Holiday Mental Health Support

The holiday season can be a mix of joy and stress—family dynamics, packed schedules, financial pressures, and unspoken expectations can take a toll on your mental health. In this episode, I share practical tips to help you stay regulated and set healthy boundaries.

You’ll learn:

• Why the holidays can feel overwhelming and how to understand your stress responses.
• Simple tools to regulate your nervous system amidst the chaos.
• Practical scripts for setting boundaries with confidence.
• How to approach the season with more self-compassion and intention.

Key Takeaways:

1. Self-Compassion might be the best holiday tip.
2. Sometimes the most practical regulation tools are the ones that can go unnoticed. 
3. Setting boundaries is how you take care of yourself. If needed, when setting boundaries, use simple repetition to reinforce them and remember it’s not your job to manage other people’s reactions to your boundaries.

Looking for more personalized support?

• Book a FREE consultation for RESTORE, our 1:1 anxiety & depression coaching program.
• Order my book, Healing Through the Vagus Nerve today!

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Website: https://www.riseaswe.com/podcast

Email: amanda@riseaswe.com

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Transcript

0:00  
Amanda, welcome to regulate and rewire an anxiety and depression podcast where we discuss the things I wish someone would have taught me earlier in my healing journey. I'm your host, Amanda Armstrong, and I'll be sharing my steps, my missteps, client experiences and tangible research based tools to help you regulate your nervous system, rewire your mind and reclaim your life. Thanks for being here. Now, let's dive in. 

Hey, welcome back today. I want to talk about all things, navigating the holidays while also protecting our mental health. Tis the season we're heading into them and wow, the holidays can be an incredible time for connection and celebration. It can also be a time of increased anxiety or isolation, stress overwhelm emotional challenges for a variety of different reasons. Some of the things that our clients have shared with us that feel triggering or stressful for them over the holiday season are things like family dynamics and old patterns, endless to do lists, financial pressures from gift giving or traveling, grief or missing loved ones, diet or alcohol related pressures, some of our clients have mentioned social obligations or even magnified loneliness. 

Something that was mentioned recently was the pressure to feel cheery or feel happy when you might not actually feel that way, and today's conversation may feel a little bit segmented or all over the place. My hope for this episode is that you walk away with something, some nugget that feels personally applicable for you, that can offer some support for the holidays, to approach them with more intention, more care for your mental health, but to help you navigate this episode, here's just a quick agenda for what we're going to cover. I will start by offering just some general context around various contributing factors that make holidays stressful. I'm then going to offer some practical tips for staying regulated through the holidays. Part of that will also include a couple specific regulation practices, tips or techniques that you can use at gatherings, that you can do to help yourself, resource and regulate while going unnoticed in a room with potentially other people. I'm also going to talk about the role and the importance of setting boundaries. And if this is a particularly tricky thing for you, to do something that is helpful for our clients, that I hope is helpful for you too, is that when I talk about boundary setting, I'm also going to offer some practical boundary setting scripts for common holiday situations, so maybe grab a pen and paper, if that might be helpful for you. 

So starting with just some general understanding of holiday stress, acknowledging why holidays can feel so intense. And what I want you to take note of is if any of these things feel particularly applicable to you, that's really helpful information that might point you towards specific tools or boundaries to focus on that will be the most supportive for you. So for example, there's often a sensory overload with the holidays, bright lights, loud conversations, crowded spaces, lots of sugary foods, internal and external, sensory overload that can be really overwhelming for our nervous system, especially if you are somebody who is sensitive to stimuli or prone to anxiety. And if you're listening to this and it's like, oh my gosh, yes, that's totally me. Awesome. There are going to be tools or practices that help to minimize sensory overload that might be specifically helpful for you. You also might want to take note of some of the boundary scripts that give you the words to take breaks, to walk away from anything that feels particularly overwhelming. 

