Simple Ways Women Can Reduce Holiday Burnout

The holidays are supposed to be magical, full of joy and connection and all those warm, fuzzy feelings. But for many women, it feels like someone took our already full lives and hit fast-forward. The calendar quickly fills with school performances, parties, and family plans until your days are louder, longer, and more crowded than ever.

You’re bouncing between work deadlines and Target runs, answering group texts while you stir something on the stove, wrapping gifts after the kids are in bed, and saying yes to one more thing because it feels easier than saying no. You want this season to feel good for the people you love, but underneath, you’re exhausted. 

I call this Holiday Burnout, and it doesn’t wait until December. It creeps in as soon as you start making lists for Halloween and often spirals till January, when you've taken care of everyone else on your holiday list and somehow forgot to add your own needs to the list.

If that sounds like you, you’re not failing, and you’re not doing anything wrong. You’re one of the 60% of women who don't prioritize their self-care during the holidays. And just like I told my client Maria, there is a way to move through the season without surrendering to Holiday Burnout. 

What Holiday Burnout Looks Like for Women Like Maria

When Maria came to me, she was already in the thick of Holiday Burnout long before the holidays. She’s a busy mom of two with a full-time job. And like most moms, she was always the default parent who handled things in her family, like buying gifts, keeping up with the kids' schedules, and  remembering all the “little things.” 

On paper, she was doing what needed to be done, but inside, she felt like she was spinning and nothing was getting done. She spent her days going from one fire to the next, and by the time she lay down at night, she either doom scrolled on her phone until she fell asleep…or lay awake mentally rewriting her to-do list.

The part that bothered her most wasn’t just the exhaustion. It was that she felt less present. She could barely remember those magical holidays she created for everyone else as anything but exhaustion and to-dos. She told me, “I feel like a hamster on a wheel.” Things kept moving, but she never actually got to the point where she could stop and relax.

She wanted the holidays to feel different — not perfect, not totally to-do list-free — but slower, easier, and dare I say…enjoyable. 

How To Fit Self-Care Into Your Life During The Holidays

When Maria and I started working together, we talked about the fact that she needed to slow down and add herself to the list — not at the bottom, not as an afterthought, but as a priority. Because here’s the truth so many of us forget: self-care isn’t selfish, it’s a necessity. Your boss, your spouse, your kids — they all do self-care tasks to meet their needs. It’s okay for you to make yourself a priority, too. 

When most people hear “self-care,” they think of the Instagram version: face masks, luxurious bubble baths, maybe a massage if you’re really treating yourself. Those can absolutely be part of it, but real self-care goes much deeper. It’s not just about hygiene routines, your morning cup of coffee, or brushing your teeth before bed. 

Real self-care is about grounding yourself in practices that actually fill your cup, not just give you a five-minute break from the chaos. In the therapy world, there are seven different types of self-care that we teach our clients. Taking care of yourself isn’t one-size-fits-all. What grounds you might look completely different from what grounds someone else, and that’s not only okay, but it is expected!

To get Maria started on her self-care journey and in recovery from Holiday Burnout, we focused on the four most common types of self-care. 

SIDE NOTE: If you got a visceral reaction from reading “self-care,” I need you to pause here and read my blog “Why Self-Care Is Becoming a Dirty Word for Moms”. Trust me, it will change the way you treat yourself!

The 4 Types of Self-Care for Women That Help During The Holidays

The easiest way to bring self-care into your holiday season is to focus on the big four: mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual self-care. Maria wanted to focus on all of them, but you don’t have to. You can pick what feels doable. The goal isn’t to create a perfect routine. For Maria, the goal was to give her a few simple ways to come back to herself in the middle of an already packed season.

1. Mental Self-Care 

Mental self-care is all about giving your brain some energy and direction. Think of it as a shift in outlook, a way to feel less scattered.  Do you feel like you're spinning in ten directions at once?  Then try taking a moment to check in with yourself and notice what is draining you, what actually needs your attention, and what can wait. This simple 2-minute check-in can help transform your day. 

Mental self-care might also look like reading something purely for fun. Maria eventually realized she hadn't read a fiction book in over a year. She started keeping a novel on her nightstand and reading a few pages before bed. Some nights it was only five. But it gave her brain something to look forward to that wasn't about solving problems or managing schedules.

