Why are the holidays so stressful with ADHD? - Part III

Welcome to the third and final installment in our trilogy of (re)sources of overwhelm during the holidays!

Revisit Part I here and Part II here.

Emotional Overwhelm

For many of us, gathering with friends and family is a cherished part of the holiday season. Feeling the belonging of our family and community is a vital part of our well being as a social species. And perhaps because so much of our sense of personal safety is tied into our need to belong and feel accepted, navigating these personal relationships can sometimes be incredibly challenging.

If you have ADHD and you gather with your family, there is a significant chance that you won’t be the only one present with ADHD (ADHD is highly heritable). And if we consider how executive function overwhelm and sensory overload may be affecting multiple people, it’s not surprising that tempers might flare and emotional conflict might erupt during holiday get-togethers.

Having an understanding of how our emotions work can allow us to see emotional overwhelm coming before it bowls us over like a tsunami.

I can’t over-emphasize how learning about emotions has changed how I see the world. There is just so much misunderstanding of emotion in popular culture today. We aren’t taught how to have feelings without being overwhelmed by them or owned by them.

We absorb this idea that emotions are dangerous and unpredictable, and strong emotions should be avoided. But emotions are part of our experience of being human, no less important than thinking. Emotions give us data, but they don’t tell us what to do. Emotions tell us if we’re feeling safe or under threat, if we’re attracted to or repelled by a stimulus or situation. But they don’t tell us how to handle that situation. We might think that emotion is driving our actions, but we’re acting based on our past experience. And if we can change the story, we can change our reaction.

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Whenever we’re in communication with another person, there are three parts of the communication — “my stuff”, “their stuff”, and “our stuff”. We cannot control another person’s thoughts or emotions, so they have to own “their stuff”. We own “my stuff”. That leaves “our stuff” to get co-created and co-owned together.

Changing the way we understand and relate to our emotions and the emotions of other people isn’t an easy task, but it can be immensely rewarding. It is worth working on.

I have gathered below a collection of podcast interviews with experts in the study of emotion, brain science and communication. These are conversations that I keep coming back to, re-listening to, and sharing with family, friends and clients. Each interview changed me, expanded my mind to imagine what is possible, and added concrete resources to my toolbox of emotional resilience. I hope that they can do the same for you.

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“My stuff” - Facing our own emotions

Exploring “my stuff”, we can discover where our own emotions come from, how to anticipate emotional overwhelm before it floods our system, and how to prepare for the times when it does. It is empowering to recognize the biology of our emotions, because it allows us to let go of the shame we experience when we lose our cool. That’s our threat-detection system doing its job. It becomes our job to regain our clear thinking, to do the work of repairing any harm we caused, and learning to do better next time, with self compassion.

​How Your Emotions Are Made | Lisa Feldman Barrett (Ten Percent Happier) (I linked this in Part I too.)

​4 Ways Not To Be Owned By Your Sh*t | Susan David (Ten Percent Happier)

​Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria: Dr. William Dodson brings new insight to Emotional Regulation (Take Control ADHD)

​Managing Intense Feelings for Kids and Grownups | Lindsey Kealey (Therapist Uncensored)

​Self-Compassion Ain’t Always Soft | Kristin Neff (Ten Percent Happier)

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“Our stuff” - Navigating emotions with others

Looking at “our stuff” means, first, seeing where it transitions into “their stuff” and giving other people the space to experience and work through their own emotions. These two podcasts offer tools for having constructive conversations with other people when emotions are high.

​How Good Boundaries Actually Bring Us Closer | Juliane Taylor Shore (Therapist Uncensored)

​Relationships 2.0: How To Keep Conflict From Spiraling | Julia Minson (Hidden Brain)

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“Their stuff” - Navigating difficult relationships

Sometimes people are so overwhelmed by “their stuff” that they do not have the skills or emotional maturity to prevent it from harming other people. This podcast talks about how we can handle interacting with such people while protecting our own emotional safety.

​How to Deal With Emotionally Immature People (Including Maybe Your Own Parents) | Lindsay C. Gibson (Ten Percent Happier)

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Putting it all together

At their core, when we peel away the garland and glitter, our holidays and traditions are meant to bring us together, to reaffirm our belonging in our communities and families (whether that’s a family we were born into or a family we chose), and to strengthen those relationships. Feeling that we are safe and connected is a fundamental human need.

However, when we bring humans together, with all of our human needs, things get complicated; especially with our ADHD in the mix.

In this series of emails, I invited you to be aware of your body’s energy budget and how it can be tapped by extra executive function tasks. Next, I highlighted how attending to each of our unique sensory needs can help us better regulate our energy and mood. Last, I explored emotional overwhelm and provided a collection of podcasts that serve as an introduction to many powerful tools for cultivating emotional resilience.

I hope that you have found something useful. I hope that one of the podcasts offered you a new insight or aha. I hope that with awareness and insight, you might find opportunities to preserve your energy this holiday season. And as you protect your body budget, I hope this clears the way for more occasions for joy and connection with the people who mean the most to you.

In the coming week, I invite you to do two things. 1. Choose one tool from this newsletter trilogy and practice using that tool. 2. Choose one idea or insight that was new to you and teach it to someone you care about.

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Wishing you the happiest festive celebrations!

Randy