Holidays can be really stressful because there's also a lot of emotional weight. Again, this could stem from old family dynamics, unmet expectations. It could even be emotional weight around grief for the people or the experiences that we're missing. And then there's the often unspoken pressure around it feels like everything and a general increase in mental load, it could be the pressure to cook the perfect meal, host the gathering, buy a special, meaningful gift, feel a certain way. There are innumerable ways that we can be left feeling like we're falling short or running out of brain power, because there are 652 extra decisions to make on a consistent basis, and to help give this even more context from a nervous system perspective, on the inside, your inside operating system doesn't know that the extra stress is brought on by holiday cheer and. And not a pack of saber tooth tigers. The stress response that we experience in our body, it's a generic response. And when you are in survival mode, when you are in especially a heightened state of activation, your logical brain goes offline. 

And I feel like this is an important concept to touch on before I give you any tangible or practical support strategies, because I think the most supportive thing that we can do or offer ourselves as we navigate holiday stress is to cultivate and offer self compassion. And for me, self compassion comes the easiest by understanding what is happening in my mind body system. So for a moment, I want you to think about your brain as having three functional parts, a lower part, a middle part and an upper part. The lower brain is your survival brain. This part of your brain is responsible for the most basic survival functions. Then you have your middle brain. This is your emotional brain. Your top brain is your logical brain. When you are in survival mode, when you are stressed or anxious, your logical brain goes offline. I sometimes refer to this as you've flipped your lead, and we've talked about that concept in past episodes. But what is happening is you are you've actually stopped sending electrochemical energy to your prefrontal cortex, to the logical part of your brain, because brains are efficient and you do not need to think rationally to run away from a saber tooth tiger. So when you are in moments or days, even of high stress or anxiety, it is your emotional and survival brain running the show. And when this happens, you always default to your most well worn patterns, your most well worn patterns of coping, patterns of protecting, of reacting, of habits, and so if you find yourself in moments of high stress, defaulting to shutting down or getting defensive, or turning to cravings or whatever your old patterns were, if you find yourself snapping at loved ones, avoiding conversations, people pleasing to keep The peace, possibly falling into all of the old patterns that you have worked so hard this past year to rewire. This is my invitation for you to notice when you have fallen into those old patterns, to take a beat, take a breath and say, Oh, I don't like that. I did that, but it makes sense. That's my old way. This must be telling me that my logical brain isn't as online as I want or need it to be. And instead of beating yourself up for falling into that old pattern, we can pause, offer self compassion and use that as a moment of awareness. 

We can use moments of unwanted dysregulation to cue us into the reality that our needs are going unmet. We have more threat cues than safety cues, and it is our job now to tend to ourselves the best we can, and you can tend to yourself. And that segues really nicely into our first kind of big topic for today, which is practical tips for staying regulated during the holiday season. Now, before you can determine the best tools or practices for you, it can be really helpful, like I mentioned a few minutes ago, to assess what part of the holiday feels the most stressful for you. So is it the large crowds and the constant noise? Is it the family dynamics or sensitive conversations, the overwhelming to do lists or feeling like you don't have enough time you don't have enough money, there's a sense of scarcity here, or maybe it's the pressure to feel or act a certain way, even if that doesn't really align with how you're feeling. 

It can also help to know how you become dysregulated. So is it that when you become dysregulated, it's more of an anxious activation of fight or flight response. Is it more of a fawning or people pleasing response? Or is it more of a protective disconnection, shutdown, dissociation, because looking at what causes you to feel most stressed, and how you show up when you feel stressed informs which practices may fit best for you. So maybe you want to take a moment now or later and just pinpoint what feels the most challenging. 

Okay, now let's talk about different ways to stay regulated. Here are just a laundry list of tools or reframes or things to consider and have in your back pocket as you navigate the holidays. 

So number one is boundaries, and I'll get more into that in a minute. But boundaries, boundaries, boundaries are going to matter. It's the number one way that you take care of yourself. 

Second thing I want to mention is to take sensory breaks. So if the noise or the energy of a gathering feels too intense, give yourself permission to step away. And I have scripts in the boundary part of this conversation for what you can say to people to give yourself that opening to step away, this might be go for a quick walk, sit in a quiet room, spend a few minutes in the bathroom or even sitting in a car to ground yourself. You always have permission to take a break. 

