How to Navigate Grief During the Holidays: A Trauma-Informed Guide
Introduction
The holidays are often presented as a time of joy, happiness, and connection. But for trauma survivors, this season can feel anything but easy. The combination of memories, family dynamics, pressure, and expectations can increase feelings of sadness, overwhelm, numbness, or loneliness. You may find yourself revisiting the past, feeling flooded by emotions and memories, or struggling to stay grounded when the world expects you to put on a happy face.
None of this means that you’re doing anything wrong. Trauma affects the nervous system, and this season can trigger old patterns, wounds, or unmet needs. Trauma therapy and EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) can offer a safe space to process what arises and help you move through the holidays with greater ease, calm, and support.
Why the Holidays Can Increase Trauma and Grief
The holidays often bring up reminders of times, relationships, or losses that were painful or destabilizing. You may experience:
Grief for the past — for the childhood, relationships, or safety you never had
Grief for your present — for the ways trauma still affects your daily life
Grief for the future — for the parts of life that feel harder because of what you’ve lived through
Traditions, sensory triggers, certain people, or the changes in your routine can stir feelings that you weren’t expecting. Your body may remember experiences your mind doesn’t fully have access to. Internal pressure to “look okay” can make this time of year even more painful.
This doesn’t mean you’re losing your footing. It means your nervous system is responding to reminders of trauma in a very normal way. Recognizing this can bring both relief and clarity.
Healthy Ways to Care for Yourself This Season
Instead of pushing through or pretending everything is fine, consider making choices that support your well-being, emotions, and nervous system.
Give Yourself Permission to Do Less
It’s okay to step back, scale down plans, or decline invitations that feel overwhelming during this time. Trauma survivors often need more internal space than the holidays might offer. Making the choice to have a slower, gentler version of the season is a form of self-care.
Create Small Moments of Internal Safety
Trauma survivors often move through the world in a state of fight or flight and the holidays can increase this state. Practicing some grounding techniques such as naming objects you can see in your surroundings, feeling your feet on the ground, breathing slowly, changing your temperature by holding something warm or cold, or stepping outside for a few minutes can help reset your nervous system.
These aren’t fixes—they’re small, gentle acts of self-love that can help you feel more centered and better able to tolerate the uncomfortable feelings.
Honor Your Trauma and Your Experience
The holidays can trigger feelings about loss of possibilities, innocence, time, or stability. Acknowledging that your grief makes sense and validating your experience can be beneficial:
“This hurts, and it makes sense that it does.”
Naming and honoring your experience is more healing than forcing yourself to move on.
Create New, Trauma-Informed Traditions
You don’t have to repeat traditions that feel triggering, exhausting, or unsettling. You can:
create or change traditions
spend less time at gatherings or choose different gatherings
choose people who feel emotionally safe
or skip traditions altogether
Putting your healing first is much more important than anyone’s expectations.
Look for Mini Moments of Relief
Trauma survivors often underestimate the power of small comforts because they’ve spent years in survival mode. But a cozy blanket, quiet music, a favorite scent, fresh air, taking a walk or talking to a friend can help reduce your emotional load.
Connect With Safe People
For many survivors, holidays can be challenging if family relationships were the source of trauma. Having just one safe connection can anchor your nervous system. It’s OK to look for support outside of your family. A friend, therapist or partner can support you just as well as family can.
How Trauma Therapy and EMDR Can Support You During the Holidays
Trauma counseling and EMDR therapy can offer a space to understand your reactions, process emotional pain, and reduce grief that the holiday season can trigger. .
Therapy can help you:
process traumatic memories that resurface during the holidays
reduce emotional overwhelm and develop self-regulation skills
heal the root of your grief, not just the symptoms
increase your ability to connect with healthy relationships
trust yourself and your story
EMDR when integrated into ongoing therapy, can help your brain process memories so that there is less pain associated with your trauma. This focused, trauma-informed approach can shift old beliefs about yourself and lessen your pain so that holidays don’t feel so triggering.
EMDR and trauma therapy don’t erase trauma or grief, but they can reduce how often and how much you are triggered by past traumas.
If this holiday season feels hard or emotionally stressful, you don’t have to move through it alone. I invite you to schedule a trauma therapy consultation to receive the compassionate, trauma-informed support you deserve as you navigate the holidays. EMDR and ongoing therapy can help you feel more grounded, understood, and supported during this time of year.
Julie Cox, LCSW is a licensed therapist with 25 years of experience supporting clients in Yorktown Heights, New York. She specializes in trauma and PANDAS/PANS and uses evidence-based approaches like EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing), Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, and Dialectical Behavior Therapy to help clients resolve trauma and navigate the challenges of PANDAS/PANS. Julie Cox, LCSW is committed to providing compassionate, trauma-informed, expert care across New York State.