About the author
Efi Pyladaki-Feinstein, MS, LMFT, BCBA, is a licensed marriage and family therapist in California and a board-certified behavior analyst with over 16 years of clinical experience. She is trained in EMDR and provides EMDR therapy and EMDR intensives for adults and parents, alongside her work with neurodivergent teens, parents of struggling teens, and women dealing with postpartum anxiety, burnout, and life transitions. She sees clients in person in Westlake Village and by telehealth across California.It is 9:40 at night. The kids are finally down. You have a gift list open on your phone, a group text about who is hosting, a school email about the winter concert, and a tightness in your chest that has been there since Halloween. You looked around at the other moms at pickup, and every one of them seemed fine. So you typed Why the holidays make my anxiety worse as a mom, because you want to know if something is wrong with you.
Nothing is wrong with you. I am going to walk you through what actually happens to a mom’s nervous system between November and January, why it hits you harder than the people around you, and what helps while the season is still in front of you instead of behind you.
This article is educational and cannot diagnose you or replace care from your own provider. If you are in crisis, call or text 988 for the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
Key takeaways
The holidays raise anxiety in moms because the planning, the emotional management, and the routines that normally hold you up all land on you at the same time. You are not imagining that you carry more of it than your partner. The fix is not doing the holidays better. It is lowering the demand on you, protecting a few routines, and letting someone else carry part of the weight, including me, if you want.
Why does my anxiety get worse during the holidays?
Your anxiety gets worse during the holidays because the season adds a second full-time job on top of the one you already have, while taking away the sleep, structure, and quiet that usually keep your nervous system regulated. More demands plus fewer resources is the exact formula for anxiety, and the holidays deliver both for eight straight weeks.
You are not the only one feeling it. In the American Psychiatric Association’s 2025 holiday poll, 41 percent of adults said they expected more holiday stress than the year before, with grief and the cost of gifts among the concerns cited. An earlier APA poll found parents were much more likely than non-parents to expect more stress, 39 percent compared to 27 percent.
Here is what that looks like in your actual week. Bedtime slides because of parties and late relatives. Meals change. School schedules change. You are sleeping less and eating differently, and your body reads that as a threat before your brain has a chance to argue. Then the season asks you to be warm, patient, and grateful on top of it. The gap between how you feel and how you think you are supposed to feel is where the anxiety lives.
Why do moms feel the holiday stress more than everyone else?
Moms feel holiday stress more because most of the holiday work is invisible, and it lands on the mother. Someone has to remember the teacher gifts, the dietary needs of the in-laws, the matching pajamas, who is not speaking to whom, and whether the kids will be okay at the big dinner. That someone is usually you.
Researchers at Arizona State University call this invisible household labor, and their study in the journal Sex Roles found that feeling solely responsible for managing the family, especially the children’s well-being, predicted feelings of emptiness and overwhelm in mothers. The holidays multiply that load. Every tradition is one more thing to track, and the tracking never shows up on anyone’s list but yours.
Women tell me this version every December. “I track every appointment, every mood, every sign. My husband just doesn’t.” “I am the only one who notices when things are wrong.” Your partner may be a wonderful person and still not see the list in your head because it's only in your head. You do not feel overwhelmed because you are bad at the holidays. You feel overwhelmed because you are running them alone and calling it normal.
Is it normal to dread the holidays as a mom?
It is normal to dread the holidays as a mom, and dreading them doesn't mean you don't love your family or your traditions. Dread is what anticipation feels like when you already know the season will cost you more than it gives you, and when you have no memory of a December where you got to rest.
Notice the shame that comes with the dread. You feel anxious about Thanksgiving, then guilty for feeling anxious, then like a bad mom for being guilty instead of grateful. By the time you sit down at the table, you have been through three layers of feeling and nobody at the table knows about any of it. I hear “I’m holding it together for everyone else, but I’m falling apart” more in the last six weeks of the year than any other time.
This is where your own history can surface too. If you grew up in a tense home, or learned that a good mother gives everything and asks for nothing, your body may be bracing for something that happened twenty years ago. Watching your own kids at the table can bring that up without warning. If that is what is underneath your dread, I want to know about it, because we can work with it.
Why do I get so irritable with my kids during the holidays?
You get irritable with your kids during the holidays because irritability is what anxiety looks like when there is no room left to feel it. Your capacity is a real, limited thing. When the season fills it with planning, hosting, and managing everyone’s moods, a spilled juice or a fight over a tablet is the last straw, and it comes out as snapping.
As a behavior analyst and therapist, I look at this the way I look at any behavior. What came before it, and what is it doing for you? Usually, the yelling comes after a long stretch of holding it in, and it releases pressure for about four seconds before the guilt arrives. If you have ADHD, which is true for many of the moms I work with, the collapse of routine hits even harder, because the structure that was helping you function is gone and nobody told your brain. If you are in perimenopause, your sleep and your stress tolerance may already be thinner than they were two years ago.
Your kids are also running on less sleep, more sugar, and no schedule. Everyone’s capacity is low at the same time. Nobody in your house is being bad. Everyone is dysregulated, and you're expected to fix it. If your teen falls apart after a school day, the holidays are that same crash stretched across two weeks of break. Read my guide on why teens break down after school and how to respond.
How do I manage holiday anxiety as a mom?
You manage holiday anxiety as a mom by lowering the demand instead of raising your effort. Pick the two or three traditions that actually matter to you, protect bedtime and one quiet routine for yourself, decide in advance how long you will stay at gatherings, and hand real tasks to your partner and your older kids instead of absorbing it all.
