While the holiday season is often a time rich with cheer, sentiment, love and family connections, it can also be a painful reminder of what once was or what many other people have but you don’t.
“We’re shown this ideal version of the holidays, with partnered people, people with children, people with families in the matching pajamas with the gorgeous photos,” said Shani Silver, a New Orleans-based writer, podcaster and author of the Substack newsletter Cheaper Than Therapy.
But that notion excludes a massive number of people who won’t have “the cozy Norman Rockwell Christmas,” she added, including those who are newly single or estranged from family, or have lost a partner or other family member.
If you’re troubled by your situation, it’s OK to honor your feelings and keep the celebrations low-key or sit this holiday season out, experts say. But you don’t have to refuse to celebrate because you’re without a partner or family.
This could be the holiday season in which you feel empowered to create new meaningful experiences with friends or the VIP in your life who is always there for you — yourself.
Here’s how to figure out what’s best for you this holiday season.
It’s time to shift your mindset
Not having a partner or close family to spend the holidays with can bring guilt, shame and blame, said Dr. Ayanna Abrams, an Atlanta-based clinical psychologist. You don’t have the life you’re “supposed” to have during this season, “and all of that exacerbates (your) feelings of loneliness and sadness,” she said.
You can still be filled with grief, especially if a breakup, estrangement or death was recent, Abrams added. “All of a sudden everything is different this year,” she said, and you may be longing for the traditions you had with the person you lost.
In such a transition, there’s no requirement to have the holidays look or feel the same as they always have, said Dr. Adam Brown, clinical psychologist and professor of psychology at The New School for Social Research in New York.
Just as there is nothing wrong with not having these things, there is also nothing bad about wanting and missing them. But there comes a point when dwelling in sadness or shame keeps you from motivating yourself to chart your own path forward and from recognizing the loving people remaining in your life.
Silver encourages single people to “stop viewing your holiday season as a consolation prize.”
Your holiday season isn’t insignificant, said Silver, who has been single for 17 years. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t get to celebrate as fully as anyone else, and “a home with one person in it is still full,” she said. “Each individual human being on Earth is a valid person.”
Hatching a new plan
When you’re considering other ways to celebrate the holidays, think about what brings the most joy, Silver said.
“We have this unique time available to us to define what we want to do as individuals, and a lot of people will never have that,” she added. “Not viewing it as a burden, but viewing it as a benefit, is one of the ways that you can start to really enjoy this time.”
If you always went to holiday markets or drive-through Christmas light shows with your ex, you can enjoy those activities alone or with friends, Silver said. Did your ex hate ice skating while you always wanted to try it? Now’s the time.
Try doing some holiday baking, watching a movie at home or in a theatre, going to a wine tasting or pop-up holiday experience, or cooking a recipe you’ve been eyeing forever.
You can still put up a tree and mail out holiday cards, Abrams said. Drive or walk through beautifully decorated neighborhoods or travel to visit a friend.
If you have friends or acquaintances in the same boat as you, get together for a holiday dinner like Silver did last year, or for other plans.
You might feel like you don’t want to be a burden. But you never know what might happen if you tell a loved one that you’re feeling the need for connection and wondering what they’re doing for the holidays, Brown said.
Maybe you’re sad about not having anyone leave you gifts under the tree, but you can do holiday shopping for things you’ve really wanted or organize a gift exchange among friends.
To keep the element of surprise, Silver used to order themed mystery gift boxes or Advent calendars she’d wait until Christmas Day to open. For those shopping in person, some bookstores wrap books in paper and write a description on the exterior so you don’t know what you’re getting.
Silver also focuses on gifting herself intangibles, such as knocking out work projects early to have more time off.
How to cope with sadness
Working with a therapist is one of the best ways to cope with struggles you may have during the season or other times of year, Abrams said. She recommended starting with one now, if needed, to get ahead of office closures. That’s especially true if you’re noticing any isolation, excessive sleep, trouble getting out of bed, substance misuse or loss of appetite.
Sometimes distractions are necessary, experts said. You can’t always avoid the pain or eliminate it, but you can learn to tolerate and hold space for it, Abrams said.
Self-care can help you cope and experience more joy this year, Brown said. Do what helps you feel good and process your feelings, including exercising, journaling, talking things out in a voice recording, nourishing your body and using your support system.
When considering whether to join the festivities, many people tend to think in all-or-nothing patterns: You either go to all the holiday parties or none. You deck all the halls of your house or leave everything bare.
“We usually take away a lot of opportunities to have some semblance of something we want to experience,” Abrams said.
Considering the middle ground can help — maybe you don’t go to a gathering but still send a white elephant gift. Or plan on attending but only staying for an hour or so. Try decorating, but maybe just one room.
If grief strikes, stepping into another room or outside to cry, for example, is better than trying to repress emotion, Abrams said. Whether external or self-imposed, the pressure to just cheer up can make people feel a lot worse. (Cold air, though uncomfortable at first, can also be good for your mood, she said.)
“You’re feeling this way because you are human,” she said.
Setting boundaries and expectations
If seeing all the happy, romantic holiday posts feels too difficult, taking a break from social media or muting certain accounts may help, Abrams said.
Shifting your mindset and how you compare yourself with someone else, on the other hand, may be in order, Silver said. “Being jealous is just one lens that you can choose,” she said. “You can also choose to see it as, ‘If it happened to them, it can happen to me.'”
And if anyone asks nosy questions about your relationship status at a social gathering, you don’t owe them an answer, Silver said. You are just as worthy of dignity, respect and privacy as someone in a relationship.
Preparing loose scripts of answers based on your boundaries and social dynamics can be useful, Abrams said, especially if you feel pressure to answer despite your feelings. You might say you don’t want to discuss it, that this season things are different or you just want to focus on the new. You could even preemptively let loved ones know via a text or phone call, which can save everyone an awkward moment.
Regardless of what you do, Silver said she hopes you have as happy a holiday as anyone else — and urges you to choose the holiday season plans that you have the emotional bandwidth to handle.
“Any way that you authentically want to spend the holidays is correct,” she said.