The third thing I want to offer you is to set realistic expectations. Let go of the idea that holidays have to be perfect. Your financial situation is what it is right now. Your healing is where it is, your home, your friends, your family circumstances. I think it can be really freeing to just be honest with yourself about where things are, instead of feeling like every holiday season is supposed to be the best or the most magical when that might not match up with our reality here and now. 

The next thing I want to offer is you can create a grounding kit. So as you go to some of these events, can you bring items that help you feel more calm? Maybe this is an essential oil, a small fidget toy. It could be your headphones and a playlist of soothing music. It could be to wear clothes that you know are not going to add to your sensory overload. Can you be comfortable? What are certain things that you can wear or have with you that are grounding? 

The next thing here is a reminder to stick to your basics. Do your best not to let the holidays throw off your foundations. Prioritize your sleep. Stay hydrated, eat nutritious foods. So much of our stress signals we don't realize come from inside of our body, from being sleep deprived, nutritionally deprived. What can we do to keep moving our bodies, feeding our bodies, resting our bodies, and feeling our bodies? Because these basic things can make a huge difference in how your body handles stress, in the capacity and the amount of resourcing you have to meet the additional stressors with. 

One more thing I'll offer, before I talk about some of the specific tools or practices that you can use, especially in a room unnoticed, is this concept of both and allow space for nuance, allow yourself to feel grief about one thing and still be having fun. Allow yourself to look forward to this thing and also be worried about an aspect of it. And this feels particularly true for me this year. This is if you listen to a few episodes back, this is going to be my first holiday season without my dog, and he's been here with me for 12 and a half years. There's going to be grief that comes with that some of you know, because I've talked about it on the podcast before, but we lost our second son, and his birthday falls between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and so I feel like I always kind of come out of November, anticipating his birthday and then move into Christmas. It's just messy. It's messy, and it's also wonderful and beautiful and so fun with the two sons that we have, you know, Earth side, and just let it be both, and let it be messy. Let it not have to be one thing. You can be excited and nervous. You can be so in your grief to the point of anger and also having a blast at a particular function. You can feel alone and supported all of it, all of it gets to just be what it is. And if we can give ourselves permission for things to be both, and I just think there's a lot of internal space that can open up. 

Now what I want to offer next are tools that can go unnoticed, things like some visual orienting drills, different breath work practices. And I know it can be really cliche to say that, like when you start to feel overwhelmed, try taking a deep breath. Yeah, but really, if you can catch your overwhelm or your stress early enough, taking slow, deep breaths can help keep you in your parasympathetic nervous system, state enough that keeps that top logical part of your brain online, enough so that you can be more intentional and authentic in how you show up in situations. And the reason I specifically say if you can catch overwhelm or catch stress early enough is because I think far too often we forget that this activated, anxious fight or flight response is a mobilized response when we are in that activated state, our system needs to move. It needs to go for a walk, it needs to discharge. It needs to stay in gentle motion. If we're really stressed and we try to take a deep, slow breath and like strong arm, our nervous system into a more regulated state. There's often backlash from that. Our nervous system is like, Oh, hey, you're not getting the message. I'm actually going to make you more stressed. And so my hope is that by having this conversation today, you're also a little bit more tuned in. You are starting to catch yourself shifting into overwhelm or shifting into stress earlier, in which case we can use gentler regulation tools and practices. There are some other breathing practices that our clients find really helpful that I want to mention. 

One of those is a physiological sigh. So it is a double inhale through your nose and an extended exhale out your mouth. It sounds like this. Maybe you want to try it with me. Ah. A double inhale through your nose, extended exhale out your mouth. I love this one because, again, it can go pretty unnoticed. This is also something and we've talked about this many times on the podcast before, but it's something that our body naturally does to settle and recalibrate. Think about a toddler who's upset when they're done being upset. It's kind of the this is a way we can purposely elicit that similar response. 

Another breathing practice that can be helpful and grounding is something called Box breathing. So you inhale to the count of four, hold your breath to the count of four, exhale a four count and hold your breath for a four count. So if you want to do that with me, now go ahead and let all your air out. We're going to breathe in. 234, hold 234, breathe out. 234, and hold 234, so this signals to your nervous system a sense of safety. I also like box breathing because it adds a level of cognitive distraction when you're counting. So if your thoughts are spiraling out, or you really just need to bring yourself here and now that counting can help to pull yourself out of those thought spirals and be really grounding. 

