Leftovers and Letdowns: The Emotional Hangover After The Holidays

And suddenly the holidays are over again. One is waiting for them for so long and within two to three days, all the carefully built magic is gone. But somehow the supposedly cozy days have not refreshed you after all. Instead, you are left with a feeling of loneliness and emptiness.

Suddenly eating gingerbread feels so terribly wrong and strolling around the christmas market is no longer cozy but just stressful. The fairy lights are gone and your schedule looks so weirdly normal again. It is like waking up after a great party with a headache and reality hits all at once.

Welcome to the emotional hangover after the holidays. 

We spend weeks looking forward to the festive holidays, imagining and craving cozy moments with loved ones or at least a gathering where usual problems and dynamics can be set aside for once. A little need of warmth and a pause from real life.

And maybe it really was good. Maybe it was even magical, just as hoped. But often it is also stressful, awkward and exhausting. Either way, once the holidays are over the letdown hits. The event that you have waited for so long is just suddenly over. The gap between expectation and reality and the sudden drop of cortisol and endorphins leaves you with a weird state of emotions. An unsettling and quiet emptiness.

The holidays come with rules, mostly unspoken ones. You are supposed to be happy, calm and grateful. Ideally glowing with inner peace and no grudge. 

Feeling anxious? Overwhelmed? Sad?

Inconvenient.

So instead, many of us perform joy. Smiling through discomfort and keeping the peace. We avoid difficult conversations, tiptoeing around each other and hope that ignoring the dynamics makes it somehow disappear. But it doesn't. At least not in the long run.  

Family gatherings have a remarkable ability to bring out old dynamics. Roles slip back on easily. And sometimes we slip back into a version of ourselves we thought we had already outgrown. Even though nothing visibly ‘bad’ happens, the effort of holding everything together is exhausting. Being around people who know so many versions of you can be comforting or also really draining at the same time.

The problem with swallowing emotions for the sake of harmony during the holiday is that they do not magically vanish overall. They wait. And once the decoration comes down the emotions come back. Maybe even louder and harder to ignore.

That is why the exhaustion afterwards feels different. It is not just physical tiredness from late nights and socializing. It is partly emotional debt coming due. The cost of staying pleasant and calm when you did not fully feel any of those things.

At the same time (or if you actually had a wonderful and calming holiday season) going from nonstop togetherness back to ordinary life feels strangely underwhelming.

One day you are constantly surrounded. Meals, plans, conversations, movement. The next day, it is just you, your daily routine and the hum of normal life. Even when you have looked forward to it, it suddenly seems so boring and you do not know what to do with your life. The transition is too abrupt going from constant adrenaline to a sudden stillness that feels heavy. Accompanied with exhaustion, motivation drops and even simple tasks feel harder than they should. 

It is  not that your life suddenly became lonely. It is that the contrast is so sharp. Silence feels louder after noise. Being alone feels different after being together.

Even if you normally enjoy independence and being alone, post-holidays loneliness hits differently.

And then you are just left with…winter.

Before, you had the lights and warmth and something to look forward to.

No you are left with darkness and coldness and the realisation that there are still at least three months to go and one is immediately yearning for spring and sun. This is the moment when the winter blues truly begin and it only complicates to find motivation and optimism.

But to find a little bit of hope in this period of time: The post-holiday hangover is not a personal failure. It is a very human response to contrast and adjustment. And even if we feel lonely, we are not lonely within this feeling. 

There is no need to rush yourself back into productivity or happiness. 

Maybe the break is needed and once we regain the energy, we can surround ourselves with warm thoughts and people that we love, despite the dark months ahead. 

And honestly, there is no rule saying you have to let go of fairy lights and hot christmas drinks just because it is January.  Remind yourself that you have free will and you can carry them with you a little longer, letting the coziness stay until the real sun and warmth find their way back into our lives. 

by Lareen Roth