6 Strategies for Reclaiming Joy This Holiday Season

Is the holiday season, especially while navigating a fertility journey, stealing your joy?
Learn practical, actionable strategies to manage stress, set boundaries, and cultivate moments of joy, even when faced with expectations and triggers.

Discussion Points: 

• How to define joy and cultivate more of it

• Tips for preventing triggers and also dealing with them in real time

• Suggestions on setting boundaries

• Understanding gratitude and how it relates to stress management

My goal is for you to use these tools to help you find more moments of beauty, connection, and joy this holiday season.

As always, please keep in mind that this is my perspective and nothing in this podcast is medical advice.

If you found this conversation valuable, book a consult call with me using this link:

https://calendly.com/loveandsciencefertility/discovery-call

Also, be sure to check out our website: loveandsciencefertility.com

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Please don’t let infertility have the final word. We are here to take the burden from you so that you can achieve your goal of building your family with confidence and compassion. I’m rooting for you always.

In Gratitude,

Dr. Erica Bove

Transcript:

Hello, my loves, and welcome back to the Love and Science podcast.

I am releasing this episode on Thanksgiving Day.

And so if you're listening on Thanksgiving, I want to wish you a very happy Thanksgiving.

It is actually my favorite holiday.

But I know that sometimes there can be a lot of expectations on holidays.

There can be a lot of strange feelings that creep up, and especially as it retains the fertility journey, there can just be a lot of sadness actually. And so what I wanted to do was sort of summarize the webinar I recently did on taking back our joy this holiday season, but also being mindful that if you're in the thick of the holidays now, what can you do to reground yourself if it's already been difficult? So those are my intentions.

So let's talk a little bit about joy, right? And it's so interesting because last year I released a podcast as I was also giving webinars about joy and the holidays. And it's just so amazing to me how much I have evolved in a year, how much love and science has evolved in a year.

We have so many more stories. We have so much more lived collective wisdom. And so as I went to listen to the podcast and sit down to write my webinar. I was like, oh my goodness, we almost need to start over because yes, we're going to keep so much of what was good last year, but we have so much to add in terms of not just keeping out the bad or the things that we don't want to be a part of our holidays, but also how can we cultivate what is good and nourishing in life giving this this holiday season.

So what I will say is let's focus on practical strategies to get through holiday functions.

Let's talk about how to anticipate and prevent the triggers and also deal with them in real time.

Let's talk about stress reduction and boundaries, but let's also talk about how to cultivate joy, which I think is definitely a skill.

It's just like surgery or intubating somebody or anything else.

Like we could actually learn how to cultivate joy.

And when we do, our lives will never be the same.

So first of all, let's talk about what is joy.

My dear friend, Dr. Chrissy Ott, defines joy as the convergence of meaning, alignment, and delight.

So what does that really mean?

And I just love this definition.

So meaning is when our lives and our work feel purposeful, right?

And I think on paper, everyone says, oh, you're a physician that must be so meaningful.

Some days more meaningful than others, right?

we know that there's a lot of drains on the system, especially if we're dealing with a fertility journey and we just feel like we're burning the candle at both ends, sometimes it can be actually hard to find meaning in our days.

And so I wanted to mention that, meaning is also when what we do matters to others.

And so that could be like remembering a friend on their birthday or calling somebody out of the blue to connect, like maybe it's a random act of kindness.

I think we underestimate our capacity to make the lives of somebody else better.

Bonus points if they let us know that, but I think we are all searching for meaning in this life.

And so I wanted to bring up that that is one of the three crucial elements of joy.

The next is alignment.

This is a word that keeps coming up in my life in so many different ways.

So I know it's a theme for me.

And what alignment really is, is it's being in line with our values, our strengths, and our truest self.

I'm gonna read that again.

Alignment is being in line with our values, our strengths, and our truest self.

So if we are out of alignment, it's like kind of like when we're in yoga and we fall out of a pose, we know what that feels like, right?

But we also know, and I want to think about you and your body, like listening to this podcast right now, what does it feel like to you when you're aligned with your values?