Let’s focus on what we can control. You cannot control your mother-in-law, the weather, or how your sister talks to you at dinner. You can control how many events you say yes to. You can decide that the cookies come from a store this year and that the holiday card is a text. When I build a plan with a family, we start with one small change in the daily routine, not twelve, because one change that works builds the confidence to make the next one. The same rule applies to your December.
Say it out loud to your partner, and say it with a specific task attached. “I need you to own the gifts for your side of the family. Buying, wrapping, and shipping.” “I need one night this week where I am not the one doing bedtime.” Vague asks get vague help. Specific asks get done. If that conversation keeps going sideways, it is often a sign you could use a third person in the room, and I do that work with couples and partners as well.
Then watch your own body. When you feel the tightness start, name it. “I am getting anxious right now because there are too many things in my head.” Naming it will not make it disappear. It will give you two seconds to choose a response instead of a reaction. This is hard. It really is. And it is still something you can get better at.
When is holiday anxiety a sign I need more support?
Holiday anxiety is a sign you need more support when it does not lift after the season ends, when it interferes with sleep, work, or your relationships, when you are irritable or crying most days, or when you realize you have been quietly bracing for the holidays for years and nobody knows. If any of that sounds like you, it is time to talk to someone.
Many women come to me in January for the first time because December finally made the pattern impossible to ignore. Some do individual therapy, where we work on the anxiety itself, the beliefs you carry about what a good mom has to do, and whatever older material the season brought up. Some do parent support because the hardest part of their holidays is a child who struggles with every change in routine.
And some of them join a group. I run a women’s support and process group for women dealing with anxiety, life transitions, work and parenting stress, and the relationships they have with other people and with themselves. Learn more about group therapy. The moment another mom says the thing you have never said out loud is usually the moment something starts to change. You do not have to have it together to be there. Nobody does.
What I want you to remember before the first gathering
You are here, reading this, which tells me you are paying attention to yourself for maybe the first time in a while. That is a big deal. This season's goal isn't a perfect holiday. The goal is a holiday you are actually present for, with less of the load in your head and more of it shared.
If you want help getting there, tell me what is going on. Let’s figure it out. I offer a free 15- to 20-minute consultation so we can talk about what you are dealing with and whether working together makes sense. I see women in person in Westlake Village and by telehealth anywhere in California. Book your free consultation here.
Frequently asked questions
Why do I feel so overwhelmed during the holidays?
You feel overwhelmed during the holidays because the season adds planning, hosting, spending, and managing other people’s feelings on top of your normal life, while taking away the sleep and routine that usually keep you steady. When demands go up and resources go down at the same time, anxiety is the normal result. For moms the overwhelm is bigger because most of the holiday work is invisible and lands on you.
Is it normal for moms to be more stressed than dads during the holidays?
Yes. Mothers consistently report more holiday stress than fathers because they carry more of the invisible labor, which includes remembering, planning, buying, and keeping the peace. Research on invisible household labor links feeling solely responsible for the family’s wellbeing with feeling overwhelmed and empty. You are not more fragile than your partner. You are managing more.
How do I stop feeling guilty for not enjoying the holidays?
Start by separating the guilt from the facts. You can love your kids and your family and still find the season exhausting, and both of those are true at the same time. Guilt usually comes from a belief that a good mom has to feel joyful through all of it, and that belief is what we question, not your worth as a mother. Lowering the demand on yourself gives you a real chance to enjoy the parts that matter.
How can I set boundaries with family during the holidays?
Decide the boundary before the gathering, say it as a plain statement, and attach a specific plan to it. “We are coming at two and leaving by six” works better than “we will see how long the kids last.” Expect some pushback, because people who benefited from you having no limits will notice when you set one. Holding the boundary once is what makes the next one easier.
Can therapy help with holiday anxiety?
Therapy can help with holiday anxiety, especially when the anxiety comes back every year or sticks around after January. In sessions we look at what is actually driving it, which is usually the mental load, old family patterns, or beliefs about what you have to do to be a good mom. From there we build specific changes you can use while the season is still happening, and a women’s group can give you a place to say the hard parts out loud with other moms who understand.
What is the mental load of the holidays?
The mental load of the holidays is the thinking, tracking, and anticipating that happens before any visible task gets done. It includes knowing which relatives need what, which child will struggle at the big dinner, what has been bought and what has not, and how everyone is feeling. Most of this work is never seen, which is why a mom can be exhausted by December first without having done anything anyone else would call work.
How do I ask my husband for help during the holidays?
Ask for a specific task with a clear finish line rather than for help in general. “You own the gifts for your side of the family, buying, wrapping, and shipping” gets done, while “I need more help” usually does not. If the conversation keeps turning into an argument about who does more, that is a sign the two of you could use a third person in the room, and that is work I do with partners as well.
Do the holidays make ADHD worse in moms?
The holidays make ADHD symptoms worse for many moms because the structure that was helping them function disappears. School schedules, bedtimes, meal routines, and work rhythms all change at once, and the number of things to remember goes up at the same time. If you notice you are more forgetful, more irritable, and more scattered every December, the season is not revealing a character flaw. It is removing the support your brain was leaning on.
When should I see a therapist for holiday anxiety?
See a therapist when the anxiety does not lift after the season ends, when it affects your sleep, your work, or how you treat your kids and partner, or when you realize you have dreaded the holidays for years and never said so. You do not need to wait until it becomes a crisis. A free consultation is enough to find out whether talking to someone would help.