Holiday grief is the feeling that sets in right about now. Where you are tempted to miss the past celebrations that have been going since Halloween. Holiday grief is a general sense of sadness, overwhelmed feelings (statically due to overspending in December shopping seasons) or loss of motivation to even do the most basic tasks.

A lot of holiday grief mirrors depression symptoms because the past 60 days have been marked by eating, celebration, gifts, sales, meetings, parties, time off, etc.

It is no wonder that after 60 (or 70 or 80) days of prepping for the Christmas/New Year's season that we would get a little hopeless after the season is over. This feeling for some can be similar to the letdown after a wedding or big birthday event. The point being is that we build up the day of Christmas to be all that we hoped it would be. It would solve our problems and give us a sense of happiness- and it does… for a week. We can be tempted to overspend on Christmas gifts because of sales, general happy feelings of shopping, manic episodes of glee that inspire generosity and so forth. We look forward to this season and it is hard to come back down off the high of celebration, connection, gifts, and spending.

Holiday grief can be marked by these three symptoms:

1. Finding yourself sad

2. Overwhelmed

3. Loss of motivation or fatigue

There are numerous reasons why these are some of the symptoms of holiday grief but are all rooted in the loss of the holiday season. The holiday season is euphoric- that is what is communicated in media, via sales, the rush to parties, Christmas bonuses and for human connection.

In light of this, here are a few activities you can try out to better help manage your holiday grief:

1. Make a dinner/coffee/drink/dog park date with someone that you like being around. Don't wait until next Christmas to have a meaningful, fun connection.

2. Try being generous with your time, talent and money in new ways as opposed to giving the Santa with a bell outside the mall a dollar each time you see him or her. Don’t wait until next Christmas to help the person in need around you.

3. Take a social media detox. With all the emails I have gotten this Christmas season, I feel like I need to take a break. For numbers to prove my point, I used to get 8-10 emails a day and after Thanksgiving, I am now getting 25-30 emails about sales and asking me to “Buy before it’s too late”. This takes a toll. Unsubscribe from your device(s) and give yourself fresh air, human connection and fun.

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