For me, it feels like I have more energy, I have more gas in the tank, I know that I'm living authentically and that feels really good to me.

When I'm out of alignment, I tend to be exhausted.

I tend to feel like I'm forcing things.

It just doesn't feel good.

It feels like I'm living somebody else's life, right?

And so let's remember that alignment is part of joy.

And the last part of joy, as defined by Dr. Chrissy Ott, is delight.

And she defines that as the spark, the playfulness, the pleasure, the yes, I feel alive.

And I think I've been a student of delight over the last couple of years, there was a whole Glenn and Doyle episode dedicated to it.

And I think it is so nice when we're delighted, right?

I also think that we can create opportunities for more delight and we'll talk about that more.

So again, joy is the convergence of meaning, alignment and delight.

How is this relevant to the fertility journey, right?

So I think it's really important that we figure out what is giving us meaning at this moment in time and do more of those things, right?

I also think it's important that we create conditions that support our alignment.

So with our bodies, with our values, with our life season and our choices, maybe it's that we scale back and that we go pretty in verbat.

Maybe it's that we tune out family members who are not supportive of our journeys.

Whatever it is, we need to look at what happens and the conditions when we feel most aligned and make choices that are basically values driven and life gets a lot better.

Also, encouraging delight.

So these micro moments of noticing, right?

Getting into our bodies, having mindful self-compassion, feeling our feelings in our bodies and let them go, letting them go instead of letting them stew and steal so much energy and also creativity.

So how can we have a life that is rich with meaning, alignment and delight while we're on the fertility journey?

I think it's worthy of discussion and I think it's possible.

So, you know, on the webinar I did recently, I asked the listeners to do an exercise.

So to take two minutes and actually write down what brings you joy and what steals your joy.

And if you're listening and you're driving, please do not do this.

But if you were able to just pause this podcast right now and just jot down.

And I said, try to do at least five things in each category, right?

So what brings you joy and what steals your joy?

And also as another question to think about, what are you dreading the most this holiday season?

All right, so I think we would be remiss if we didn't talk about triggers as we're thinking about this whole process of getting together with family and holiday cars and all those other things.

I have learned the most about triggers from one of my mentors, Dr. Kuvitha San.

And really what a trigger is, is it's something that activates our nervous system and causes dysregulation, right?

And so the interesting thing about triggers is if we have a growth mindset, we can actually look at where we're triggered and understand where we need healing the most.

And I'll say that again.

When we look at what triggers us the most, we can actually look at those times and see where we need healing the most.

For instance, if somebody says something to me that is not even in my field that I'm sensitive about, right?

So if somebody says like, you know, Erica, you're really a terrible friend, like I am not really going to listen to that.

It's not gonna hurt me unless it comes from someone who's like actually a dear friend who's giving me feedback that I heard them or that I'm a bad friend.

Like obviously that would hurt, But in terms of a trigger, like if some random person just says to me, you know, "Eric, you're about a friend," like, I'm not going to even take that seriously because I know that's not true.

Right?

But if somebody says something to me like, um, you know, Erica, like, I really love you dearly, but sometimes it's really hard to spend time with you because you keep yourself so busy.

Right?

Like if somebody said to me, like, that is something I'm working on in my life.

somebody said something like that to me, that actually might activate me, that might hurt because there's a part of, there's something in there that I'm sensitive about, right? The example that Dr.

Capita-Sun gives is like, if somebody calls her a giraffe, she's just going to let that roll right off her back because she knows she's not a giraffe, right? But if somebody says something that, you know, maybe she's self-conscious about or she has some self-doubt about or she's sensitive about, that's really where it's going to hurt. So for instance, if somebody sort of asks the question, you know, when, when are you guys going to have a little one? So, you know, are you going to have a little one soon, something like that at a holiday function? If that's an area where you're hurting, that's likely likely to activate you and to hurt you. So I think, you know, the whole thing about triggers like 80% is prevention and trying to understand what our triggers are and why we have the triggers we do, right? And creating conditions that make it easier for us not to get triggered. So for instance, if we know that our pregnant cousin is going to come to some family gathering, maybe we figure out a way that we don't need to go to that gathering, or maybe we figure out a way that we understand when they're going to be there and we go to different time. Like, whatever it is, like, we can actually have some agency in these times, you know, when we might be triggered. Maybe it's a holiday card. We talk about this a lot, holiday season. Maybe there is lots of baby announcements or people who are pregnant and pictures of their bumps as they're sharing news about their family and that can be very activating. So sometimes people just delegate somebody else to do that job, which I think is very fair and can really prevent a lot of heartache.

