#18: Using Skills to Get Through the Holidays
The holidays are a time where there is often a lot of pressure to have a certain kind of experience – one that is about family, friends, joy, and celebration. For many folks, this is more of a fantasy than a reality.
If you are fortunate enough to enjoy time with family and friends during the holidays, the expectation of constant togetherness and merry-making can be a set up for disappointment.
This episode discusses common themes that come up during the holidays as well as ways to take care of yourself.
Show Highlights:
- The mythical family gathering where everyone is happy creates a lot of unrealistic expectations
- Travel can add pressure and stress
- Even in the most functional families, it’s often a lot of concentrated time together
- Old dynamics between parents and adult children arise
- Dealing with judgmental family members
- Cope Ahead is a great skill to use for the holidays
- Cope Ahead requires you to describe the situation that will prompt a problem response in you, anticipate the problem behavior or emotion ahead of time, and then plan out what skills you will use
- The skill of Radical Acceptance – that you have the family, friends, and social life that you have right now
- Acceptance does not equal approval
- Adult children can often think that they are going to go back to families and change them and this rarely works
- Loneliness, isolation, and grief gets amplified
- Creating your own rituals and traditions
- The Distress Tolerance skill of Contributing can be especially helpful during the holidays
Recap of Skills Discussed:
- Mindfulness
- PLEASE
- Cope Ahead
- Radical Acceptance
- Mindfulness of Others
- Contributing
Links & Resources:
DBT Skills Training Handouts and Worksheets, Second Edition
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To learn more about DBT and therapy in general, read our blog.
#18: Using Skills to Get Through the Holidays Transcript
Marielle Berg
Hello and welcome to The Skillful Podcast, where we explore DBT and RO-DBT skills to help you reduce emotional suffering, improve your relationships, and become more present in your life. I’m your host, Marielle Berg, a psychotherapist at the Bay Area DBT and Couples Counseling Center.
Marielle Berg
Hi, listeners, after receiving great feedback from folks all over the world who are finding the podcast helpful, we’ve decided to start answering listener questions. Ifyou’d like to submit a question to the podcast, head over to the podcast page on our website, bayareadbtcc.com. There you’ll find the link to submit your own question. That’s bayareadbtcc.com. We can’t guarantee that we’ll get to every question, but we’ll try to answer as many as we can. And if you’re finding this podcast helpful, please rate and review us in iTunes.
Marielle Berg
Today’s episode is going to focus on getting through the holidays. So the holidays are upon us, if you’re listening to this as this episode is being released. And we know that this time of year can bring up a lot for people. So we wanted to talk about some of the challenges that can come up during the holidays, and some skills that might help you get through it.
Ed Fowler
I think that in the United States, there’s a lot of societal pressure, the holiday song that comes to mind is like The Most Wonderful Time of the Year. So there’s just like a lot of pressure that this is the happiest time of the year. And everybody’s getting together with their families and loved ones. And it’s so wonderful. And that can often be quite challenging.
Marielle Berg
Yes, and I’m glad you said in the US because we know we have listeners from all over. But so we have Thanksgiving, this episode will probably be airing around the time of Thanksgiving. And then of course, Christmas.
Ed Fowler
And New Years.
Marielle Berg
Oh, I forgot about New Year’s. Thank you. Yes.
Ed Fowler
Yeah. Just keeps going.
Marielle Berg
Yeah. And so maybe we should begin by talking about some of the hard situations that we hear folks talking about?
Ed Fowler
Yeah, there’s a bunch of things that that people are common themes, about struggles with the holidays.
Marielle Berg
There’s a lot of emphasis on families during the holiday season. And for many folks that we work with, and you know, people in DBT, family can be really tricky, or our family of origin. So the family that we grew up in, and maybe even our present day family structure. And so as you were saying, add with that, you know the most wonderful time of the year, I hadn’t thought of that song a long time. And like, you know, wow, what pressure.
Marielle Berg
But there’s there’s such an emphasis on family togetherness, and this kind of mythical family gathering where everyone’s around a fireplace and a, you know, a big kind of feast and maybe a tree and everyone’s happy and jolly or merry. And that is so often not the case. So just even that pressure, I think can create the sense in so many people that something is lacking, because how many people actually have that experience, or have those kinds of family dynamics?
Ed Fowler
Yeah, I think that sometimes people’s experience during holiday events is you know, like it is, it’s fun, it’s nice, it’s good to be together. Because there is this added pressure of this is supposed to be this momentous moment of being together, even in families that tend to be pretty comfortable with each other, it can be hard.
