The December Crash: When You’re Just Too Tired to Keep Going

By this point in December, something strange often happens.

The build-up is over. The momentum has gone. The adrenaline that carried you through plans, preparation, expectations and emotional labour has quietly drained away. What’s left is not relief. It’s exhaustion. Flatness. A kind of emotional fog.

You might find yourself thinking:

I just can’t be bothered anymore.
I don’t care as much as I thought I would.
I’m feeling a bit numb.
I should be grateful, but I’m just tired.

If that’s you, I want to say this gently and clearly.

There is nothing wrong with you.

This isn’t laziness.
It isn’t failure.
It isn’t you giving up.

It’s what happens when a nervous system has been holding too much, for too long.

When the snow globe finally drops

December asks a lot of people. Especially the ones who cope, organise, think ahead, notice how everyone else is doing, and quietly hold things together.

By the time we reach the final stretch, the snow globe has already been shaken repeatedly. Expectations. Emotions. Memories. Social demands. The pressure to feel something specific.

At some point, the body simply says enough.

And instead of anxiety or overwhelm, what shows up is collapse.

That heavy, drained feeling.
The loss of motivation.
The quiet sense that you can’t do any more of this.

This, my friends, is the December crash.

Burnout doesn’t always look dramatic

Burnout isn’t constantly crying on the kitchen floor or cancelling everything. Often, it looks much quieter than that.

It looks like scrolling without really seeing anything.
Struggling to care about things you normally care about.
Feeling detached or disengaged.
Wanting everyone to stop needing things from you.
Finding even small decisions oddly difficult.

From the outside, you might look fine.
Inside, you are running on fumes.

That doesn’t mean you’ve failed Christmas.
It means your system is tired.

If you are already carrying a lot

The December crash often hits harder if you are already managing chronic illness, fatigue, grief, ongoing stress, caring roles, or invisible emotional labour.

Christmas doesn’t pause those realities. It stacks itself on top of them.

So if your energy disappeared earlier than you expected, that isn’t a weakness.
It’s realism.

You don’t need a reset. You need permission.

This is not the moment for fresh starts, mindset shifts, pushing through, or making the most of it.

What helps now is something much simpler.

Permission to rest without earning it.
Permission to opt out quietly. You don’t have to play charades – again!
Permission to do the bare minimum.
Permission to let things be unfinished.
Permission to stop explaining yourself. You don’t need to fix how you feel before Christmas.
You’re allowed to arrive exactly as you are.

Three small kindnesses

Not strategies. Not solutions. Just steadiness.

1. Lower the bar further than you think is reasonable. Then lower it again.
2. Choose one place where you do not perform. One room, one relationship, one moment where you stop trying.
3. Remind yourself this feeling is temporary. Not in a cheer-up way, but in the sense that this is a nervous system state, not a verdict on your life.

The snow will settle.
Right now, it is okay to stop shaking the globe.

This is Part 5 of the Snow Globe Series.

The final piece will arrive on Christmas Eve. It will not offer advice or answers – just presence during this festive season.

If you are reading this and feeling seen, that is enough for today.

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