So what are we really trying to do when we're talking about triggers? We're really trying to find a place of calm and grounding, right? We're trying to calm the nervous system after we get triggered. And so for me personally, and again, I learned this from Kavitha, I in the moment, if I start to get triggered, I like basically take my what I call emotional temperature. And if my emotional temperature is over a five out of 10, I know that nothing good is going to happen in that moment, right? There's no way that my frontal lobe is going to be able to process, to speak in a kind way.

And so that's when I have my options, right?

I usually remove myself from the situation.

I think about what I need to do.

Maybe I splash cold water on my face.

Maybe I go outside in the cold air.

Maybe I take a walk around the block, whatever it is.

I know that if I'm above a five out of 10, then I just need to re-regulate before I can do anything else.

So sometimes it's quick and I can come back into the situation. Other times I need more time, especially if it's somebody I really care about and they kind of poke that deep wound. But I think that just understanding that if it's under a five out of 10, then it's possible I can stay in the conversation.

But if it's more than that, I have to actively re-regulate before I can move forward. So just think about that, right? Just in the moment. And sometimes my family knows this know about me sometimes I even say, Hey guys, I'm starting to get overwhelmed.

Uh, I'm just going to take a little break.

I'll be back.

And, you know, although that may seem like a strange thing to say, maybe the first time you say it or like, Oh, that was weird.

Well, it's very powerful.

And I'm like, I would rather be like a little bit weird, but regulated than, you know, like fly off the handle and say something I might regret later.

So that is a tool that you can use to say like, Hey, you know, I'm, I'm not feeling so well or I'm starting to get overwhelmed, like I just need a moment. I'll be back soon.

And then when you feel like you can come back to the conversation.

So we've talked about prevention and we've talked about during the trigger. Let's talk about post trigger. I love if we can for us to try to get into a space of curiosity when it comes to post trigger. And if you've listened to my content, you know that I'm all about responding and not reacting, right? So what can we do in the post trigger situation to create that pause so that we can understand because the interesting thing is that the post trigger becomes the pre-trigger prevention. So if you think about it, you know, you've had the trigger, you're integrating it, you're trying to figure out sort of what that meant, what you can do differently next time, how you can heal in the meantime. When we are curious after the trigger, we can then have a of what that trigger was and why it was so painful.

So that moving forward, we may be able to handle that same trigger differently.

And the interesting thing is the same triggers keep happening over and over again.

We may not be able to handle it like quote unquote perfectly, although there's no such thing.

The next time, but maybe like two or three times down the road, we find that we're doing a little better.

We're getting less dysregulated.

We have more tools in the toolkit.

And that is growth.

Growth is nonlinear.

The whole thing about growth is seeing changes over time.

And as long as we're patient with ourselves, as long as we have self-compassion, we really will start to see ourselves change in this way.

And I think we need to celebrate that growth, right?

When we notice that growth, we call it out.

And that's one of the things I love to do at Love and Science is to say like, okay, you handled that really well.

Think about six months ago and how you might have handled it then.

And we can use time as kind of our goalpost to be like, "Oh yeah, I handled that situation so much better than I would have six months ago." Okay, so that's triggers, which I mean, obviously holiday season is a minefield of triggers.

And so I think we just need to acknowledge that.

Also preempting conversations, like, you know, one of the things I wanted to mention is that, you know, we all know the players in our family, right?

We know that a certain aunt is gonna act a certain way, usually speaking, they're usually gonna ask similar questions, maybe it's a mother-in-law, Like we know who the hardest people in our family are.

