New Year's Eve When You're Healing from Complex Trauma (A Real Talk Pep Talk)

Episode 111

Listen, if the only thing you're excited about right now is that 2025 is finally over, I get it.

If you're scrolling Instagram watching everyone post their year in review like they just won an Oscar for Best Life Performance, and you're over here like "I survived, does that count?"—yeah, that counts.

If you're white-knuckling it through another family gathering or sitting alone wondering if you're supposed to feel something other than numb or exhausted or confused, you're not broken.

New Year's Eve when you're healing from complex trauma? It hits different.

Your Nervous System Doesn't Care About the Calendar

Here's the thing nobody tells you: our nervous systems don't do well with artificial timelines.

They don't care that it's December 31st. They don't care about vision boards or word-of-the-year energy or whatever productivity guru is yelling about discipline on your feed right now.

Your nervous system is still back there at eight years old trying to stay safe in a house that wasn't safe enough. And no amount of champagne at midnight is going to convince it that January 1st is some magical reset button.

For those of us who've spent years just trying to survive, New Year's can feel like one more thing we're failing at.

The All-or-Nothing Trap Gets Louder This Time of Year

You know what happens around New Year's? That all-or-nothing thinking your trauma brain loves so much kicks into overdrive.

Perfect or garbage. Transformation or failure. New year, new you, or same old mess.

So you make these massive resolutions. These huge promises to yourself. Because maybe this will be the year you finally get your shit together, right?

And then January 3rd rolls around and you're exhausted. The shame spiral starts. And you decide, once again, that you're the problem.

But you're not the problem. The timeline is.

Recovery doesn't happen on a calendar. Healing doesn't wait for January 1st to start, and it doesn't reset when you miss a goal or fall off track or have a hard week.

Your healing is happening on its own timeline, not the internet's.

What If You Didn't Have a Breakthrough This Year

If you're ending this year feeling kind of the same as when you started it, I need you to hear something:

Staying alive counts.

Showing up for yourself, even when it's messy and imperfect and you have no idea what you're doing—that counts.

Learning one new thing about how your trauma shows up counts.

Maybe you set a boundary this year, even if it felt awful and you second-guessed yourself for three weeks after. Maybe you recognized a trauma response while it was happening instead of three days later during your 2am shame spiral. Maybe you let yourself feel something you've been pushing down for years.

That's huge.

And if you're sitting there thinking "but I didn't do any of that either," listen: maybe this year you just survived. And surviving a year when you're carrying what you're carrying? That's the work too.

I'm Right Here With You

2025 was a year where things settled for me after five years of chaos. My kids got older. My higher-needs son found his groove. I finally stopped bracing for disaster every time something good happened in my business.

I even exhaled a little. Not because everything magically fixed itself, but because I stopped waiting for permission to take up space.

And you know what I realized? I have no hobbies. Like, none.

A friend asked me what I liked to do before I had kids and I sat there completely blank. Because I've always just worked.

That hit hard. Who am I when I'm not producing something? When I'm not fixing something? When I'm not proving I deserve to exist?

So in 2026, I'm aiming for slower. For actually resting. For maybe even having a hobby without turning it into a side hustle or optimization project.

I'm right here with you, still figuring out what it looks like to stop performing productivity.

What Actually Helps (Spoiler: Not Punishment)

I'm not anti-goals. I'm not anti-intention setting.

I'm anti-punishing yourself into change. Anti-shaming yourself into productivity. Anti-hustling your way through someone else's version of success while ignoring what your actual body and brain need.

You know what does help?

Tiny, consistent choices your nervous system can actually handle. Noticing when you're starting to disappear. Asking for help before you're drowning. Resting without the three-act guilt play. Saying no without writing a dissertation about why.

That's it. That's the work.

My Very Unsexy Invitation for 2026

Here's what I want for you in the new year, and it's way less Instagram-worthy than what you'll see everywhere else:

Just keep going.

Not in that toxic "push through" grind culture way. In that "I see you, I'm still here, we're doing this one breath at a time" way.

If January 1st feels like a good day to try something new, do it. But if it doesn't, if you need to coast for a while longer, that's okay too.

Your healing doesn't have to perform for anyone. You don't owe anyone a transformation. You don't owe anyone visible progress.

You just owe yourself compassion. And most days, that's the hardest thing you'll ever do.

Whatever You're Feeling Right Now Is Allowed

Hope. Dread. Nothing. Everything. All of it at once.

You're allowed to be exactly where you are.

Tomorrow is just another day. Not a magic reset. Not a fresh start that erases everything. Just another day where you get to keep choosing yourself, keep learning about yourself, keep showing up for yourself.

No pressure. No perfection. Just you, doing the best you can with what you've got.

And honestly? That's enough.

We've got big conversations coming in 2026 on the podcast. Narcissism in families. Religious trauma. Emotional neglect. Dissociation. Betrayal trauma. The stuff nobody wants to talk about but everyone needs to understand.

I'm glad you're here. Stick with me.

Happy New Year.

Need More Support?

If you're struggling with complex trauma, family dynamics, or the aftermath of difficult holidays, therapy can help. At Reclaim Therapy, we specialize in helping people understand their trauma responses and navigate challenging relationships. Head here to learn more about trauma therapy in Pennsylvania.

Free Dysregulation SOS Toolkit: Nervous system regulation techniques you can use in real time. Download here

Have a question for the podcast? Record it here

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