Ed Fowler
And there isn’t actually a lot of room for people to be able to say I’m actually not doing so great this year, or at this time of year or today, because it’s a holiday, we’re supposed to be happy. And so I think that people tend to go into family gatherings with a sense of internal pressure. I think that especially if there’s unresolved stuff and families, there’s a sense of a little bit of apprehension about what might come up what might people be saying or doing or thinking and all of that can increase anxiety.
Marielle Berg
And if we take that example that you had of like the more functional family, I don’t know how else to describe it. But maybe a family where there’s not a lot of trauma or really hard stuff in its history. Even in those families, you’re right that there can be a lot of pressure to appear a certain way. So you might not be able to be honest about how you’re doing.
Marielle Berg
And even in those families where there’s, it’s more, it’s more functional, there’s more like overt love and caring, there’s not a lot of trauma history with the family, oftentimes, we’re spending more time with the family than we usually do, we might be traveling, which can add its own sort of pressure and stress and can make us not our best selves. So there’s more concentrated time together, even in the best of families, which I think is hard, right?
Ed Fowler
Again, like so often people are traveling to be with whoever they’re spending the holiday with, whether it’s family, or friends, or whoever. And a lot of people are traveling, so travel tends to be pretty hectic and stressful, whether it’s airports or, or bus stations, train stations, traffic, all of that kind of stuff, adds to the stress. And then being around oftentimes people that we don’t see for a lot of other times in the year, so being around family members that we don’t see on a regularbasis, we don’t necessarily have a lot of contact with that can add to the pressure and the stress.
Ed Fowler
Another dynamic that I have experienced in here a lot is the sense of like, for instance, going to visit parents and feeling like being with family members as an adult, feeling all these feelings that we had when we were like teenagers. And I actually just had this conversation with my own mom yesterday about the holidays and how it’s like, even when people are really, really secure in their identity, being around like a family dynamic at a holiday there can just be this, you know, like, deep memory of being young, that comes forward and all of a sudden, and feel like a teenager and I want to bicker with my mom, you know? And so like, I think that’s an added dynamic that can often come up.
Marielle Berg
Yes, absolutely. I remember when I was in therapy school, a teacher talking aboutand he, you know, had white hair, he was older, he’s saying, you know, I have been a therapist for 30 plus years, and I go home to see my parents. And it’s like, I’m 10 again, right? Like it was all the work he had done. So those right, those old dynamics, even in, you know, more functional, happy families can come up.
Ed Fowler
Certainly.
Marielle Berg
And let’s let’s talk a little bit about the families that are not so happy or functional, because that’s where I think folks will really need to pull out more skillsand need to do some more intentional preparation or coping ahead, which is oneof the skills we’ll talk about to help you deal with those families. And so this mightbe a family where maybe there’s been some, as I said, some traumatic history, you might be going back to a family where you were chronically invalidated. And that’s going to happen again, you might be around people who have substance abuse or mental health issues, or I mean, we’re probably not going to cover all but the whole host of things that are painful, and more or less dysfunctional, you might be confronting.
Ed Fowler
Right. And and again, I think one of the things that people struggle with is that they we might be confronted. So going to visit family and having a lot of incessant questions about what are you doing, and why are you doing that, and a sense of, like you said, being invalidated, having our experiences just overwritten by other people’s expectations or impressions of us, and in DBT language, their judgments of us. And when we know that a family dynamic is going to be tough, there’s going to be tension, maybe we had to face somebody who we’ve had extreme conflict with someone who was really abusive to us, there’s just, you know, a lot of anxiety can come up around facing that.
Marielle Berg
And so there’s a several different skills, I think that could be helpful. And of course, if you’re, if you’re a regular listener to this podcast, have done DBT therapy yourself, you can, you know, flip through your notes and your books and find other skills that maybe we won’t touch on today.
Marielle Berg
But one of the first ones I think of as Cope Ahead, because that’s what we’re talking about in this whole episode, is how can we Cope Ahead with difficult situations. And this is something that, you know, to involve skill that we talked about in depth in a different episode, but let’s maybe do like a quick run through to remind folks how you actually do it.
