The holidays are a busy time full of lights, activities, presents, travel, food, friends, and family. While we love the excitement that comes this time of year, it can also be draining. After all, there can be too much of a good thing. Post-holiday letdown refers to a state of depression and disappointment that can occur at the end of the holiday season.
While this mostly affects adults, children can suffer from it as well. The post-holiday letdown in children can have several symptoms. Common signs include depression, sadness, loneliness, trouble sleeping, mood swings, overindulging on food or treats, or becoming physically ill. You can also notice increased sadness or even lack of enthusiasm for holiday activities in your children.
The cause behind these symptoms can be unrealistic expectations around the holidays or wanting things to be perfect. Kids can pick up on these feelings in us or have their own versions of holidays that don’t match expectations.
Thankfully, there are steps you can take to help your children avoid a post-holiday letdown. By managing expectations and knowing how to handle letdowns after the season is done, your kids can avoid the worst.
Keep an eye out for any symptoms and make sure you keep these tips in mind. By having solutions in place for holiday letdowns, you can ensure your children enjoy the holidays and the time afterward.
1. Help Your Kids Stay in Contact with Family and Friends
Children enjoy seeing distant relatives and relations that they don’t get to meet frequently. Spending time with family that lives far away is one of the biggest hallmarks of the holiday. We also make time for friends under special circumstances at the same time as making the holidays even more special.
However, once the holiday has ended and those family members and friends leave again, children can become despondent. Helping children keep in contact can alleviate some of the symptoms of a post-holiday letdown.
When we only see families on the holidays, children miss their cousins and grandparents afterward. Providing children with cell phones specifically designed for simple texting and calling can help them nurture relationships.
You can check out Gabb Wireless to learn more about cell phones for children. These types of connections allow your children to know that their interactions with family and friends aren’t limited to just the holidays.
2. Don’t Overindulge During Holiday Celebrations
The holidays often lead to overindulgence. With so many opportunities to go out to parties, shopping excursions, and other special activities, we can easily overdo it. In the moment, it’s hard to see which opportunities we should partake in, and which we should avoid.
That leads to burnout and post-holiday letdown when our energy levels drop. By managing our indulgence during the holidays, we can help to ensure that we don’t overdo it. Planning in advance can help your children know what’s coming next. That way, they aren’t surprised by more activities and unexpected visits.
When children know what’s coming next, they won’t burn out as quickly as they learn to manage their own energy levels. It also helps you understand when you’ve pushed the family too hard. It’s okay to say no during the holidays and take some time for yourselves as a family.
3. Start Looking Forward to Your Next Family Event
Once the holidays finish, children can be disappointed that there aren’t any events left. The rest of the winter can feel dull and it’s hard to get children excited. One tip is to start planning your next family event soon after the holidays wrap up. By giving kids something to look forward to, you can help them avoid feeling too down.
Planning your next family event doesn’t have to be a big ordeal either. Even a weekend movie marathon or trip to a local park can help get children interested in things again. By helping them look ahead, you make sure kids don’t focus completely on the events that have ended. It also allows you to have fun together by planning as a family. When children have something to look forward to, it alleviates their disappointment after the holidays.
4. Find Fun Winter Activities to Fill Time
The holiday season is the pinnacle of the winter months. Once the holidays end, winter can seem cold and disappointing in comparison. No matter where you live, the weather is different in winter and shorter days with less sun can depress us.
Part of managing post-holiday letdown is being able to find other things that can entertain families and kids. Combining that goal with the unique properties of winter can help create new special memories for families.
If you live in an area with snow, try sledding down snowy hills or skating out on the ice. Taking a trip to a ski slope can also be a great way to engage your children. You can also enjoy holiday drinks and food favorites like warm soups and hot chocolate, no matter where you live.
By helping to make the winter days brighter, post-holiday letdown can lessen and you can find new activities. Your children can have events to look forward to and learn how to avoid a post-holiday letdown.
5. Take Time to Relax and Recharge
A large part of managing your children’s expectations after the holidays is making sure that there are new things on the horizon. But another important component is ensuring that there is time for rest and relaxation. The holidays are a busy time of year that takes a lot of energy.
Shopping, decorating, baking, traveling, and socializing take a lot out of adults, let alone children. Kids can get easily worn down by the holidays and need to have time to recharge at home.
By having events planned for the future, you can help children have things to look forward to. Combine that with plenty of time to relax and recharge, and you have a recipe for success.
Children want to enjoy their holidays and be able to reset after the excitement has ended. By allowing plenty of time for relaxation post-holiday, you can avoid holiday letdowns. It also allows you to regroup as a family and learn to relax together.
Helping Your Kids Starts with Helping Yourself
We all want our children to enjoy their holidays to the fullest extent. However, once the celebrations have died down, children can be disappointed. By working to help children manage expectations and starting new activities, you can keep them happy.
While you do what you can to help the children, you also need to monitor yourself. Helping your kids starts with helping yourself, so don’t let the post-holiday letdown affect you either.
