Strategies to cope with holiday stress and anxiety

Stress. Anxiety. Depression. Consider them the least-wanted gifts of the holiday season.

For some unfortunate revelers, they arrive with the Christmas season as surely as carolers, jammed stores and growing credit card balances. However, area therapists say there are a few strategies that can help stem the sometimes negative emotional effects of the period from Christmas to New Year’s.

“I think the holidays can be a wonderful time and also a difficult time for a variety of reasons,” said Dr. Amy Black, a licensed counseling psychologist and adult psychotherapy program coordinator at UNLV PRACTICE, the university’s community mental health training clinic.

The holiday season is “a time when people feel more stressed,” Black said, and some experience more anxiety and more depression.

“As humans, we are meaning-makers, and the holidays is a time that’s laden with a lot of different meanings, some of them positive and hopeful and others more painful. And because there’s so much tradition associated with the holidays, it can bring up memories both good and bad.”

If the holiday season doesn’t agree with you, emotionally speaking, you’re not alone. One survey by the American Psychological Association found that 38 percent of people “feel more stress during the holidays,” said Dr. Carla Perlotto, director of the office of student counseling at Touro University Nevada.

Also, Perlotto said, “we know that the holidays bring stress and illness and sometimes a little bit more substance use and misuse.”

No shortage of triggers

The causes of holiday stress can be varied, from the simple stress of having too much to do in a relatively short time, to dealing with tense family relationships, to trying to pull off the perfect Christmas.

That last one is particularly tricky, given both the high expectations many hold of Christmas and the near impossibility of living up to them. Think, for instance, about all of those TV movies depicting picture-perfect holidays.

“Most families are not Hallmark movies,” Perlotto said, but “we have all of these expectations of ‘This is how it is supposed to happen,’ and maybe they don’t.”

Holiday anxiety or depression also can come from the sheer glut of holiday preparations and tasks that we feel need to be done.

“We see a lot of expectation around the holidays. A lot of people have more on their plate,” Black said. “I do tend to see that with women, who tend to bear a lot of the planning.”

The holidays also tend to be a time for gathering with family. But if familial relationships are frayed or troublesome, anxiety may result.

“There tend to be a lot of relational elements of the holidays,“ Black said. Those can either make us feel connected and give us a sense of belonging or, less helpfully, prompt feelings of exclusion and not belonging.

Another trigger for anxiety can be financial pressure that comes with the holiday feeling of being “obligated to overspend,” said Jody Marshall, clinical director at Community Counseling Center of Southern Nevada.

Goal-setting as one year ends and another begins also may be a source of anxiety.

“A lot of times, we become introspective at the end of the year,” Marshall said. Because it’s also a time when we are reminded of those who have died and can’t join in the holiday celebration, depression may arrive.

Particularly at risk for holiday anxiety or depression may be those who already struggle with anxiety or depression. Marshall notes that this time of year “can be a triple threat for those dealing with co-occurring disorders” such as medical issues, mental health concerns and substance abuse, particularly if they don’t have a good support system.

In short, because of the emotional heft they can carry, the holidays are “such a double-edged sword,” Black said. “The reasons we tend to love the holidays are also reasons it can be stressful.”

Strategies for coping

Managing holiday anxiety involves, first, managing our expectations of the holidays.

“The biggest disappointment for most people is failed expectations,” Marshall said. “So, it’s really about being more realistic and honest with ourselves.”

It might even be that your memories of perfect past celebrations are a bit skewed. “People are notoriously bad at remembering things,” Perlotto said. “So, we don’t remember things as well as we think we do.”

Consider adopting new, more manageable, more realistic, less stressful holiday traditions.

“I think tradition can be such a powerful force,” Black said. “I think, in general, as humans, we tend to like tradition and ritual, and the ways we spend time together marking the holidays become meaning-making. So, when we change things, it can be hard.”

Plan strategies for dealing with the anxieties you expect to face. For example, holiday travel can be a source of anxiety, so plan ahead by packing books or games for your flight, leaving plenty of time to make connections and making a conscious effort to relax.

“As humans, the unknown is a really great recipe for anxiety,” Black said. “Anything out of our comfort zone or out of our control is a really great recipe for anxiety”

Examine your emotions to understand why you might be anxious or depressed.

“There are a lot of emotions that come up during the holidays,” Black said, and it can be useful to “take a look at what you’re feeling and what is that about. If I’m feeling a sense of grief or loss but not sure what it’s tied to, take a little time to reflect on that.”

Avoid social media, which can feed impossible expectations of perfect holiday celebrations.

“From research, we know that looking at Facebook for five minutes can stimulate depression,” Perlotto said. “It’s always this comparison and I always come up short. There’s no way my reality is going to match those pictures.”

Consider that the season also can offer an “opportunity to reinvent ourselves,” Perlotto said. If gathering with problematic family members is a source of anxiety, remember that “sometimes family is not blood; you need to find your own family.”

“I encourage people to set boundaries, to make choices about who’s going to be in their lives,” Perlotto said.

Finally, try to cultivate an attitude of gratitude and giving. Black said some people find service to others can give meaning to the holidays.

Cultivating gratitude, Marshall said, takes the mind “off of yourself and puts it on someone else.”