Marielle Berg
So the first thing with the Cope Ahead skill is to describe the situation that is going to likely prompt some kind of problem response in you. So you’re thinking ahead, okay, now I’m going to see Uncle Joe, he’s going to ask me for like the umpteenth time, why I’m not married, or whatever it might be. And I know whenever this happens, I tend to snap. And then I, you know, I say something that and then I feel bad about it afterwards, because I’ve come off, you know, angry, whatever the situation situation might be. So this requires you to kind of think ahead of time, like, what are the problem situations? And what do I think is the behavior that I’m going to do that is going to maybe create additional problems?And sometimes it’s not an overt behavior, like I’m going to snap or I’m going to reach for substance when I’m really making an effort not to do without, it might be something more internal.
Marielle Berg
So the skill, the way it’s structured asks you to think about what kind of problem behavior might you do in response to a difficult situation. But I think when we’re thinking about the holidays, we might also want to add in what might be an internal kind of problem or painful emotion that might get evoked. So my uncle isgoing to ask me again, how come I’m not married, and maybe I won’t do anything in response. But inside I’m going to feel really ashamed. It’s going to be like, he, you know, scratched a wound that was just healing, I’m going to feel all terrible about myself, and how come I am not with someone and I’m so unlovable, whatever might happen. So you can think ahead of time, like, who’s gonna say what to whom? And who’s going to do what, and how am I likely going to feel or an act.
Ed Fowler
And I think with this part of coping ahead of just naming and describing what we need to cope with, I think an important aspect is also to Check the Facts, and try to be nonjudgmental, and just really like, what are the facts of the situation? So Uncle Joe often asks, why I’m not married, I often feel shame. In response, I want I find a strong urge to reach for substances, as opposed to Uncle Joe always is so insensitive, and he is the worst. And then I respond, and then I act like an idiot. Like, that’s actually not going to be helpful probably, to have all that judgment. So being able to like, note what’s happening and what we need to prepare for, and tried to really check the facts and be nonjudgmental about it.
Marielle Berg
And sometimes even doing that, like taking the time to think about, okay, what actually happens, and what said, and what does that evoke in me can be really helpful, even if you don’t go further.
Ed Fowler
And so then, if once we know what it is that we need to cope with, we want to decide what to do, what coping or problem solving skills do we need to bring to that situation, and to really, actually be specific. So I’m going to need to think about, you know, my emotional response is probably not going to cut it. But saying, like, I will likely notice shame. And so I want to try to be mindful of my emotion, I want to validate myself, I’m maybe going to remind myself before and after and during the event of things that I am proud of in myself to counteract that shame, I’m going to write down for myself some things that other people have told me they appreciate about me to counteract the shame, like be specific about what will help to deal with the reaction that we are concerned about.
Marielle Berg
So the next step is to imagine the situation in your mind as vividly as possible. So imagining it as if it’s actually happening, seeing yourself there. So it’s a mental rehearsing.
Ed Fowler
And again, the point of that is that if we really think about, okay, when I see Uncle Joe, let me imagine what that conversation is going to look like, and how I’m going to cope and what I’m going to do, and really imagine doing it. And the benefit of that is that it helps us practice ahead. And as we’ve talked before, withthe Cope Ahead skill, just imagining doing what we want to do, is as valuable as doing it in terms of our sense of preparedness and practice.
Marielle Berg
Yeah, so you’re rehearsing in your mind, what you’re going to say how you’re going to say it, what you’re actually going to do, and this is so valuable in preparing yourself for when it actually happens. And then, if you’re going through the steps on your own, remember to practice relaxing in any way that is helpful for you. Maybe it’s taking a walk around the block or taking some deep breaths or listening to some soothing music because it can be stressful to sort of go through the whole Cope Ahead skill. So remember to practice relaxing, after you rehearse in your mind.
Ed Fowler
So to kind of summarize what what we can do in order to Cope Ahead for these challenging situations. Number one, describe the situation that we’re going to be encountering and checking the facts being nonjudgmental. Number two, decide what we’re going to do to cope, what will we need to do. And then number three, imagine what the situation will be. And number four, rehearse how we’re going toimplement our coping strategy. And then number five, give ourselves a break and relax afterwards.
Marielle Berg
Yes. And I want to add just some other skills that can be useful to think about if you’re going into a challenging family situation. And one of the ones that comes to mind most frequently for me is Radical Acceptance, that your family is who your family is, probably can do very little to change it. And so radically accepting both your family as it is and yourself and your family. And whatever the consequences are out um, has been of you being raised in the family that you were raised in.