And so I think as long as we just expect them to be exactly who they are and nobody different, at least in my world that creates a lot of safe space, it prevents a lot of suffering.

So just give yourself some grace, know that people are gonna people, right?

Aunt Bertha is gonna Aunt Bertha.

And so when you sort of know that, I think it makes a little bit better.

Although you can try and reach out ahead of time, that's one of my favorite things to do is like, If something is a sore spot for me, either the day of the party or maybe the day before, just reaching out to that person and being like, hey, on so and so, just wanted to share that this is a sore spot for me right now.

And so if at all possible, can we please not talk about XYZ?

And obviously it's up to them if they honor that boundary for you.

But if they don't, then you can either redirect the conversation and just pretend they never asked you that question in the first place, or you can also think about just saying, hey, as we discussed, I'd really rather talk about other things and move on forward.

Okay, let's talk about stress management because if you are a busy female physician, if you're a working professional, a lot of times things get busier during the holidays and not less busy.

And so especially if you're a person who is maybe picking up shifts for other people who have plans or doing other things, I think it can be really tricky thinking about just how to navigate this time.

So the first thing is to give yourself grace into have reasonable expectations for yourself and to understand that like whatever we're feeling is going to be amplified during the season.

And so pace of grace, honor the stage that you're in and just try if you can to accept things as they are.

And sort of, if you catch yourself saying like it should be different, just know, Well, that is that may that may feel true to us, but if we really do think it should be different, that's going to create a lot of suffering because then we're really resisting the reality of what we have. Okay, so, you know, if we go to the root of Thanksgiving, it really is a holiday about gratitude. And this is not me being pie in the sky. This is not me being Pollyanna silver lining.

I think that if you think about sort of authentic gratitude and thinking about, okay, what is one thing that I'm grateful for today? Something that without which my life would be much different, something which I know not everybody else in this life has. Maybe it's a wonderful husband. Maybe it's loving parents who support you no matter what. Maybe it's a delicious meal that is full of family traditions. Maybe it's an able body who is able to go running in the woods whatever it is, even if you can think of one thing that you're authentically great before, maybe you have embryos in the freezer that you didn't have this time last year, even if you haven't met your goal yet.

I love threes, so when I do my gratitude practice, I try and find three things, but honestly, sometimes it's even hard to find one thing.

And so if you can really find one thing you're grateful for today and savor it, like actually lean in and think about all the ways your life is so much better because of that thing, I do think that might add a boost to your day.

OK, so now let's talk about if you're already in the thick of it.

Maybe you're listening to this four days after Thanksgiving, or maybe you have a trip to Greece, like my very good friend and her family celebrated Thanksgiving a couple weeks ago.

All sorts of things can happen.

And so I wanted to offer six suggestions for how to let the season not take away all your joy.

Okay, so the first is, and it can be a little tricky if you're already in it, but decide today that this holiday season will not steal all of your joy.

And this is a decision.

You know, I have amazing coaches, Dr. Luna, I'll give her a shout out.

She is so big on making decisions ahead of time about how we're gonna handle certain situations.

And so by saying like, I'm not going to let this season take all my joy, it's not saying there won't be moments that totally suck.

There won't be moments that are really heartbreaking or triggering or scary or sad, but it's saying the overall tenor of my holiday season is not gonna be ruled by these things.

And so it's a decision.

This holiday season will not steal all of my joy.

If you can say that and repeat it over and over and over, I really do believe that you will be able to weather what comes a lot better.

Okay, so that's the first thing is that decision of your orientation during the season.

The second thing is give yourself permission to take a break.

We know that sometimes these holiday functions can last days on end.

We know that sometimes we're in the middle of a long holiday party, and if you're an introvert like me, sometimes that can be kind of exhausting and a little overstimulating.

So I want to give you full permission to take a break, whatever that means, whether it's going for a walk in the middle of a party, whether it's maybe ending the evening kind of early because you're tired you need to rest, maybe it's deciding that maybe you're not the one who's going to do all the cooking and that you delegate or that maybe you go on dish duty because for some people that's not as stressful.

