I know, for at least myself, anything after thanksgiving is a drag. I fall into this stage of the year where I don't feel that happy until Christmas Eve. As of recently, it has been kind of hard not to feel lonely while being stuck in the cramped dorm during the frigid temperatures. However, I have found some ways to make the holiday a lot more enjoyable for me.

And that is what I am going to be sharing with you today.

A quick disclaimer before I go on: this is going off of my own experience. I am not saying this is going to help everyone since everyone is different when it comes to coping with their anxiety. I am not an expert, I am just speaking from my own lived moments.

Without further ado, let's do this.

My Family: Christmas 2014My mom's Facebook

Family

Parties

When it comes to family holiday parties, it is almost impossible for me to go through it without my (prescribed) Xanax. The number of people walking around my little house is just too much for my anxious brain to handle. However, I have come up with something that has been helping me at every function in the past couple of years.

Find the one family member that you vibe with and talk to them the whole time.

I know this sounds super obvious, but some people are not good at seeing that (i.e. me). I have a select few family members that I am willing to hang out with and that was how I got through thanksgiving this year and that is how I plan on getting myself through the 22nd when all of my family is going to surround me with all the yelling about politics and gawking over formerly born baby cousin. This is going to be unfortunate if you really cannot find a family member that doesn't grind your gears, but this is just a suggestion.

Another thing that you can do is find something to distract yourself with; an amazing example of this is helping make dinner. My family makes a turkey, a ham, and all of the fixings for this specific holiday, so there is a lot of work to be done so everyone can have a plate (and for others, multiple plates). I found this to be especially helpful when I was young and ignorant of the obvious anxiety disorder I had going on.

Buying for Them (if money allows, of course)

This was the first year I was buying for my family and it stressed me out to no end. Thankfully I did not have many to buy for, but I have been filled with the notion that they are going to hate what I got them (thanks, anxiety). I am yet to have found a solution to the fear, but I have found something that might combat it slightly.

I asked people closer to these members (like friends of their's). My brother, for example, I was not sure what to get him until I found something on Hot Topic's website on Cyber Monday. Even then I was not very sure about whether he would like it or not. Logically, my brother doesn't care too much about what I get him. He genuinely couldn't care less. However, my brain does not consider that.

What needs to be known is if your family truly loves you, just you being there would be enough of a gift.

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Friends

Seeing Them

In college, it gets kind of difficult if you don't have friends on campus. I know this from personal experience. In my case, it's extremely hard since I have no means of transportation from where I go to school to where I'm from. However, this is something that can be mended easily with some simple communication.

What I did this year is I put all of my closest friends in a group chat and we made a plan to meet on a specific date at a specific place.

Well let's say you do that: what do you do now?

Well, you would know if you did something specific. What my friends and I did was do a $20 secret Santa. This was made this way so it wasn't too awkward for everyone. All of us are socially anxious nerds, so it's easy for us to mingle and get along with one another.

Bringing a board game is something that might be beneficial. I would recommend Cards Against Humanity since it is something that is funny and will put you back into the mode of being goofy with your friends and not just sit around a table and make awkward eye contact.

(There is no need to put a "buying for them" section since it will make this quite redundant)

Significant Others

If you are lucky enough to have a significant other this season (not that you need one to be lucky), you are going to want to spend time with them. To some people, Christmas is about celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ, to others, it is just about spending time with your loved ones. I take the latter in this situation.

At the same time, however, you are going to want to spend time with your family as well. Depending on the situation, you can bring your significant other to the family get together (depending on whether they have plans themselves). That is something that could go hand in hand with what I had mentioned earlier about finding a person.

Spending time with people you're comfortable with is one of the biggest things at your disposal to get you through the holidays with the least amount of anxiety as humanly possible. Hopefully your significant other, if you have one, is someone that can get you through those awkward and anxious times.

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Shopping (AKA Claustrophobic Chaos)

This is probably the worst part of the whole holiday for me. Shopping around the holidays is very crowded, and I do not do well with crowds. Being surrounded by a bunch of people just makes me feel like there is no escape, and that stuff scares me to no end. That is the exact reason I have not done Black Friday in 6 years; the pure terror of being surrounded by a bunch of coupon savvy people.

How do I combat this? If I am stuck in some sort of crowded stores like Kohl's or JCPenny, I am a person to just wait outside the store or in the car for my mom to be done. That way you can just get some fresh air and remember that not everywhere is going to be like that (hopefully).

But what if you're an adult and have to do the shopping by yourself? I have a few solutions for that one.

The first one is to go online shopping. That is something I had to do a lot this year, for the reasons of social anxiety as well as not being able to physically get to a store without having to walk about 10 miles. This is also a time saver and even a money saver if you think about it. However, I am not saying that this is the solution year-round. This is kind of a way of avoiding being in a situation that would make you anxious, which would not be helping the problem at all.

My other solution is to bring someone with you while shopping. This is useful for just in case you do fall into a situation that is going to trigger an anxiety or panic attack. Heaven forbid but if this does happen to you, you can have that trusted individual keep an eye on your stuff while you go find somewhere that you can calm yourself down. Once I get to shop, this is probably something that I am going to be using a lot.

A little message from the author

I know Christmas or whatever holiday you may celebrate is very overwhelming and maybe the anxiety of it all feels like it is getting in the way. I am here to tell you, my friends, that anxiety is not all of who you are. Yes, it might influence some of the decisions you make, but it also is something that can keep you from having a good time.

There have been so many years that I have had to completely shut myself down at these functions just because my anxiety said I should do so. It has caused me to make a scene and draw even more attention to myself than I wanted to.

If you do get anxious, do not blame yourself if you need to move away for a little bit.

Happy Holidays

Katlyn