Marielle Berg
And this can bring up a lot of emotion, it can bring up grief, they can bring up anger, I think those are the two most common ones. But if you allow yourself to feel those emotions, you know, at the end are usually the that eventual outcome is feeling like a sense of peace. And again, when we’re talking about Radical Acceptance, and we did a whole previous episode on that, which you can go back and listen to, acceptance does not equal approval. So we’re not saying it’s okay, that whatever bad things happened in your family, we’re not saying that that’s okay. And people get a cart launch. But we are saying like it did happen, and we can’t do anything to change the past.
Ed Fowler
And the point, the value in Radical Acceptance, is accepting reality as it is, ratherthan spending energy fighting reality. And so often our distress comes from that fight, rather than what actually is, or more so than what actually is. So just noticing, you know, what, what are the family dynamics that I’m dealing with? What is it about myself that I struggle with during this time of year and during these gatherings? And just accepting this is what it is, rather than trying to fight it, it should be different, I should be different, just this is what it is. And that, again, can help us be prepared to cope effectively, in the situations, rather than going in with a sense of like, I, I should be different, or they should be different, or this should be different. Because we don’t have the power to make things different. We can only kind of do what we can do within ourselves. Acceptance is a better starting point for that.
Marielle Berg
Yeah. And I think about stories, I hear how that creates so many problems when adult children go back to their family of origin and think they’re going to change their parents and siblings and aunts and uncles and cousins who and whoever else is there. And how how that never really happens.
Ed Fowler
Holidays are often not the time to do that. Because as we talked about at the beginning of this episode, there’s so much pressure on everyone. And so holidays are not necessarily a time for a lot of change. And going in with Radical Acceptance can help us strategize about what we do want to change.
Ed Fowler
The idea that Radical Acceptance is not approval, oftentimes, we are confronted during holiday times with family dynamics that are harmful, and painful and difficult. And I don’t think we need to have a stance of okay, it is what it is, this isn’t going to change, there may be aspects of the family dynamic, or our engagement with the family dynamic that we would like to change.
Ed Fowler
Sometimes, you know, when people go to family events, they have a sense of like,I tend to not say what’s on my mind, I fall into the dynamic of, you know, just letting other people say whatever they want, and I don’t speak up, we might Cope Ahead with how could I say something a little bit without the pressure of because I’m going to change the family dynamic. But more I’m just going to say what’s on my mind and then cope with whatever the reaction is accepting that I probably won’t change these dynamics in one Thanksgiving dinner.
Marielle Berg
Yes. And I’d like the focus of what, on the individual, what we can change ourselves as opposed to changing other people’s behavior. Like I’m gonna get mymom to be a different person, that’s not going to happen. But what how can I respond to her differently that might feel better? And who knows might change the interaction between us? But what what can I do, not how can I change otherpeople.
Ed Fowler
And one of the dynamics that can often come up during holiday season that we haven’t talked about yet is kind of the other end of the spectrum of people. You know, some people are really struggling with being around family in a difficult way. And for other people, there’s more of a struggle of being on their own duringthe holidays. Not necessarily being with family or friends and sometimes feeling asense of isolation are feeling a sense of like I’m out of sync with everybody else because I’m more on my own for whatever reasons, and Radical Acceptance of like, this is where I am right now.
Ed Fowler
Followed by coping ahead of like, okay, if I’m going to be on my own, what do I need to make this helpful time for me as opposed to something that’s really painful? So for instance, I have a friend who has created, has a lot of difficulty with family and has created a tradition of like really thoroughly enjoying time on her own on both Thanksgiving and Christmas and and has created traditions for herself of reveling in that time to herself and time to do exactly what she wants to do, rather than going and being around family members that are gonna be so painful. And so part of her coping ahead was to create a new tradition for herself. All of that comes from a starting point of acceptance, this is what is, it’s not healthy for me to be with my family, or I just don’t have the family relationships that I’m able to be with family holidays. So I’m going to create my own traditions.
Marielle Berg
And that’s one of the beautiful silver linings I think for people who, their struggle during the holidays is not that they’re going home to a challenging family situation, is that maybe they don’t have family or they don’t have the relationships that they want in their life. The silver lining is you get to create your own rituals. So what worked for me about what we did during the holidays, and what didn’t, and what would I like to bring in what’s going to be a way to take care of myself during this time? And experimenting. I love how your friend is usingthat the holidays, because usually, you know people are off work, there’s some more free time as a time in place for her to be more quiet and take care of herself. So figuring out what what might work for you. In creating your own traditions and rituals,
Ed Fowler
And touching on another DBT skill that is a form of Building Mastery, which also, you know, increases our emotional resilience of like, I have the capacity to create what I need in my life. And whether it’s around being on my own or whether it’s around being with family, and building mastery and creating what I need in my life.