Whatever it is, you deserve a break when you feel you need a break.

Even if it's a micro moment of going to the bathroom and taking two minutes to breathe deeply and to re-regulate, give yourself permission to take breaks.

You can schedule breaks ahead of time.

If you can preempt when you think you might need them, which I am always a fan of that, right?

Sort of thinking forward, but also in real time, if you're feeling off kilter, if you're feeling like you're starting to get triggered, if you feel like all of a sudden you have some feelings that you didn't expect, just remove yourself from the situation.

It's okay.

Like the whole situation is going to go on without you temporarily, right?

And then when you feel like you really authentically want to reengage, then do so.

My third suggestion, and I sort of alluded to this before, is to remember that people usually don't change and expect them to be exactly themselves.

So what I mean by that is if you can sort of imagine that person in your life who's very difficult and say, "They're probably going to be that way.

I cannot change them.

I can change myself.

I can limit my exposure to them, but they're probably going to be exactly who they are." And I can remember that, like that's when I hear the insensitive comments and I'm just like, "Oh, that's just them.

That's they are limited, they're incapable.

That is all they have to offer." And that's really sad for them, but I'm not going to let it get to me.

So it's a difference, right?

I think sometimes we can take these comments so personally and it can really hurt.

But if we remember that like this is their essential nature and that maybe they had a hard childhood, maybe they never got the skills of self-awareness or sensitivity or compassion.

Maybe they're super critical with themselves and so therefore they're super critical with everybody else in their world. Maybe it's rooted in insecurity. I'm not giving them a pass, but I'm saying is how we experience them is way different if we remember that we are who they are and they are who they are and we expect them to be exactly themselves. If they have a sensitive comment or if they sort of rise to the occasion, more power to them. That's fantastic. But I don't think we can expect that upfront. Otherwise, it's a recipe for disappointment. It's a recipe for all the different feelings. And so keeping the expectations for those people, kind of on the low side, I think that's really helpful in these situations.

Okay. My fourth suggestion is to plan something that you can look forward to. So maybe you're visit you live in the country and you're visiting your family in the city and you want to go see the ballet or maybe you're a sports junkie and your favorite team is playing you know a sport when you're visiting your family like we do not need to spend time with our families 24/7. I actually enjoy my own family you know much more when I do so in doses. Again I'm an introvert the way I recharge is time by myself for a way so what I would say is you know think about what can you do in the space where they are and plan something that you're looking forward to. Preferentially something with tickets, so where you actually need to go leave and do something, or maybe it's a restaurant that you've been looking forward to. Whatever it is, just try and look forward to something because I don't think that holidays should be an obligation. I think that there should be some quality time with family if that's possible. And I also think especially if you're taking vacation time to be off to travel to be in a different place, all those things like take it back, own your time, and do something that brings you joy.

All right.

Number five, find some time to write about your experiences.

This is a really important one.

So many of us keep ourselves so busy that we don't ever take time to reflect.

I bring my journal with me everywhere I go.

doesn't mean I always write in it, but I think when I bring it with me, I'm much more likely to be disciplined to write in it.

Or maybe it's even just like, sometimes I just write like, "How am I feeling right now?" And I write like five or 10 feelings, and that's an interesting exercise in and of itself.

But I think to acknowledge that we all do better as humans when we integrate our experiences, when we reflect, when we think about what went well, when we think about what we wish went differently, when we can be honest, you know, it's so hard to be honest sometimes.

And for me, like a lot of the times that I can be most honest is when I'm writing in my journal and I'm just like basically reflecting.

I will say there have been times in my life when I was much more private with my journal.

Like I don't expect that anybody is gonna read my journal but like there are times, you know, like for instance, when I was going through my divorce, when I was very, very protective of what I wrote, Another hack that I have, I do prefer pen to paper, but I actually do have a Google folder.

It actually, it's in my email.

So I just email myself and I keep that in a very covert folder of my email, of my journal entries.

And so like say I'm like on a train or say I am, you know, maybe at my parents house and I haven't remembered my journal that time, like I can just quickly email myself a journal entry and download my feelings in real time.

