December 22, 2025 • 6 mins
Holidays are painful for people who are going through grief, loss, dysfunctional relationships, and painful memories among many other things. Listen to this video to get ideas on how to deal with holiday triggers.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
You're listening to an audio recordingby Change My Relationship, featuring
licensed marriage and family therapistand author Karla Downing.
These audios are designed to provide youwith practical solutions
based on biblical truthsfor all your relationships.
(00:21):
So I'm going to read to you
December 22nd from this book.
My book Change My Relationship (00:25):
365 Daily Devotions
for Christians in Difficult Relationships.
And I'm going to be reading
a new one called Holiday Triggers.
The wicked put up a bold front,but the upright give to their waves.
Proverbs 21:29
(00:48):
so we don't have to put up a bold front,
but we need to give thought to our ways,which that means think about what's going
on, what's what is going on in our life,what's going on in our hearts,
what's going on in our circumstances,
what's going to go on in our health,in our holidays?
Like we can prepare.
(01:10):
So forme, holidays were kind of bittersweet
in my childhoodand says we didn't get a Christmas tree
until Christmas Evewhen they went on sale.
Because my dad was always very thrifty.
He would always wait until that night whenthey were practically giving them away.
And he did that when he was, out of work,laid off in the 70s,
(01:30):
and also just even when he wasn't because
he was just really careful with money.
But we always had a lot of fundecorating the tree that night.
We had put up lots of decorations.
We put up the house.
We and our family opened giftson Christmas Eve so we would
decorate the tree, put the gifts under it,and then open them right away.
(01:53):
And there were always lots of giftsand lots and lots of presents.
On Christmas Eve, my,
Aunt Kay,
my my great aunt came overand her daughter, my,
I called hermy grandma Edith, and my Aunt Margaret,
and they came overand we had a great family dinner.
And my mom cooked a big dinner,
and they always made cakesand they made Swedish pastries.
(02:16):
Oh my gosh, I still remember them.
I loved them, they were so good.
And it was just a wonderful night.
We played games and just always had
big Christmases,but sometime between that night
and before the Christmas treewould be put away, things would get bad.
(02:37):
There would be a big fight.
My dad drank a lot,and there was a lot of bad fights
and a lot of, angerand often violence in the home.
So at some point there would be a notso good memory associated with Christmas.
And, I remember that for me later on that
(02:59):
it I oh,
I didn't always understandat first when I got married
and I had my Christmas treeand my Christmas and my little ones.
Why I always felt kind of tenseand stressed at Christmas,
even though I made cookiesand I put lots of gifts under the tree,
and we took family picturesand we got the whole family together,
(03:21):
there was always just something that feltjust actually not just Christmas,
but all holidays for me. Even Halloween.
I always felt, upset on Halloween
and with my kids,even though I made their costumes
and I didn't really understand whyuntil I realized, Halloween
was like a timewhen many times we would be out.
We had a huge neighborhoodwith hundreds of kids and home.
(03:46):
They just went trickor treating all the time and up to home
after home after home, and have a huge bagthe candy and came home.
But there were many Halloweens when my momwould pick us up trick or treating
before we got home,and our stuff would be thrown in the car
and we'd have to go to a motelbecause my dad was, you know,
in one of his, angry statesand we couldn't go home.
(04:08):
So these things kind of stick with you.
So says holiday triggers.
I'm going to keep reading holidays
and dysfunctional familiesaren't what we see on Christmas cards.
Yeah, for sure.
All kinds of things can happento make them painful.
Many of us dread the holidaysand wish they were over.
We may feel bad that we don't want to bewith our families.
(04:28):
We may grieve because the holidaysremind us of the family we don't have.
We may feel uneasy during the holidaysand not even understand why.
It helps to pinpoint our holiday triggersso we can prepare for them
when we know what makes us feel bad,we can deal with it
in a waythat doesn't bring us down so important.
(04:50):
When we know what makes us feel bad,
we deal with itand it doesn't have to derail us.
It doesn't have tocause us to be completely down.
No matter how you feel, you're not alone.
Many other people feel the same way.
Yes, always know that there's no right
way to be or right way, right thing to do.
(05:11):
It's okay to get through them inwhatever way you can,
says God, I know you understandwhy the holidays are painful for me.
Give me insight into why I am hurting
and what I can do to get through them.
All right, so I will
(05:33):
see you when I read you the next steps.
Thank you.
Thank you for listeningto Change My Relationship.
We hope you will subscribe to thesepodcasts and share them with your friends.
Karla would love to hear from you.
She welcomes ideas for a future podcast,as well as your feedback
on how the podcasts have helped your lifeand relationships.
(05:54):
You can email her at.
karla@changemyrelationship.com
For more informationon Change My Relationship and Karla
Downing's ministry, including her books,studies, devotionals, podcasts
and YouTube videosvisit changemyrelationship.com.