Marielle Berg
And another challenge that can come up during the holidays, which you were justtouching on but we didn’t quite name is, I think just the whole theme of loss during the holidays. So if someone you loved has died, oftentimes during the holidays where memories of them can come up more starkly. And there can be more grieving because it is a time where there’s such an emphasis on family togetherness. So that’s actual loss of someone you love has died.
Marielle Berg
But it’s also loss, perhaps of a relationship that ended. So breakups or divorce, or ending of important friendships. And another way to think about loss during the holidays, as, as you touched on a moment ago Ed, maybe just not having the kind of relationships you want in your life, at least presently. So feeling like oh, I don’t have like, the kind of friend group I might want, or I don’t have a relationship, I’m on my own. So there’s, or my family is just too hard for me to be around. So there’s a loss there. And that’s something that is so often not talked about when we talk about the holidays.
Ed Fowler
Right. And I think that, you know, even people being with family, there can also be a sense of loss of being around family members that are challenging to be with and that sense of like, yeah, this is really hard, and the sense of loss of carefree family time or something like that. So that’s where I really feel frustration with our societal pressure around, you know, all of November and December into the beginning of January of like, yes, yes. So it’s a great time to beconnected and happy. And it’s usually mixed, so that there can be plenty of moments of, of connection and moments of real contentment. And there also can be moments of loss or grief, or frustration or struggle.
Marielle Berg
Yes, and for the loss and grief, some Distress Tolerance skills might be helpful, I think particularly under Wise Mind ACCEPTS, which is one of our Distracting skills. There’s a Distress Tolerance skill around Contributing, which might be particularly helpful during the holidays, and that’s helping other folks in need. Maybe people who need a hot meal or homeless or someone who’s ill, that can be a way to shift the focus away from your own suffering and feel useful.
Marielle Berg
Another distracting skill that comes to mind falls under the acronym improve forIMPROVE the Moment. I mean, any of those, there’s imagery, meaning, prayer, relaxing, doing one thing in the moment, taking a brief vacation, encouragement and rethinking the situation. That’s a quick rundown of IMPROVE but any of those can be helpful. I think particularly maybe meaning making can be useful during the holiday, trying to find meaning in your challenging situation. And also, you’ve already alluded to this as kind of encouragement and rethinking the situation. You can do this while you’re coping ahead. You know, that’s sort of thinking about your self talk. Like okay, you’re doing a good job, you’re gonna get through this, whatever you might need to encourage yourself to get through some of the more stressful times.
Ed Fowler
Okay, another one of those IMPROVE options is doing one thing in the moment which gets to the kind of One Mindfulness or using Mindfulness skills. So finding things that you do enjoy and another Distress Tolerance category of skills is Self Soothing. So finding things that are really soothing, especially if you experience the holiday seasons to be stressful, finding things that are soothing and comforting and mindfully, engaging those letting that sink in of like doing those things that you appreciate. There can be a lot of pressure during holiday seasons to do what other people want to do to do what’s expected to go to a lot of like work parties and family parties and that kind of stuff. And finding those momentswhere you’re doing what you want to do, you’re soothing yourself and doing it mindfully.
Marielle Berg
Yes, and on that note, I’m so glad you brought up work parties, because parties and social gathering are often a big part of what happens during the holiday season, which makes me think of the PLEASE skills, which I don’t believe we talked about on the podcast. But these, the PLEASE skill falls under Emotion Regulation. So this is a skill about taking care of your body and your mind. So you will reduce your susceptibility to being in strong Emotion Mind.
Marielle Berg
And so the PLEASE skills the P and the L stands for treating physical illness. The Eis for balanced eating, which I think is an important one during the holiday because there’s a lot of festive foods that maybe you’re not usually around the A is for avoiding mood altering substances. Also a really important one during the holiday season, because there’s often lots of alcohol flowing. S is for sleep. Another important one during the holidays, because if you’re partying more or busy, you know getting presents or doing holiday cooking, or whatever you mightdo, your sleep might get be off. And the last one the E in the PLEASE skill is for getting exercise, which also can be challenging during the holidays if you’re busier.