2. Emotional Self-Care

Emotional self-care is about honoring your emotions and your connection with people. It's the things that help you create balance in your life.

For Maria, this started small. She started sending voice notes to her best friend on her drive home. It was fun to catch up more frequently and less of a time commitment than a phone call or even typing a text.

3. Physical Self-Care

Physical self-care is about taking care of your body, but not in the way you might think. Most people assume it has to be either yoga or some intense, calorie-burning workout. But can we just meet in the middle?! Physical self-care can be as easy as going to bed thirty minutes earlier, allowing yourself to take a nap before making dinner, or moving your body in ways that feel good rather than punishing.

Maria let herself take bubble baths without guilt (yes, those do count when they're intentional). She also started doing spontaneous dance breaks in her kitchen when she felt the stress building. Her kids thought it was funny. It helped her release tension in a way that felt natural and didn't require her to add another task to her schedule.

4. Spiritual Self-Care

Spiritual self-care is about connecting to your inner wisdom, values, and beliefs. And before you worry that this is going to get religious on you, let me be clear: it's not about religion unless that's meaningful to you. For some women, spiritual self-care does look like prayer or Bible study. For others, it’s simply unplugging from the noise. 

For Maria, unplugging was huge! She was on her phone all the time, between supervising a team at work and having kids old enough to text from the next room, her phone never stopped buzzing. As a supervisor at work, she was getting calls even on her days off. Setting boundaries around technology helped her reconnect with herself and what mattered most. It gave her permission to just be present without constantly responding to everyone else's needs.

So, What Happened To Maria?

I did a follow-up session with Maria after the holidays to see how things went. And no, by working with these four types of self-care, Maria didn’t magically clear her calendar. But she did start to feel like she could breathe again. She told me it was the best holiday season she’s had in years. She felt present, able to relax, and she still got the important things on her to-do list done and let others go to her spouse (or the wind). I was also happy to hear that instead of dropping these practices once the holidays were over, she kept them going. Now, whenever that “I can’t catch my breath” feeling starts to creep in, she goes back to these same tools to create a little bit of pause in the moment.

That's what I want for you, too.

You’re Allowed To Take Small Wins This Year To Avoid Holiday Burnout

If you feel like you’re drowning in your life, you’re not alone. And sometimes, therapy or a personal guru isn’t an option because of busy schedules or financial needs. But that doesn’t mean that self-care should be out of your reach. For years, my clients would tell me that self-care felt overwhelming and hard to fit into real life and busy schedules. And honestly? What they saw on social media wasn't realistic or calming. It was just one more thing making them feel like they weren't doing enough. (And as moms, we don’t need more help doing that!)  They wanted ideas and a practical place to start.

So I made them one. And you can have it too.

The Self-Care Workbook for Women is part guide, part journal, part tracker, and full love-letter to all of the women out there feeling overwhelmed and wanting a positive change. It comes with step-by-step instructions on how to start incorporating self-care, specific reflections to help you on your journey, and tons of ideas for self-care activities that can fit into busy schedules. And one of the best parts? It’s a judgment-free workbook. You’re allowed to take what works for you, and skip what doesn’t.  

Give Yourself Permission to Slow Down

Here's what I know: you're not going to suddenly have more time. The holidays aren't going to get less busy. Your family isn't going to stop needing you, and your work deadlines aren't going to disappear.

But you can change how you move through it all. You can add yourself to the list. You can practice grounding yourself in ways that actually work for your real life, not just the Instagram version of self-care. And if you need deeper support, if you're noticing that no amount of self-care practices can quite reach the patterns keeping you stuck, EMDR intensives can help you work through what's underneath it all. But for most of us, starting with the basics of taking care of ourselves is exactly what we need.

The Self-Care Workbook for Women is available on Amazon, and it's designed to meet you exactly where you are. Busy, overwhelmed, barely keeping your head above water, and desperately wanting to enjoy the holidays instead of just surviving them.

You deserve to breathe again, and it starts with making space for yourself, even when it feels impossible. 

Remember, you’ve got this.  And I’ve got you.