Holiday Heaviness
Why do the holidays always seem heavier? There is so much anticipation, joy, and expectation. There can also be alot of heartache, grief, and complication. Why are holidays so hard? For starters; there is alot of social (and maybe family) pressure to keep up with preparing meals, attending events, travel, financies, gifts. Add on top of it complicated family dynamics. “We spend the holidays with his family every year, we try to see both families every year, we host every year.” Have you considered staying home with your immediate family and creating your own traditions? Relational stress is often the tipping point that pushes us over the edge from enjoying holidays to dreading them.
Grief: This can be complicated, if you have lost someone around the holidays, they can remind you of their absense. This can get tricky when we had a complicated relationship with a decesased family member or loved one. Maybe you were abused or estranged from a family member/s. Maybe you are currently estranged from your family members. Grief isn’t just for those who have passed, you can also greive a relationship with someone who is still alive, has disappointed you, crossed your boundaries, failed to give you what you needed and treated you as a problem for having needs or setting boundaries.
For my perfectionist friends/ moms: manage your expectations! What are you expecting yourself to accomplish this holiday season? Do you really need to go to every holiday event, contribute homemade treats for school, say yes to any and everything because someone else wants you to? Brene Brown would suggest giving it a day before you commit to anything. Overcommitting can create burnout and resentment. Also- stop comparing yourself to other people. Did that other mom at school homemake all the treats, volunteer in the classroom, dole out homemade cards? Good for them! Stay in your lane! Some people have more energy that others. In fact there are circles I am in that make it really hard not to compare. Recently one woman helping orangize an event commented, “how hard can it be, so and so did x,y and z.” To which I replied: “everyone opperates at different capacities, I’m so glad you have energy for that, I do not. “ Just because you have the ability does not mean you have the capacity. This woman knows nothing of my autoimmune disease and complicated family dynamics, and I don’t have to explain them to her, I can just set a boundary. I like to ask myself how much energy do I have and where do I want to put it? In the past I would have absolutly made cinnamon rolls from scratch, agreed to more things than I should have, etc. I don’t do that anymore because I’m not hussling for my worth, Im saving my energy for my kids, husband, and the relatioships I value.
Prioriotize self care, set boundaries, and “try softer” as therapist and author Aundi Kolber would say. You can check out her book and her work here .
