Beware of The After Holiday ” Blues”

Many recovering people will say thank goodness that we have just concluded the holiday season for 2008. Recovering individuals in general, as most people know, express that they feel an extra dose of stress during the holidays. And, this is a much discussed topic in recovery meetings. People express many different sources of such stress such as their projection of family gatherings, or lack of family gatherings for the holidays. People feel lonelier during the holidays and they feel financial stress and even the stress of buying gifts. There is no lack of topics or reasons for the stress that recovering individuals feel during the holidays.

And recovery meetings provide a lot of help for such people during this time period. People who attend and share about their holiday stress will find that others are sharing similar feelings and experiences and recovering people who are feeling overwhelmed at this time period will find that there is quite a bit of discussion, articles and in general sympathetic ears to be found during the time period leading up to the holidays , typically the time period just preceding Thanksgiving up through and including January 1.

But what of the time period that comes right after the holidays are over ? Many people who have experienced a lot of excitement and joy during the holidays express that they experience a “crash” right after everything is over. Sometimes the frantic pace of preparing for special holiday parties, dinners, gatherings, shopping , and celebrating leading up to the New Year can result in a period of depression right after the first of the year. Many people don’t realize it but a relapse danger period exists right after the holidays during the month of January.

The time period right after the conclusion of the holidays is when “reality sets in”. Perhaps some people have shopped a bit too much and the bills start appearing in January. For other people the reality is that they back again into their normal routine which can seem very boring at times and especially after almost six (6) weeks of pre holiday excitement promoted by the media, by stores , by television , by family and friends , and by self imposed pressure. Then also, many people think of the start of the New Year as a renewal period and they want to make all sorts of promises to themselves ( “resolutions” ) to lose weight , finish projects , etc and it might suddenly appear that they are really not going to be following through with these sorts of activities.

The message of this article is that recovering people face the stress of life all during the year. There are certainly time periods when they can see it coming , like the holiday time period, but there are other times when it may not be so apparent until it hits them in the face. The best thing to do is to maintain and ongoing consistent support system in recovery that you feel comfortable in utilizing for assistance all through out the year. That way, you are in the best position to remain balanced and stable during any giving time period.

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Tagged as: addiction, anxiety, depression, family, recovery, relapse, stress