Ed Fowler
So the PLEASE skills are like really such a helpful foundation for our emotional resilience and stability in general all year long. And as a coping ahead strategy focusing on our eating and making sure that we’re keeping a balance or focusingon exercise or sleep. Oftentimes people that I’m meeting with will talk about how helpful it is to be like I am really prioritizing these physical health things that keep me resilient. Because for instance, people know if I don’t get enough sleep, I’m going to have very little patience for other people. Or if I drink too much, I’m going to really struggle to maintain what I want in my conversations with people.And so attending to all of those things can be a helpful focus, to keep us on trackfor our own personal goals during the season.
Marielle Berg
Before we end, let’s talk a little bit. So we’ve talked about, you know, challenging family situations and go, you know, going home to see family or traveling. The forced togetherness we also talked about if people are alone and feeling lonely, or experiencing a lot of grief due to losses during the holiday. So these different scenarios. Let’s also just talk a little bit about some of the upside or the positive in terms of being able to experience moments of joy and connection and some of the things that might get in the way of that.
Ed Fowler
I think what the another skill that I think about is the skill of Mindfulness of Others, which is under the Interpersonal Effectiveness skills of like when we are insocial gatherings with other people, rather than being really self conscious being focused on enjoying what other people have to say listening really genuinely listening, and being involved with other people. And so I think one of the benefits in in a way to focus during the holiday seasons, when there is a lot of social interaction is to take the opportunity to really listen to others to enjoy getting to know people to connect, and find ways to mindfully do that.
Marielle Berg
Yes, and I think Mindfulness in general can be helpful in any of these kinds of social situations. So letting go of self consciousness and also trying to let go of worry. Which can make what might be a pleasurable situation not so pleasurable. So trying to let go of what you have to do tomorrow, what you didn’tdo today. And if you’re having a nice moment with a coworker at a holiday party, or with a friend you haven’t seen for a while at a different holiday gathering, just trying to see if you can allow yourself to be in that moment.
Ed Fowler
You know, in terms of the more benefits of the holiday season. I do think that people tend to a lot of times have associations and memories of past holiday experiences and spending some time remembering those things in a way that is positive and, and feels nourishing to think about positive memories you’ve had during holiday experiences and give yourself some time to have some nostalgia in a way that’s helpful if nostalgia is stressful and maybe not as much. But I think that that can be a benefit.
Marielle Berg
The last thing I want us to talk about is some unique challenges that we didn’t address. I want to talk for a moment just about race, ethnicity and religious differences that can come up more starkly during the holidays. And so here in theUS, we celebrate Thanksgiving, which actually has a really hard and troubled history with the Native Americans of this country. And so that for Native Americans can really be thought of as a day of genocide for their people. And I know I’ve heard from some some of my Native American friends that there’s a real push and encouragement to not feast on that day.
Marielle Berg
So I just want to note that, that that can be a particular challenge, especially if you are of Native American heritage, and you know, sort of the history of this holiday. So not to kind of gloss over that particular challenge. And also, you know, we were talking about Thanksgiving and Christmas, because those are the biggest holidays that we face in the US that not everyone celebrates Christmas, right. And so that can have its own challenges when everyone is making such a big deal on this day, and everything is shut down and you don’t celebrate Christmas.
Ed Fowler
Right. And again, there’s also other holidays that don’t get as much attention because not as many people are observing like Hanukkah or Kwanzaa. And so you know, like being able to be mindful of your own experience. So if you celebrate a holiday that isn’t on the the major list for that time of year, or any time of year, to really mindfully enjoy what your own holiday celebrations, whatever they might be. And if you do celebrate the major holidays to be conscientious of friends, friends and family who maybe don’t, or even conscientious that other people may be having a harder time with the holiday than even you are.
Marielle Berg
Yes. And for different reasons.
Ed Fowler
Right. So this is a summary of lots of different things to be conscientious about aswe approach these end of the year holidays. And we obviously have not covered everything. And so I think our biggest encouragement is to really do what will be helpful to you in whatever way and our hope that this end of the year holiday time can be a time where you find those moments of contentment and even joy.
Marielle Berg
Thank you. If you’re listening to episodes as they get released, we’ll be taking a break for the holiday season, and we’ll return with new episodes in 2020.
Marielle Berg
Thanks for listening to today’s episode. To learn more, or if you’re in the Bay Area and want to get started with therapy, you can find us online at bayareadbtcc.com. That’s bayareadbtcc.com.