Navigating The Holiday Season: Maintaining Connection Amidst the Chaos

The holiday season can represent a sense of connectedness, warmth, or a meaningful ritual within one's faith or family. However, it can also represent a sense of familial expectations, logistical nightmares, amplified emotions, crowded calendars, financial pressures and the opportunity for old wounds to show up. For many relationships, both in their early stages and long-term, this mix can place a strain on intimacy and connection. The good news is that there are evidence-based ways that partners can stay attuned, support one another, and come out of the holiday season feeling closer rather than more distant.

1. PRE-SEASON PLANNING: SETTING A CONTAINER OF SAFETY BEFORE THE CHAOS

Research shows that partners who plan and cope together fare better when stress hits¹. Collaborative pre-planning in discussing the logistics, roles, and non-negotiables before the busyness of the holiday season starts can set you and your partnership up for success.

Some ideas around this can be to build a short one page "holiday map" together to minimise feeling blindsided in the season to come. This map can cover elements on who you’ll be seeing, travel times, sleep arrangements, and intentionally scheduling when you will be needing alone time to recharge. Discuss shared boundaries around navigating certain topics if they come up; how you’ll respond to nosy or intrusive questions from family members as a team; where and when you may feel comfortable exploring different degrees of sexual intimacy or intimacy more broadly; and which roles you are or are not willing to step into. These collaborative decisions form what’s known as relational scaffolding, a process that can reduce reactive cycles within the partnership¹.

2. COMMUNICATION THAT HELPS

The Gottman's have done decades of research in trying to understand and support partnerships in what communication and behavioural patterns help relationships thrive and survive and which patterns can be harmful to connection and the longevity of a relationship². The Gottman's found that when one person would begin talking about an issue they have been having more gently using "I" statements, rather than "you" statements, conversations would tend to remain calmer and lead to better relational outcomes³.

Small everyday bids for connection (i.e., a smile, a passing touch, your partner's comment about their day, etc.) matter, so it's important to the health and security of the relationship that we turn towards our partners bids. Turning towards a bid for connection can look like reaching back to hold your partner after experiencing a passing touch or asking questions of curiosity about their day. These actions can help fund what the Gottman's call the emotional bank account, where these smaller moments of turning towards each other add up and are a reminder of the stability and the security of the relationship when conflict does arise⁴. Research on capitalising on bids with active and engaging responses also shows that celebrating small wins together can boost intimacy and positive affect⁵, which can be especially useful when stress is high during times like the holiday season. Practice noticing and responding enthusiastically to each other’s small positive moments - these consistent and continual small steps will help with the bigger strides needed as the holiday season ramps up.

3. SETTING BOUNDARIES WITH COMPASSION THAT HELP PROTECT THE PARTNERSHIP

Setting up boundaried conversations is particularly important during times of high stress. Boundaries help partners avoid reactive cycles by reducing triggers and providing pre-negotiated guidelines to follow⁶. Take time to reflect on what boundaries you would like to establish collaboratively for the holiday season. This might include agreeing to refrain from discussions that have historically been challenging for your relationship, such as finances, parenting, or politics, during holiday events. Enforce these boundaries gently and consistently when they are tested. For example, you might say: “We agreed not to talk about finances tonight. If you want to discuss it, I’m happy to set a time tomorrow to go over it together.”

Explore what pre-agreed signals and quick phrases you both would like to set up this holiday season to assist building on boundaries that protect the partnership. Talk about what these phrases may mean for you, what support or some time apart to recalibrate would look like, and how you action them collaboratively. Be gentle with yourselves and each other, and remember that it’s okay (and often more productive) to postpone certain conversations until after the busyness of the holiday season, when you may both feel more regulated and present to each other's concerns.

