around the holidays is GRIEF. For a lot of people, this holiday will be the first one without a loved one that they have recently lost. For others, the holidays are a constant reminder of the family or friend groups that they never had. Even grief that has been processed can be activated during the holidays as memories come to life. Grief is something that takes time, and you may want to avoid the unwanted emotions that come with it. Unfortunately, avoiding these emotions can cause them to build up in your body, increasing feelings of holiday stress and tension.

The Holiday Season

The holiday SEASON itself can cause holiday stress, because it’s just that, a whole season. Your entire world seems to change for two months out of the year. Friends get busier and unavailable. School schedules get interrupted with holiday breaks. Favorite restaurants and stores go from familiar and comfy to holiday themed. Some people thrive on change and find it exciting. Lots of people don’t. Changes and transitions can feel threatening and dysregulate the nervous system, and two months is a long time to wait for life to get back to normal.

How do I Manage Holiday Stress?

Boundaries

Boundaries are a great way to maintain personal power around the holidays. The MOST important thing to remember about boundaries is that they are for YOU, not for other people. Boundaries, when used correctly, are meant to protect you. Focus on what is in your control. You may not be able to prevent your dad from criticizing you, your friend from cancelling on you, or make your boyfriend act a certain way, but you can set a boundary if someone does something that activates you.

Common examples of boundaries look like:

If you act that way, it makes me not want to be around you, so I will leave.
When you criticize me, I feel bad, and I will stop talking to you to avoid being criticized.
I won’t be exchanging gifts this year.
I will go to the holiday party, but only for two hours.
I won’t be going to [insert event name here] this year.

Different boundaries make sense for different people. Find out what boundaries help you feel safe and help reduce your holiday stress.

Shift Expectations

Again, expectations can ruin a perfectly good reality. Identify what expectations you have and find ways to shift them. Maybe you expect your partner to get you a certain gift, setting yourself up for resentment when they get you something else. Maybe you expect yourself to be free from unwanted emotions, creating an added stress when you get mad at yourself for having feelings. Take a look at which expectations are contributing to your stress and create some flexibility around them. Some flexible statements might look like:

I’m allowed to feel, this is a stressful time.
It’s okay if things aren’t perfect, I’m doing the best I can.
My family will likely engage in their old patterns, I can prep myself for that.

Think about what flexible expectations work for you to reduce holiday stress.

Process Grief

Grief might be unavoidable but processing it can help relieve some tension. So, what does processing grief even look like? If you have someone in your life that feels safe, like a friend or a therapist, talking to someone is the most effective way to process grief. Exploring your emotions, talking through the loss, and feeling connected can help alleviate the painful or tense emotions.

If you are someone who prefers to process alone, journaling on the grief or meditating on the grief is a great alternative to talking to someone. Allow yourself space in this busy season to sit with the emotions, processing whatever grief feels trapped.

Self-Care

There may not be enough boundaries and expectation shifting to completely avoid holiday stress, so it is a good idea to fill your cup back up wherever you can. Managing the holidays can take a lot of energy, and you can’t keep running on fumes, so think about what kinds of things make you feel energized. Maybe you feel energized by having a night in, watching a familiar movie, and snuggling up on the couch. Maybe you feel energized by taking a quick trip or meeting up with good friends. Whether it’s increasing your bubbles baths, buying yourself a little something, meditating, or seeking solace in friends, do more of what feels good to counterbalance the things that feel draining.

Do Yoga

I might be a broken record with how often I tell people to do yoga, but it IS a great way to regulate your nervous system. Stress activates your sympathetic nervous system, and rhythmic movement and/or breathing exercises can get you back to a state of calm. So, whether it’s a YouTube yoga to reduce stress, Tai Chi, running, cycling, or mindfully walking, get moving in a rhythmic way to give your body a break from being activated.

Those are the 5 tips to help manage your holiday stress this season! Remember, the holidays will keep coming every year, so start practicing some of these tips to make them just as manageable as the rest of the year.