And again, I'm suggesting breathing practices and visual orienting together, because there is often anxiety or dissociation happening when you are around other people, and the tools and practices that go unnoticed are just the most practical. They may not be the best ones for whatever you're experiencing, but they're the most practical for the situation, therefore making them our best option in the moment. 

Now some context for visual orienting is that when we are in states of dysregulation, our vision changes. Often, our pupils will dilate. We become really tunnel visioned. Our peripheral vision kind of turns off. So Visual orienting is allowing yourself to slowly scan the room. If you notice, when you're feeling anxious or stressed, your eyes often dart from one thing or one person to the next. With Visual orienting, you do a slow lateral gazing, so you're just looking around the room, allowing your eyes to just shift from one thing to the next. 

And my personal favorite visual orienting practice is something called Color spotting, again, because it adds that element of mind or cognitive distraction. So if I were to tell you right now, pick a color, any color, what color do you choose? Awesome. My color is orange. Your color is whatever came to your mind first. And I'm asking you this now because you don't want to choose a color in the moment. You want to have your color already chosen. So with color spotting, if you want to do it with me right now, look up and around your space and just note all of the items that are your color. And it's okay if there are no items. Of your color in the room. Part of the goal is just the looking, and that's it. That's color spotting. What it does is it allows you to engage near and far viewing patterns. It often engages your peripheral vision. All of that orients you to your environment and communicates safety to your nervous system. 

Now, two other practices that can usually go unnoticed is number one, holding an ice cube underneath the table. So this is an uncomfortable sensation that brings you back into the present moment, out of your spiraling mind, and you typically will have to take a few deep breaths to continue squeezing an ice cube in your palm for about a minute. 

And the last unnoticeable tool that I will share with you today is one that I use a lot, because I know this is a high payoff practice for me, which is rubbing my neck. So if you just take your hand right now to the side of your neck, you'll feel this chunky muscle that starts behind your ear and connects down near your collarbone. Maybe if you turn your neck to the side, it's easier to find this is called your sternoclemastoid, and there's no really right way to rub or massage your neck here. This is just a place where your vagus nerve innervates pretty close to the skin, and so sometimes I'll just put my hand up to my neck, give it a little rub, and I know that that helps to activate and stimulate my vagus nerve, and it settles my system. 

Now, quick review of these tools that tend to go unnoticed. It could be taking a deep, slow breath, that physiological sigh, double inhale, extended exhale, or box breathing you might do visual orienting. You could do color spotting. Another one is to just like, wiggle your fingers in your peripheral vision, hold an ice cube, rub your neck. And one final tip I want to give with these practices is do not wait until the event or until you are dysregulated to try these. You want to practice them now you want to see if, in minor stressful situations, any of these feel more or less helpful for you by practicing them now, you are going to be more familiar with them in moments of dysregulation, when you need them most. So practice these different tools now see if there are any of them that feel like a better fit for you. That way, you can quickly turn to it when you need it. 

All right. Now, let's shift gears and talk about boundaries, and like I mentioned, if you are somebody who typically struggles with boundary setting but knows you need to grab a pen and paper, because the most helpful part of today's conversation might be the verbatim boundary scripts I'm going to offer you. But before we get too far into this, I want to say that boundaries aren't hard to set because you suck. Boundaries are just hard they put us in a position where we risk disappointing or angering other people, and that can feel really unsafe to our nervous system for a variety of reasons, and what I want you to know is that if you have to choose between disappointing yourself or disappointing someone else, quit choosing to disappoint yourself. I also want you to know that you might be on the receiving end of somebody else's boundary setting this holiday season, and that can also be really uncomfortable. And so to help you navigate both sides of boundary setting, I want you to remember this, that boundaries are set by people who care enough to let you know how they can stay in relationship with you without resentment. I'm going to repeat that boundaries are set by people who care enough to let you know how they can stay in relationship with you without resentment. This also means that you set boundaries with other people to let them know how they can stay in relationship with you without resentment. 