And then I've processed, then I reflected, I've gotten it out, and it's much better than not having that time for integration.

So like I said, my preference is usually pen to paper.

With an actual physical journal, I love journals.

I think some of them are so pretty.

My journal right now is blue with gold sort of accents, and it has jellyfish and starfish, because I got it in South Carolina, which is one of my favorite places.

But I just-- I love pretty journals.

It's one of my things.

of nice paper.

That brings me joy, right?

Taking back my joy is having a pretty journal.

But what I would say is you don't have to even have anything.

You can have a blank piece of paper.

You can email yourself something that you want to just get out and maybe recall later.

You can even put, if you're going through divorce and you're listening to this, as I know many people are, you can even put in the beginning of it for my attorney only, and then it's actually protected from the law.

Fun fact, I learned during my divorce.

So you can get creative, but the point is to find time to write about your experience because I think, like I said, we all do better when we have that time to integrate.

And the sixth thing is to tap into gratitude.

And I know it sounds so hokey and cheesy and I don't mean it in that way at all.

But I think if we can actually go back to thinking about we have food, we have heat, we have friends, we have hopefully family, we have hopefully a team of fertility specialists who cares and maybe a coach community. Like there's so many things that I think we can take for granted. And sometimes it's even just basic needs. Like I will tell you every single day I'm grateful for coffee. That is like not a day goes by that I'm not grateful for coffee. And I savor that gratitude. But maybe it's something like me, no, my friend and I, even the last week, our gratitude practice, like, it was very dreary. It's been a dreary November. And like when the sun comes out, like, that's a beautiful moment. And sometimes it can just pass us by. But the more we train our brain to be grateful things. The more it's like, oh my gosh, what a wonderful moment. It's been so gray. And all of a sudden we can see blue sky with some sun. Like that's amazing. Or maybe it's, you know, we come in from the cold and we feel the rush of heat in our home and we're like, wow, you know, I'm so grateful that I am not cold right now. Like I'm really grateful to have heat and a working furnace.

Maybe it's that like I saw this flower on the side of the road the other day, which I didn't expect to see because everything else looks so dead. But I saw this gorgeous flower that has somehow escape the weather. And so it doesn't always have to be the biggest things, but I think just like looking around, thinking about your senses, what can you see? What can you touch?

What can you feel? What can you smell? I adore the smell of Thanksgiving dinner. Like it's one of my favorite things. My mother does a fantastic job. Our family is going to all be pitching in more because she just had her knee replaced and I'm also grateful for that. So, you know, I think about it like sometimes it's really hard because we are really in our stories. We're really in the gap and not the game. We're really in what's not working. But if we can say, okay, fine, it's Thanksgiving, I'm going to like think about things that I'm truly authentically grateful for.

There's data that it improves our brain chemistry. There's data that we see more beautiful things.

And you know, just try it and see what happens. Even take your journal, combine five and six, you know, take your journal and just write like things I'm truly grateful for and just see what happens because you might surprise yourself and it just feels good inside the body when we do this.

So again, you know, we talked about sort of what is joy and how to cultivate more of it.

And we talked about how to sort of keep the walls up for the things that steal our joy, right? So we talked about triggers, we talked a little bit about boundaries, we talked about stress management.

And also, like, if you are in the thick of it this holiday season already and you're getting to this podcast after or during the holidays, we talked about six strategies to help you basically have more joy this holiday season.

So number one, decide that this will, this holiday season will not steal your joy and all of your joy.

Number two, give yourself permission to take breaks.

Number three, remember that people don't usually change and expect them to be exactly themselves.

Try not to take things personally.

Number four, plan something to look forward to.

Number five, find time to write about your experiences.

And six, tap into authentic gratitude.

So with that, you know how much I love you.

I really do hope this Thanksgiving season has some moments of beauty, some moments of connection, many moments of joy, and I'd love to hear about it.

So let me know how your holiday is going.

Let me know what strategies worked for you.

I'm all about actionable tools.

And like I said, you know how much I love you until the next time. Bye!