When Seasonal Anxiety Hits Hard: The Simple Things That Saved Me This Week
All week, I’ve felt a low, nagging anxiety. It sits in my chest, like a heavy weight pressing against my sternum. I attributed the feeling to lingering wounds from the recent holiday, and the stress around buying Christmas gifts and new living room furniture.
Normally, I can shake off anxiety quickly. Over the years, it used to plague me like a chronic disease. I lived in a constant state of unease and angst. As I’ve grown older, it’s shifted into the background and seems to only rear its head when there are a culmination of factors.
Enter: Seasonal Depression + Holiday Season Anxiety. The ultimate duo.
I’ll be honest, I’ve struggled hard this week. Partially, it’s because the winter blues are kicking in, but they’re certainly not in full swing (just wait until after Christmas).
If you live in New England, or anywhere in the north, you understand that when the clocks roll back in November, it’s dark pretty much all the time. Morning? Dark. Leave work? Still dark. Heck, you start to wonder if the sun even still exists.
For me, this constant darkness creates a sense of imbalance internally. And the imbalance often manifests itself as anxiety and seasonal depression.
The past few days I’ve been doing my darndest to ignore the anxiety. Maybe it’ll just go away on its own, I’ve thought. But if you have anxiety, you know that simply shoving it aside and hoping for the best is a bandaid at best and at worst makes things worse.
So what actually does help me when I have this low, persistent anxiety? If I’m being totally honest, my brain’s initial response is: Alcohol (what does this say about me?).
But it’s true (to some degree).
Alcohol can quickly ease some of the discomfort that anxiety brings. But it’s temporary. I know that. You know that. When you wake up, your problems will still be there, and very often you end up feeling worse. Plus, since we can’t always turn to the alcohols when feeling uncomfortable, we have to develop other coping mechanisms.
And look, since we all know that whiskey and wine can’t actually solve your problems, we have to get creative with more “boring” techniques (I guess).
I’ve found a few things that actually work to help me regulate myself when feeling anxiety. Here’s what I’ve tried this week, and how it’s helped ease some of the inner turmoil:
Simple Strategies That Helped Ease My Seasonal Anxiety This Week
Limiting Doomscrolling
When I refer to doomscrolling, I use it loosely in terms of just being on your phone, scrolling memes, reels, and content on Facebook, Insta, or TikTok.
We get that initial bump of calm, and maybe a little twinge of happiness. But that positive feeling is as short lived as our dwindling attention spans. Constant scrolling actually contributes to higher levels of anxiety, triggering a stress response.
So, while reels and memes are a tantalizing escape from reality, I find when I’m already feeling stressed, that they’re not the answer.
To prevent myself from scrolling, I’ll leave my phone downstairs or in another room. Removing the distraction allows me to avoid that impulse to grab my phone without thinking.
Instead of reaching for my phone, I’ll grab a cookbook to skim through or a magazine. These alternatives still offer some of the mental break I’m looking for without the cortisol spike.
Breathing Exercises
I’m not talking about anything too crazy here. I’m not saying I even meditate (I wish). Simply, I freaking remember to breathe. I’ll sit in place, and count a few breaths in and a few breaths out. You’d think that by the age of 35 I’d have learned how to breathe already, but it seems that I need to concentrate on the practice to get the most out of it.
By spending a few quiet moments just focusing on my breath, this helps to align me with the present moment and soothes my nerves.
Journaling
You may hear about people doing “morning pages.” In her book, The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron suggests spending every morning writing 3 full pages (I think 8×11.5 pages) by hand.
While this sounds awesome in theory, who really has a full hour to write 3 full pages every single day. I mean, I could make time but something else would have to give.
That said, the benefits of writing and reflecting daily are indisputable. Instead of spending a full hour writing, I spend 15–20 minutes before my workday to write a page or two in my journal. I just dump out what I’m feeling, what’s stressing me out, and what’s on my mind.
If you can write 3 full pages, great. But if you don’t have the time, try spending 5 or 10 minutes to start just jotting down your thoughts. This has greatly helped me ease anxiety and is a practice I find myself returning to over and over.
Getting out in Nature
This is the king (or queen?) of anti-anxiety meds for me. In the summer, I was spending a few minutes each morning just standing on my porch looking out into the woods behind my house.
I let the habit fall to the wayside in the winter because, you know, it’s cold. But this week, when my anxiety started to surface again, I thought “fuck it, let’s throw on a jacket, get out there, and see what happens.”
Guess what happened? Magic.
Cold or not, when I’m standing outside looking into the woods, I feel a sense of immediate calm wash away from me. No phones, televisions, computer work screens. Just the serenity of trees and silence.
The ultimate antidote to seasonal depression.
If you don’t have a ton of nature outside your front door, try to find even a small slice of it somewhere. Even just finding a beautiful tree or plant (outside) that you can shift your focus to may help to ease your nervous system.
This practice is hard in the winter, but also so critical to keep grounded and connected with the world in a meaningful and calming way.
Finding Center and Alignment Again
As the week comes to a close, I’m finding that my anxiety, while still present, has lessened by implementing some of these strategies and tactics. I’m continuing to try to be more “present,” and less distracted by my phone and other competing demands.
With our attention constantly being pulled in a multitude of directions, we have to work extra hard to bring ourselves back to center.
With winter in full swing, and the holidays around the corner, you may also feel unsteadied in your core. If so, consider implementing one of the above tactics, or try them all. You may be surprised how these little tweaks in your day can pack a big punch.
If any of this resonated with you, or if you have other self-regulating tactics that work, I hope that you share your thoughts in the comments!