4. STAYING ATTUNED UNDER THE PRESSURE

Knowing when to take breaks for yourself, whether that be sporadically when on the move with your partner or when a potential issue arises between you in conversation will be important during the holiday season. We all have what is called a window of tolerance - when we are sitting within our window, it means that our prefrontal cortex - which is responsible for executive functioning, emotional regulation, impulse control, working and episodic memory - is online, allowing us to navigate emotional and interpersonal challenges more effectively⁷. However, factors such as events that bring up old wounds, overwhelming stress, and consistent conflict can cause us to move outside of our window. When this happens, our prefrontal cortex goes offline, affecting how we process what is being said, how we respond, and how we experience our emotions⁷⁻⁸.

Catching this shift early in the conversation and requesting a break, and building in buffers of alone time throughout the holiday season, can help maintain and strengthen your window of tolerance. Practices that support returning to your window such as mindfulness, deep breathing, bodily self-care (e.g., rest, exercise, nutritious foods, and avoiding substances), and spending time in nature can also be beneficial for having attuned and constructive conversations during the holidays.

5. REPAIRING FROM CONFLICT

Conflict is a normal part of any relationship, it is how you navigate the conflict together and how you repair is what separates relationships that are resilient during the hard times to those where further distance grows. John Gottman’s research on repair attempts (a turning towards which de-escalates negativity after conflict) is central and can assist partnerships in becoming more effective to make and accept repair attempts more frequently⁹. Repair can look like taking accountability for actions that may have caused your partner being emotionally hurt, being curious about what your partner is needing, soothing actions such as being in close proximity or hand holding that can help soothe the nervous system and is based in consent, or pausing to reschedule having the conversation needed by validating the significance and recognising that the conversation may feel stuck.

Another perspective that can assist in the repair process can be reframing your partner's responses after conflict has occurred. Research on Emotionally-Focused Therapy shows that reframing conflicts as attachment-based pursuits (e.g., seeing shutting down as a plea for safety, or the heightening of emotions as a plea for needs to be met) can assist partners to respond with empathy and reduces escalations¹⁰. Consistent and effective repair can help cultivate secure attachment and safe base between partners, increasing their resilience in conflict and increasing the chances of successful repair attempts.

6. INTIMACY DURING THE HOLIDAYS: PRIORITISING QUALITY OVER QUANTITY AND MICRO-INTIMACY PRACTICES

Stress doesn’t just “kill the mood” - it has measurable physiological and psychological effects that can suppress desire and impacts our mesolimbic dopamine pathway - the brains reward and pleasure circuit¹¹⁻¹². Knowing this impact can open up space for intentional, empathic, and supportive connection that is realistic during the busyness of the holiday season. So let's get into it.

It is not about how often you have intimacy, it's about how meaningful it is and recognising that even brief acts of intimacy (i.e., a passing or intimate touch, eye contact, affectionate or "pillow talk", etc.) can sustain connection when your typical intimate encounters are hard to navigate amidst the holiday chaos. Together, acknowledge that there may be downs and upswings in desire throughout the season and to not judge low desire as a “failure,” but as a signal. Use this signal as an invitation to slow down, reconnect, and re-regulate. Celebrating moments of micro-intimacy in the relationship with positive affect rather than commiserating on the lack of intimacy can help build further relational resilience and stoke the flames of desire.

When time and emotional energy are constrained, small moments can be powerful. A minute or two of gentle stroking, hand-holding, forehead kisses, co-regulating by breathing together, or cuddling can sustain connection. Research into daily experience shows that such moments can assist in buffering stress and fostering intimacy¹³. Engaging in physical or skin-to-skin contact with your partner can also help leverage a bonding hormone called oxytocin to work in your favour. Oxytocin is released through affectionate touch, orgasm, and closeness and assists in fostering trust, lowers stress, and enhances feelings of safety¹⁴.

FINAL NOTES

The goal isn’t to avoid every misstep - that’s part of the human experience - it's to create a predictable and kind way of returning to one another. The holidays may be brief, but the patterns you establish during this holiday season through pre-planning, setting and navigating boundaries, practicing compassionate communication and repair, and savoring the moments of intimacy the holidays sometimes uniquely afford are the same patterns that can strengthen your relationship in the new year and beyond. Have a safe and connected holiday season.

*Please note that this blog is not a substitute for individual or partnership therapy.

REFERENCES

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