You're listening to an audio recordingby Change My Relationship, featuring
licensed marriage and family therapistand author Karla Downing.
These audios are designed to provide youwith practical solutions
based on biblical truthsfor all your relationships.
(00:21):
So I'm going to read to you
December 22nd from this book.
My book Change My Relationship (00:25):
365 Daily Devotions
for Christians in Difficult Relationships.
And I'm going to be reading
a new one called Holiday Triggers.
The wicked put up a bold front,but the upright give to their waves.
Proverbs 21:29
(00:48):
so we don't have to put up a bold front,
but we need to give thought to our ways,which that means think about what's going
on, what's what is going on in our life,what's going on in our hearts,
what's going on in our circumstances,
what's going to go on in our health,in our holidays?
Like we can prepare.
(01:10):
So forme, holidays were kind of bittersweet
in my childhoodand says we didn't get a Christmas tree
until Christmas Evewhen they went on sale.
Because my dad was always very thrifty.
He would always wait until that night whenthey were practically giving them away.
And he did that when he was, out of work,laid off in the 70s,
(01:30):
and also just even when he wasn't because
he was just really careful with money.
But we always had a lot of fundecorating the tree that night.
We had put up lots of decorations.
We put up the house.
We and our family opened giftson Christmas Eve so we would
decorate the tree, put the gifts under it,and then open them right away.
(01:53):
And there were always lots of giftsand lots and lots of presents.
On Christmas Eve, my,
Aunt Kay,
my my great aunt came overand her daughter, my,
I called hermy grandma Edith, and my Aunt Margaret,
and they came overand we had a great family dinner.
And my mom cooked a big dinner,
and they always made cakesand they made Swedish pastries.
(02:16):
Oh my gosh, I still remember them.
I loved them, they were so good.
And it was just a wonderful night.
We played games and just always had
big Christmases,but sometime between that night
and before the Christmas treewould be put away, things would get bad.
(02:37):
There would be a big fight.
My dad drank a lot,and there was a lot of bad fights
and a lot of, angerand often violence in the home.
So at some point there would be a notso good memory associated with Christmas.
And, I remember that for me later on that
(02:59):
it I oh,
I didn't always understandat first when I got married
and I had my Christmas treeand my Christmas and my little ones.
Why I always felt kind of tenseand stressed at Christmas,
even though I made cookiesand I put lots of gifts under the tree,
and we took family picturesand we got the whole family together,
(03:21):
there was always just something that feltjust actually not just Christmas,
but all holidays for me. Even Halloween.
I always felt, upset on Halloween
and with my kids,even though I made their costumes
and I didn't really understand whyuntil I realized, Halloween
was like a timewhen many times we would be out.
We had a huge neighborhoodwith hundreds of kids and home.
(03:46):
They just went trickor treating all the time and up to home
after home after home, and have a huge bagthe candy and came home.
But there were many Halloweens when my momwould pick us up trick or treating
before we got home,and our stuff would be thrown in the car
and we'd have to go to a motelbecause my dad was, you know,
in one of his, angry statesand we couldn't go home.
(04:08):
So these things kind of stick with you.
So says holiday triggers.
I'm going to keep reading holidays
and dysfunctional familiesaren't what we see on Christmas cards.
Yeah, for sure.
All kinds of things can happento make them painful.
Many of us dread the holidaysand wish they were over.
We may feel bad that we don't want to bewith our families.
(04:28):
We may grieve because the holidaysremind us of the family we don't have.
We may feel uneasy during the holidaysand not even understand why.
It helps to pinpoint our holiday triggersso we can prepare for them
when we know what makes us feel bad,we can deal with it
in a waythat doesn't bring us down so important.
(04:50):
When we know what makes us feel bad,
we deal with itand it doesn't have to derail us.
It doesn't have tocause us to be completely down.
No matter how you feel, you're not alone.
Many other people feel the same way.
Yes, always know that there's no right
way to be or right way, right thing to do.
(05:11):
It's okay to get through them inwhatever way you can,
says God, I know you understandwhy the holidays are painful for me.
Give me insight into why I am hurting
and what I can do to get through them.
All right, so I will
(05:33):
see you when I read you the next steps.
Thank you.
Thank you for listeningto Change My Relationship.
We hope you will subscribe to thesepodcasts and share them with your friends.
Karla would love to hear from you.
She welcomes ideas for a future podcast,as well as your feedback
on how the podcasts have helped your lifeand relationships.
(05:54):
You can email her at.
karla@changemyrelationship.com
For more informationon Change My Relationship and Karla
Downing's ministry, including her books,studies, devotionals, podcasts
and YouTube videosvisit changemyrelationship.com.
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