People who don't care don't bother setting boundaries. And just like it is not somebody else's job to manage your possible disappointment with their boundary that they need to set for themselves and their reasons and their mental health, it is also not your job to manage the possible disappointment of setting a boundary with other people. It is your job to take care of you and potentially your tiny humans, if you have them. And so I want to reiterate, boundaries are essential because they help us protect our energy and maintain our mental health. They are not about being selfish. They are about being clear about what you need to stay healthy and present. 

Now here are a few types of boundaries that you might consider. So the first is physical boundaries. This could be things like deciding how long you're going to stay at a gathering, whether you're comfortable with hugs, physical closeness with anybody or particular people. And so pausing to ask yourself. Are there any physical boundaries I feel like I need in place this holiday season? Other types of boundaries might be emotional or conversational boundaries, so not engaging in certain conversations that might feel triggering or harmful for you. Is there a way that you can steer away from conversations or topics things like politics or parenting choices or your personal life in a way that feels intrusive or uncomfortable for you. And one thing we get asked sometimes by our clients is, how do you know when you need to set a boundary? And my answer is, always pay attention to your body if you feel tense, exhausted or resentful, either in the moment or after an interaction, this is a sign that a boundary has been crossed or needs to be set. 

All right, shifting into the final part of this conversation, which is me offering some practical scripts for common holiday situations, and most of these could be easily spoken or sent in a text, if that feels more comfortable for you. 

So here is a statement for time boundaries. 

"I would love to join you, but we can only stay until 8pm." That could be it. It could be: "We can only stay until 8pm because we have other commitments to honor." But if you feel like you want to go, but you also want to have a bracket for what that looks like, "I'd love to join you, but we can only stay until whatever time."

This is a boundary script for when you need a break or some personal space. 

"I need some time to recharge. I'm going to take a short walk. I'll be back in 30 minutes." 

This is a boundary for food or drink pressures.

"Thank you for offering, but I'm listening to my body right now and I am comfortable with my choices." Or even more simply, "thanks for offering, but I'm not interested." Or even more simply, "no thanks." And if they offer again, simply repeating, no thanks. 

One thing I want to note about boundaries is that oftentimes other people will push back on them, even well meaning people, because they don't know how to be okay with their own discomfort. It's not as big of a deal to them as it is to you, and I find that simple repetition is often the easiest way to hold your boundary, and it makes the other person feel silly enough that they usually stop. And what I have found to be true for me is I often try to defend my boundary if somebody pushes back against it, and you do not need to defend your boundary. And so maybe simple repetition is going to be the magic ticket for you this holiday season. 

So that it might sound like when somebody is pressuring you to stay longer and you set this boundary. 

"I've had such a nice time, but I need to head out now. Thanks for having me." 

"Oh, come on. Stay later." 

"I'm leaving now. Have a good night." 

"Seriously, you're leaving." 

I'm leaving now. Have a good night. Thanks for having me." 

The simple repetition, eventually they run out of Oh, come on.

Or maybe the circumstance is you feel overwhelmed by a task or an expectation, and you set your boundary, set your guidelines. 

"I'd love to help, but I can only manage insert specific task right now. Can somebody else take care of it?" 

And maybe they respond with like, "No, not really. There's nobody else" 

"like I said. I'd love to help, but I can only manage X." 

Maybe they even say, "well, then that leaves all of this to me."

"Like I said, I'd love to help, but I can only manage X." 

And remember, it is not your job to manage the other person's frustration or disappointment. It is your job to know where you need to draw the line so that there is no resentment and you're taking care of you. 

This could be a possible script. When somebody asks about a sensitive topic, maybe you say:

"thanks for asking, but I'd rather not talk about that. How about we focus on insert another topic instead?" "

Oh, come on. It's just a simple question. Answer it" 

repeat. "I'd rather not talk about that." 

"Well, why not?" 

"Because I don't want to, and if you continue to ask, I'm going to leave the table."

And why I wanted to add that second part is, I typically work with clients to come up with full boundary statements being an if, and then there's the request, and then there is what I will do if that request is not honored with each of the boundaries you set, there has to be a way that you will hold your Boundary if that person doesn't respect the guidelines or requests that you've offered. 

