Holiday candles bringing warmth to a room, Jingle bells on the front door, ringing every time it opens. Grandma’s house is filled with all kinds of moving miniature dolls, made to look like Ma & Pa Santa Clause, inviting you to come in and enjoy the heavenly decorated Christmas Tree, filled with memories from Christmas’ past.
The smells of cinnamon and cranberries scents fill your nostrils pinging your memory of times past when the Holiday’s weren’t all that pleasant or welcomed. Times filled with sadness and dread. Suddenly, you’re ready to craw back into bed and Hide, like the proverbial ground hog that craws back into it’s hole after seeing it’s shadow each year during Groundhog Day.
Holiday Blues can be a common experience. With the Holidays being such a big Consumer Holiday, the commercials constantly telling you it’s the Holidays and you need to meet everyone expectation, the possibility of spending the holidays alone, all this and the memory of the loss of a loved one from Holiday’s past make Holiday’s a difficult time for many people.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the American Psychological Association, the National Mental Health Association, and the Mental Health Association of Colorado have put together a number of recommendations to help you survive the Holiday Blues.
- Plan ahead and set realistic expectations and goals for the holidays. Plan a budget for gift and holiday decorations and stick to your budget
- Limit your drinking.
- Don’t let anyone “guilt you” into celebrating the Holidays.
- Allow yourself to express your feelings, especially if you have recently experience a tragedy, death or break-up with a loved one, tell people about your needs.
- Enjoy Holidays that are free: such as driving around and viewing Holiday Decorations; participating by joining a performance of a Holiday Musical Concerts or plays; Offer to chaperon a school function for your child. Also I find that it feels really good to volunteer your time at the hospital, hospice or senior home. It feels good and it does so much good for the people you are there to help! You can even get some friends together to Carol for a local retirement home. They are always looking for people to come in and cheer-up their residences.
Here’s to Holiday Cheer and hoping that we all share in a big helping of it.
Living Simply 