Coping With The Holiday Blues

The hol­i­day sea­son is here, and this time of year is often asso­ci­at­ed with joy and hap­pi­ness. How­ev­er, for some peo­ple, the hol­i­days can trig­ger feel­ings of sad­ness and depres­sion. These feel­ings, often described as the ​“hol­i­day blues,” are not uncom­mon accord­ing to Quin­cy Med­ical Group Behav­ioral Health Ther­a­pist Paul Warning.

“A lot of peo­ple have stress dur­ing the hol­i­days. There’s an expec­ta­tion to be ​‘mer­ry and joy­ful’ this time of year, and for peo­ple strug­gling with men­tal health issues that can feel like an extra bur­den,” he explained.

This year these feel­ings may be exac­er­bat­ed by the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic. As a result of the pan­dem­ic, some tra­di­tions you have come to expect with the hol­i­days may look dif­fer­ent than years past and these changes can be dif­fi­cult to han­dle emo­tion­al­ly, Warn­ing said.

“I think it is impor­tant to real­ize that this pan­dem­ic is a tem­po­rary sit­u­a­tion. Our social dis­tanc­ing will not be per­ma­nent and it is like­ly that by this time next year life will look a lot more ​‘nor­mal.”

To help dur­ing this time, Warn­ing says it’s good to adjust expec­ta­tions and make the most of our cur­rent sit­u­a­tion. For many, this may mean vir­tu­al get-togeth­ers instead of face-to-face gath­er­ings. Stay­ing con­nect­ed and in touch with how you’re feel­ing is essential.

“It’s impor­tant that peo­ple main­tain and try to strength­en their social con­nec­tions,” said Warn­ing. ​“It’s also okay to take some time for self-care. Acknowl­edg­ing that there is stress, there are changes and mak­ing some room for that while still doing the things we need to do that help care for oth­ers and ourselves.”

A behav­ioral health ther­a­pist can help you. Warn­ing said you should speak to your doc­tor or a behav­ioral health ther­a­pist if you are expe­ri­enc­ing changes to your sleep and appetite, feel­ing sad­ness that doesn’t go away, los­ing inter­est in activ­i­ties that used to be fun, feel­ing the sense that you ​“can’t turn my mind off” and you’re wor­ry­ing all the time, and hope­less­ness and think­ing that it would be bet­ter for myself and for oth­ers if I weren’t here.

For more infor­ma­tion on Quin­cy Med­ical Group Behav­ioral Health ser­vices or to sched­ule an appoint­ment, call 217−222−6550, ext. 3418.