So if someone is trying to pressure you to stay longer, the way that you hold your boundary statement is that you will leave if somebody insists on talking about a topic that you have made a request to avoid, you can remove yourself from that situation. You can ask them to leave your home if they're in your home, and it really, really sucks when somebody makes you do that. But I have found that having a pre planned exit strategy from a conversation or an event or a moment can help support you, support yourself in setting and keeping those boundaries, it is okay if setting a boundary feels uncomfortable for you and the receiving party, you are still responsible for your own well being. 

And one more thing that I want to say here is that it's also okay to set expectations or boundaries around finances or gift giving. I know for so many people, holiday spending is the hardest part, and a financial boundary is a clear limit that you set around money to protect your financial well being that is very, very tied to your overall mental well being. So here are some examples of what a financial boundary could sound like for gift giving pressure? 

"I'm sticking to a budget this year, so I won't be able to exchange gifts, but I'd love to spend time together instead for group activities that are expensive." 

"that sounds like so much fun. It's outside my budget right now. Can we plan something more affordable?" 

Maybe the situation is that you're being asked to contribute to a particular gift that's beyond your means. You could say something like, 

"I'd love to help, but I can only contribute X amount. This time" 

Again, if somebody else has chosen to do a bigger thing, you're not responsible for their expectation of your financial contribution. You are responsible for contributing in a way that keeps you financially in an okay position, or maybe this is for managing expectations with children or family. 

"this year we're focused on meaningful, Simple Gifts. Instead of spending a lot, I want to prioritize connection over cost."

 And with each of these scripts, there are limitless ways that you can personalize them to your unique needs. But what I have found so often to be true in my own life but also in the experiences of our clients, is that they have self sacrificed for a really, really long time that they don't even know where to start. What would a boundary even sound like? What would setting that limit? What does taking care of me over somebody else even possibly look like? And so my hope was that offering these scripts, there was just something in your mind or in your system that was like, oh, oh, yeah. That could be helpful, or this is how I could tweak this to make it more applicable to me. 

So as we wrap up today's episode, I want to emphasize how everything we've talked about, whether it's the grounding practices or setting boundaries, creating more moments of space and rest and distance from sensory input, this all plays a vital role in supporting your mental health and nervous system regulation. The holidays can stir up so much for us, but when you prioritize these practices, when you ensure that you're taking care of you while also showing up for all of the extra things and the people around you that the holidays ask of us, you are giving your nervous system what it needs to feel more safe and balanced and present In all of that, the different grounding practices can help calm your body's physiological responses to stress, while the boundaries help you to create a sense of control and help you to protect your emotional energy. And together, these practices really help you move through the holiday season with greater resilience, reducing the likelihood of total burnout, overwhelm, resentment. 

Alright, bringing it to our three tangible takeaways. 

Number one is that self compassion might be the best holiday tip. So remember that when we are in a high stress state, we're going to default to our old patterns, even the ones we've worked so hard to rewire notice when you've fallen back into a pattern. Okay, this makes sense. This is telling me I need to step back. I need to have a moment of care, to become more regulated again, so that I can step into situations and responses and reactions more intentionally. 

Number two is that sometimes the most practical regulation tools are the ones that can go unnoticed. Are there any of those that feel like a good fit for you, or the situations you might find yourself in this holiday season? 

And number three is that setting boundaries is how you take care of yourself, and if needed when setting. Boundaries. Use simple repetition to reinforce and remember it's not your job to manage other people's reactions to your boundaries. 

All right, friends, that is what I have for you today. I hope there was some nugget, something helpful that you can put in your back pocket as you navigate the holiday season and as always until next time I'm sending so much hope and healing your way.

Thanks for listening to another episode of The regulate and rewire podcast. If you enjoyed what you heard today, please subscribe and leave a five star review to help us get these powerful tools out to even more people who need them. And if you yourself are looking for more personalized support and applying what you've learned today, consider joining me inside rise my monthly mental health membership and nervous system healing space, or apply for our one on one anxiety and depression coaching program, restore. I've shared a link for more information to both in the show notes, again, thanks so much for being here, and I'll see you next time you.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai