When your tra-la-la-la-la is all about trauma

Do you look forward to the festive season, or do you find yourself gritting your teeth until the solitude of January?

For some people, the holidays are highly anticipated joyful occasions, but for many others, this time of the year can bring up hidden trauma that makes it difficult to enjoy the season.

Why does this time of year have such an effect?

For many people with a history of trauma, it’s a common and predictable experience. The festive season has a way of activating the nervous system, particularly when it brings us back into familiar environments, family dynamics, and expectations that were formed long before we had the tools or language to understand them.

Trauma lives in the nervous system, not just memory

Trauma isn’t defined solely by what happened to you. It’s defined by how your nervous system adapts in order to survive.

When an experience overwhelms a person’s sense of safety, predictability, or control, the body learns protective patterns. These patterns are stored in the nervous system rather than as clear, linear memories. This is why trauma can instantly resurface.

The nervous system doesn’t organise experiences neatly into “past” and “present”. It responds to cues of sensory and relational signals, which can pull the body back into an old survival state before the thinking mind has time to intervene.

This is why you can arrive at a family gathering feeling happy and calm, but within minutes, your body tightens in response to past trauma. From a trauma perspective, this is the nervous system doing exactly what it learned to do.

Why family settings are especially triggering

Family relationships hold a unique power as this is where early emotional learning took place, how conflict was handled, whether feelings were welcomed or dismissed, and how safety was created or withdrawn. These early dynamics shape attachment patterns and influence how the nervous system learned to stay safe.

When you return to those environments, especially during the holidays, old roles can resurface automatically, and you may feel like a version of yourself appears that doesn’t exist anywhere else.

These responses are not a sign that you haven’t healed, but rather survival strategies you learned as a child to keep you safe. However, during the holidays, when family dynamics intensify and routines are disrupted, those old patterns can re-emerge with surprising speed, leaving you feeling open and raw with all of your old childhood trauma wounds exposed.

Recognising your own triggers

One of the most protective things you can do during this season is to increase your awareness around your own triggers.

Triggers often follow patterns, so taking the time to reflect before holiday gatherings can help reduce the sense of being caught off guard. You might consider:

• Which family member activates your nervous system
• Which topics consistently leave you feeling small, defensive, or overwhelmed
• Which gatherings consistently leave you in fight-or-flight mode
• What areas of the home leave you feeling unsafe
• What early signs show up in your body when you’re becoming dysregulated
• What you tolerated last year that you don’t want to repeat

Awareness doesn’t stop the nervous system from responding, but it does give you more choice in how you respond.

Supporting yourself through the season

If this time of the year is triggering to you, there are some techniques to help you stay more regulated during the holiday season.

Plan with your nervous system in mind

This might mean deciding in advance whether you’ll stay the night or not, having your own transportation in case you need to leave early, and having a backup plan for another place to stay if things become truly overwhelming. Remember, boundaries are your self-protection, not a request for permission.

If you have a trusted friend or partner you can bring as a solid support person, this can greatly alleviate an activated nervous system.

Having a solid plan reduces the sense of being trapped, which is a common trigger for people with trauma histories. Proactive planning is a key step in protecting your wellbeing.

Support your nervous system in the moment

Small regulation practices can help bring the body back into the present:

• Stepping outside for fresh air
• Splashing cold water on your face or wrists
• Deep breathing
• Grounding through touch or temperature
• Slowly counting and naming the objects in the room
• Leaving the gathering if necessary

These are not coping tricks — they are ways of signalling safety to the nervous system.

Have aftercare in place

Triggers don’t always resolve immediately. Movement, rest, and connection with someone who understands can help your system settle afterwards. Shame often follows a trigger; gentle self-compassion helps interrupt that cycle.

Sometimes, limiting contact is the healthiest choice

If an environment consistently activates your fight-or-flight response, pulls you into a state of fear, or pushes you past your emotional capacity, choosing not to engage may be an act of care rather than rejection. This can be especially difficult if you grew up believing that keeping the family unit intact was the ultimate goal.

Healing involves learning to tell the truth about what harms you. That truth may change over time. If you’re concerned about potential backlash from your family, have a well-thought-out communication strategy ready, like “I need to focus on my mental health and personal wellbeing this year.” That’s it, no need to elaborate.

You don’t have to forgive, forget or let go. You’re allowed to reassess everything as you grow.

Prioritise your self-care

When holiday schedules take over, it’s easy to get distracted and overlook self-care practices, but this is the time of year when it’s more important than ever to take care of yourself.

If you have a regular daily routine, try to maintain it as much as possible, even if you’re travelling or staying with family or friends. This might look like waking up at the same time every morning, finding a quiet spot to have coffee while you journal, working out, eating healthy meals, or taking some time for meditation and reflection.

With all of the chaos and excitement of the season, it’s easy to let things slide, but whatever it is that keeps you grounded and feeling stable, it’s essential to continue doing it.

How Innisfree Therapy can help

If you’re struggling this holiday season, give yourself some self-compassion. You’re not alone. It’s ok to feel a little stressed or sad this time of the year, especially if you have a family history of trauma.

At Innisfree Therapy, we work with highly skilled and trained trauma therapists who use established trauma models to help clients understand their nervous system responses, attachment patterns, and relational triggers. Trauma therapy offers a space to slow down, make sense of what’s being activated, and develop ways of responding that don’t require abandoning yourself.

With the right trauma therapist, you’ll be able to safely process your traumatic memories, determine which situations are most triggering and build a foundation to feel more empowered year-round.

You don’t have to navigate this season alone. We can provide you with the tools, boundaries and support you need to cope with holiday triggers and help you heal from the past.

Contact us today to learn more.