By Tara McGee, MSW, RSW, Dip TiRP Psychotherapist, OCSWSSW, IAYT
The Holidays are touted to be magical moments where families get together to enjoy each other’s company and some good food. It is meant to be a time where you can relax, regroup and catch up on all the rest and socializing you didn’t get during the year. For some people, this is what happens for them over the holidays. For others, the holidays can be a time filled with dread, anxiety, increased stress and difficulty navigating family relationships. For others it can be a time that brings up the grief of lost loved ones or the grief of not having the support and love that everyone yearns for.
Every year around the holidays, some clients come to their sessions with fears about how they will cope as the holidays approach. Some clients make extra appointments to help bolster them during this time. These sessions are usually filled with the grief of loss of the childhood they wished they had or the parents who weren’t who they wished they were. Maybe they are missing a special person to them, or perhaps their parents have both passed away. These sessions are also filled with discussing strategies for managing their time off. There is always a component of how to hold boundaries with the people or situations that they dread.
Going into a stressful situation with a plan is a way to mitigate that stress. Often clients don’t realize that setting boundaries doesn’t have to be an awkward announcement to people who already make them uncomfortable or afraid. Instead, people can work to really know their boundaries – what is the edge where you start to feel uncomfortable? Is it when everyone has had more than 3 drinks? Maybe that’s your cue to leave. Is it that a relative is openly or covertly judgmental towards you? How do you want to respond? Knowing what makes you feel horrible is the first step in planning for what you want to do about it. You will know your boundary has been reached or crossed when you start to feel angry, hurt, judged, controlled, or just start to feel “the ick”.
It is not up to others to manage your boundaries (though people we are comfortable with are usually attuned enough to sense our boundaries and respect them), it is up to you to sense when something feels off to you and to take action to manage this (I am not referring to abusive relationships where this might not be possible). The best barometer about where your boundaries lie is your attunement to your own body responses and emotions. Once you tune into this, you can then take action to hold your limit.
Often thinking ahead to what has made you uncomfortable in the past can help you to make proactive choices around how to mitigate, reduce or avoid this discomfort going forward. For instance, perhaps you have a parent who likes to take the opportunity over the holidays to point out that you are living your life in a manner that they don’t approve of. Or perhaps your family is pleasant enough until people start drinking. Maybe you have a relative who is so anxious that they try to exert control over every detail of what others say, think or do. Knowing these things, what will you say, think and do to keep yourself emotionally safe?
Here are some of the limits my clients have planned for and successfully held over the holidays to take care of themselves emotionally and to create more space for what they really want to do:
- Staying only as long as feels comfortable at a gathering and leaving while things are still pleasant and before they become unbearable. This strategy reminds me of the episode in Seinfeld where George realizes that he can make the people in his office laugh during meetings, but then there is a point where he goes too far, his jokes are no longer landing and everyone leaves feeling uncomfortable. Seinfeld suggests that George make his initial joke and then immediately leave the room so that people’s experience of him is that he is funny rather than tiresome. If there is an event that makes you feel uncomfortable, but you still want to attend, plan to leave when things are still going well.
- Don’t go to the gathering at all. One of the benefits of being an adult is that you have more access to choices. It often seems revolutionary to my clients that they could just decline. No, you don’t have to go to Christmas Dinner, you don’t have to attend your neighbour’s holiday event that you have attended for 30 years. You can politely decline. You don’t even have to have a reason, you can just say no thank you and plan to do something else that would feel more supportive to you. Will there be consequences to saying no? Yes, of course. But there will also be consequences to saying yes and not meaning it. You just need to weigh the costs and benefits and make your choice. Once you choose, own your choice and all that goes along with it – the good, the bad, the unexpected. Plan to take care of yourself so you can manage the fallout either way.
- Go on that family trip, or to the place where everyone usually stays together, but stay somewhere that makes you feel safer – a hotel, a friend’s house, somewhere you can go if/when situations overwhelm or cross your boundaries. You don’t have to stay at a family home if you know you are likely to be judged, ridiculed, hurt, overwhelmed or controlled. You can maintain your relationships with your family but at a safe distance. Plan to have a place to go when you need a break, need to reset or retreat. Let this alternative place be somewhere that feels supportive to you and that can help you re-centre.
- Make up your own traditions with your friends, community or loved ones. Many people have “chosen” families or just friends who they are close to. Some people don’t want to haul their kids and dogs all over creation to satisfy both their parents and their in laws parents. They want to actually take time to relax. In these cases (and others) you may choose to develop your own traditions. Do you even want to celebrate the holidays your family of origin observed? Or do you feel drawn to a different kind of celebration? You can plan an alternative way of celebrating that feels more in alignment with who you are now or what your family would find most meaningful. Start your own traditions, be with community that feels celebratory, or just plan a great day for yourself.
HOLD YOUR BOUNDARIES.
Holding boundaries also helps people know where you stand. It helps them know how to be with you and can improve relationships over time. When you first start holding your limit, be prepared for push back from others. People don’t usually like it when you change the “game” of the relationship; see if you can allow them to manage their feelings about the limit without trying to soothe them or back pedalling and betraying yourself. Take care of yourself and trust that they are capable of having feelings and moving through them – “hold them able”.
In the meantime, if you have time off, we hope you find moments to truly rest, relax, rejuvenate and connect with the peace that is within you and the joy that can be found in even the smallest moments of grace.
Warm Wishes, Tara